System for decentralized material flow control

摘要

A component of a material flow system for transporting goods has a mechatronics arrangement with transport elements, sensors and actuators for transporting the goods, a control device for controlling the mechatronics arrangement, interfaces to adjacent components and the surroundings, and an internal simulator for determining the future state of the component. The internal simulator co-operates with internal simulators of other components of the material flow system, for determining a prognosis of the future state of the installation of the material flow system. The decentralized internal simulators can be synchronously or asynchronously activated.

主权项

1. A material flow system for transporting goods, comprising a plurality of components for carrying out a transportation task, wherein each of the plurality of components comprises:
a) a mechanical element configured to transport the goods; b) a sensory system configured to detect states of at least one of the mechanical element, of the transported goods and of the surroundings; c) an actuator system configured to mechanically influence at least one of the mechanical element and the transported goods; d) a control system configured to control the mechanical element and the actuator system, based on the data supplied by the sensory system, to current installation state data of the material flow system and to control parameters of the control system; e) communication interfaces with adjacent components of the plurality of components and with the surroundings, and f) an internal simulator configured to calculate a future state of that component, wherein the internal simulators of the plurality of components are decentralized, wherein the internal simulator of each component is configured to:
access data from the respective internal simulators of one or more adjacent components via the communication interfaces, andcalculate a future state of that component based at least on (a) a current state of that component and (b) the accessed data from the respective internal simulators of the one or more adjacent components, and wherein a prediction of a future state of the installation of the material flow system is determined from the respective future states of the plurality of components calculated by the plurality of internal simulators.