An Experimental Framework for 5G Wireless System Integration into Industry 4.0 Applications

Abstract

The fourth industrial revolution, or Industry 4.0 (I4.0), makes use of wireless technologies together with other industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT) technologies, cyber–physical systems (CPS), and edge computing to enable the optimization and the faster re-configuration of industrial production processes. As I4.0 deployments are ramping up, the practical integration of 5G wireless systems with existing industrial applications is being explored in both Industry and Academia, in order to find optimized strategies and to develop guidelines oriented towards ensuring the success of the industrial wireless digitalization process. This paper explores the challenges arisen from such integration between industrial systems and 5G wireless, and presents a framework applicable to achieve a structured and successful integration. The paper aims at describing the different aspects of the framework such as the application operational flow and its associated tools, developed based on analytical and experimental applied research methodologies. The applicability of the framework is illustrated by addressing the integration of 5G technology into a specific industrial use case: the control of autonomous mobile robots. The results indicate that 5G technology can be used for reliable fleet management control of autonomous mobile robots in industrial scenarios, and that 5G can support the migration of the on-board path planning intelligence to the edge-cloud.

Progressive schema of 5G for Industry 4.0: features, enablers, and services

“…Further advances in 5G developments will make it possible to seamlessly link embedded sensors to any object and quickly accelerate IoT adoption by many sectors. 5G will play an enormous role in enabling smart towns and intelligent homes, enhancing monitoring of assets and logistics, reinventing procedures for industrial production and maintenance and altering other IoT-ready businesses (Humayun et al, 2020;Siriwardhana et al, 2020;Rodriguez et al, 2021aRodriguez et al, , 2021b. The research objectives of this paper are as under: RO1.…”

“…Collaboration between stakeholders in the production and the mobile industry "ecosystems" that have been in significant parallel was crucial to realising Industry 4.0 and 5 G (Khodashenas et al, 2016;Fuentes et al, 2020). The mobile industry traditionally focuses on providing conventional, voice, video and data to consumers, and the production industry relies on its solutions and retrofits to enhance its wireless connectivity within factories, facilities and warehouses from the wireless technologies (Silva and Guerreiro, 2020;Rodriguez et al, 2021aRodriguez et al, , 2021b.…”

A Novel QoS-Aware Multi-Connectivity Scheme for Wireless IIoT

“…In order to validate its design, the presented novel crosslayer QoS-aware multi-connectivity link selection scheme was implemented. Figure 3 details the functional block diagram of the implementation, which is based on the wireless multi-access gateway (MAGW) with layer-2 tunneling capabilities, previously presented in [16]. This device allows for transparent end-to-end integration of Ethernet-based systems.…”

Analysis of Network Performance over Deep Reinforcement Learning Control Loops for Industry 4.0

“…They demonstrated that information latency is more critical in 5G vertical applications than in conventional URLLC. Rodriguez et al [2021] presented an experimental framework which consist on the use and performance optimization of 5G-integrated autonomous mobile robots. They used prototyping tools consisting of a network traffic sniffer, a 5G emulator, and a wireless multi-access gateway.…”