I-Corps: The Operating System for Cyber Manufacturing

这个i-Corps项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力来自于它所支持的日益复杂的云制造能力。这些能力包括改善用户访问制造资源的平台、企业可见性平台、供应网络管理系统以及云技术驱动的制造市场/交易所。该项目通过启用易于访问的制造商实验室和其他制造资源网络来促进本地创新。该项目还可能为经济发展机构提供一个工具，用于评估当地的制造能力和产能，并通过分析系统中交易的流入和流出来衡量制造活动。这个i-Corps项目创建了一个云平台，为制造资源提供安全的网络存在。该项目实施了一个基于制造资源的资源交易模型的内核，并围绕其提供服务以实现几个功能，包括：a)其能力、可用性、配置和状态的网络可见性；b)交易服务，包括用于发起和执行作业的队列管理、日历、调度和交易处理；c)用于验证用户和管理对资源的访问和特权的用户服务；d)用于收集和操作源自资源的数据流的物联网服务，并安全地分发到经过认证的终端；e)连接到经过管理的云软件应用商店，以增强其对各类用户的可见性和可用性。通过这些服务和使用成熟的车间连接协议，该平台简化了创建和管理相互作用的制造资源或内部/外部制造云的网络-物理制造网络的复杂任务。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project accrues from the cloud manufacturing capabilities of increasing sophistication that it enables. These capabilities range from platforms to improve user access to manufacturing resources to enterprise visibility platforms, supply network management systems, and cloud technology-driven manufacturing marketplaces/exchanges. This project fosters local innovation by enabling networks of easily accessible maker labs and other manufacturing resources. The project can also potentially provide economic development agencies a tool for assessing local manufacturing capability and capacity as well as measuring manufacturing activity through analysis of the in-flow and out-flow of transactions in the system.This I-Corps project creates a cloud platform to provide manufacturing resources with a secure network presence. The project implements a kernel based on a resource-transaction model for manufacturing resources, and surrounds it with services to enable several features, including: a) Network visibility of its capabilities, availability, configuration and state; b) Transaction services, including queue management, calendar, scheduler and transaction processing for initiating and executing jobs; c) User services for authenticating users and managing access and privileges on resources; d) IoT services for gathering and manipulating data streams originating at a resource, and secure distribution to authenticated end-points; e) Connectivity to a curated store of cloud software applications for enhancing its visibility and usability to broad classes of users. With these services and its use of well-established shop-floor connectivity protocols, this platform simplifies the complex tasks of creating and managing cyber-physical manufacturing networks of interacting manufacturing resources or internal/external manufacturing clouds.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.