Planning Grant: Engineering Research Center for Integrative Manufacturing and Remanufacturing Technologies (iMart) to Spur Rural Development

工程研究中心规划奖助金竞赛是作为ERC计划的试点征集活动进行的。计划拨款并不是整个ERC竞赛的一部分，而是为了在团队之间建立能力，以计划集中的、中心规模的工程研究。这个项目设想了从从摇篮到坟墓的制造范式到从坟墓到摇篮的再制造范式的转变。从坟墓到摇篮的再制造将使处于各种可能损坏条件下的部件能够转变为可以重新引入商业流程的认证产品。再制造通常可以节省成本，其特点是数量较少，材料和部件种类繁多，初始条件(损坏)也不同。农村地区有巨大的潜力来应对相关的挑战，因为劳动力和土地成本较低，而且现有的制造能力和供应商种类繁多。这项规划拨款建议是为了促进和促进一体化制造和再制造技术(IMart ERC)的规划，以促进农村发展和形成趋同的研究合作。IMart ERC的愿景是通过在美国农村地区实现综合再制造和制造能力来建立强大的供应链网络。IMart的革命性使命是1)探索一体化再制造供应链的新科学；2)使再制造自动化朝着认证方向发展；3)通过将数据科学、加法制造和再制造自动化无缝地整合到iMart再制造中，改造iMart供应链系统；4)让利益相关者参与到eRC专门开发的丰富环境中；5)在农村地区整合具有竞争力的再制造供应链，并在促进乡村振兴的同时，在可持续的工作环境中培训和再培训工人；6)评估和解决与再制造中的安全、保障、人为因素、认证、环境、社会接受度、生命周期质量和能源节约相关的问题。缺乏自动化不仅会导致更高的再制造成本，还会导致再制造质量的不一致，从而大大减少用户？鼓励使用修复后的部件。拟议中的iMart ERC的新颖性将开发使能技术，并将全自动化能力带入再制造行业。这种能力将导致再制造一致性的显著改善，从而产生对再制造的普遍接受。IMart ERC将通过跨学科的研究专业知识、行业合作伙伴和创新促进者，通过推进拟议的基础知识和创新使能技术来克服障碍。计划拨款将吸引所有利益相关者为实施iMart ERC制定一个无缝计划，目标是创造具有变革性的产品再制造技术，既具有成本效益，又显著提高再制造的质量、可靠性、可用性和认证。集成化再制造过程涉及到产品和过程表示所需的大量数据。研究使用数据科学来解决与再制造中的安全、安保、认证、环境、社会接受和生命周期相关的挑战，将提供深入的融合知识。因此，iMart ERC还结合了当前融合的主题，利用数据革命和人类-技术前沿的未来工作。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 Planning Grants for Engineering Research Centers competition was run as a pilot solicitation within the ERC program. Planning grants are not required as part of the full ERC competition, but intended to build capacity among teams to plan for convergent, center-scale engineering research.This project envisions a shift of cradle-to-grave manufacturing paradigm to grave-to-cradle remanufacturing paradigm. Grave-to-cradle remanufacturing will enable the transformation of a part in various possible damage conditions to a certified product that can be reintroduced into the stream of commerce. Remanufacturing, which often leads to cost savings, is characterized by lower quantity, a large variety of materials and parts, and diversity of initial conditions (damage). Rural areas have great potential to address associated challenges due to lower costs of labor and land and the wide variety of available manufacturing capabilities and suppliers. This planning grant proposal is to foster and facilitate the planning of an ERC for Integrative Manufacturing and Remanufacturing Technologies (iMart ERC) to spur rural development and form convergent research collaborations. The vision of iMart ERC is to establish strong supply-chain networks by achieving integrative remanufacturing and manufacturing capabilities in rural areas in the US. The transformative mission of iMart is to 1) explore a new science of integrative remanufacturing supply chains; 2) enable remanufacturing automation toward certification; 3) transform the iMart supply chain system by seamlessly integrating data science, additive manufacturing, and remanufacturing automation into iMart remanufacturing; 4) engage stakeholders in the rich environment deliberately developed within the ERC; 5) integrate a competitive remanufacturing supply chain among rural areas, and train and retrain workers within a sustainable working environment while promoting rural area revitalization; and 6) assess and address issues related to safety, security, human factors, certification, environmental, societal acceptance, life cycle mass, and energy savings in remanufacturing. Lack of automation not only results in higher remanufacturing cost, but also introduces inconsistencies in remanufacturing quality, which dramatically reduces users? incentive to use restored parts. The novelty of the proposed iMart ERC will develop the enabling technologies and bring fully automated capability into the remanufacturing industry. Such a capability will lead to a dramatic improvement in remanufacturing consistency, thus yielding general acceptance of remanufacturing. The iMart ERC will overcome barriers through the trans-disciplinary research expertise, industrial partners, and innovation facilitators by advancing the proposed fundamental knowledge and innovative enabling technologies. The planning grant will bring in all stakeholders to devise a seamless plan for implementing the iMart ERC, with the goal of creating transformative product remanufacturing technologies that are cost-effective, yet significantly improve the quality, reliability, availability, and certification of remanufacturing. The integrative remanufacturing processes involve a large amount of data needed for the representation of products and processes. Investigating the use of data science to address challenges associated with safety, security, certification, environment, societal acceptance, and life cycle in remanufacturing will provide indepth convergence knowledge. Thus the iMart ERC also combines current convergent themes in Harnessing the Data Revolution and Future of Work at the Human-Technology Frontier.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.