Computer-Assisted Work Process Modeling in Chemical Engineering

转移项目旨在跨学科和机构边界对化学产品生命周期中的各种工作过程进行综合建模、分析和改进。阐述了一种方法，用于建立概念性的、粗粒度的工作过程模型，该模型源于工业中的经验实地研究，并随后为基于计算机的解释和处理而丰富和形式化。底层元模型被设计为通用和可扩展的，以便于针对不同的工作过程类型进行定制，包括不同类型的设计过程以及化工厂运行期间的工作过程。开发了一种新的工作过程建模工具，使工业工作过程中的任何利益相关者能够以适度的额外努力常规地创建和利用工作过程模型。该工具建立在语义信息处理的基础上，便于将模型导出到其他软件应用程序中，以执行工作流程。示例包括工作流引擎、工作流模拟系统和过程控制系统。学术界和产业界共同开发的建模方法，原型工具的实施，以及它与实际工业工作过程建模问题的验证，将清楚地揭示所建议的方法在工业环境中的可行性和潜在好处。

The transfer project aims at the integrative modeling, analysis, and improvement of a variety of work processes in the lifecycle of a chemical product across disciplinary and institutional boundaries. A methodology is elaborated for the creation of conceptual, coarse grained models of work processes originating from empirical field studies in industry and their subsequent enrichment and formalization for computer-based interpretation and processing. The underlying meta-model is designed to be generic and extensible to facilitate customization for different work process types, comprising different types of design processes as well as the work processes during chemical plant operation. A novel work process modeling tool is developed to enable any stakeholder in an industrial work process to routinely create and utilize work process models with moderate additional effort. The tool builds on semantic information processing and facilitates the export of the model into other software applications for the execution of work processes. Examples include workflow engines, workflow simulation systems, and process control systems. The joint academic-industrial development of the modeling methodology, the implementation of a prototypical tool, and its validation with real industrial work process modeling problems will clearly reveal the feasibility and the potential benefit of the suggested approach in an industrial setting.