Technische Universität München

Technische Universität München (TUM) is one of Europe’s top universities. It is committed to excellence in research and teaching and interdisciplinary education. The university also forges strong links with companies and scientific institutions across the world. TUM was one of the first universities in Germany to be named a University of Excellence. Moreover, TUM regularly ranks among the best European universities in international rankings. Currently, the TUM’s fabric is made up of 501 professors, 9869 staff members and 38000 students.

The Institute of Automation and Information Systems (AIS) focuses on the modelling of distributed embedded systems in automation and control regarding dependability and usability and also on Human Machine Interaction in process engineering and operation.

The AIS’s goal is the improvement of the whole life cycle for engineering of products and production lines in hybrid processes, because the AIS is aware of the different development intervals as well as operation intervals in mechanical engineering, automation and software engineering.

High system availability is one of the most important goals of any plant operator. To achieve increased plant availability, each sensor and actuator has to assess the current status of the product as well as the entire production system before or in case of a failure. Thus, error compensation measures can be initiated in order to maintain the system’s operability. At the same time, the required product quality is ensured during all production situations. This concept goes beyond current diagnostic systems and asset management systems (AMS) and requires novel and innovative methods, based on current and future trends in technology. Especially the heterogeneity and complexity of data that needs to be processed (Big Data) is one of the central challenges.

The AIS researches new and innovative methods for knowledge-based asset management systems, data-driven diagnostic methods in the context of Industry 4.0 and Cyber-Physical Production Systems (CPPS) in the complete plant lifecycle, taking into account human factors when using human-machine interfaces.

Prof. Vogel-Heuser is in charge of the smart factory scenario of the cyber physical systems road-map in close cooperation with market-leading companies. The outcome of the AIS's work is accepted by the industry and implemented into products and tools. The AIS is member of the Cluster Mechatronik & Automation in Bavaria and holds yearly industry workshops. AIS is embedded in following important running research clusters: SPP1593, and SFB 768 (Cycle-oriented modeling of innovation processes), of which Prof. Vogel-Heuser is the speaker. Furthermore, the AIS’ dedication to intelligent automation is highlighted by its contributions to the VDI/VDE-GMA Technical Committee 5.15 „Multi-agent systems“ and its commitment to the Industry 4.0 Demonstrator “myJoghurt”. Besides several other bilateral projects, the chair ran a certification laboratory for fieldbus systems until 2013, i.e. Profinet and Profibus, which allows to keep and develop detailed knowledge about recent bus protocols and specification. Currently, the group consists of 1 professor and 28 staff members.

The Munich Center for Technology in Society (MCTS) is one of three Integrative Research Centers at TUM. It was established in 2012 as part of TUM’s institutional strategy in the second phase of the Excellence Initiative to coordinate, conduct and facilitate research in the emerging field of TechnoScienceStudies. Research at MCTS is interdisciplinary by definition: its main focus is interdisciplinary reflection of the conditions and effects of Technoscience – Science and Engineering in Technologized Societies: New forms of technoscientific knowledge production, governance at and of universities and the interconnection of policies and strategies, opportunities for industrial application and expectations and objections from civil society.

The MCTS is a place to connect research in Science and Engineering with equally excellent research in the Social Sciences and Humanities. Sociologists and ethics experts, philosophers and historians, political scientists, economists and media scholars team up with engineers and natural scientists for all of TUM’s major research undertakings. MCTS and AIS already are working together in SPP 768. MCTS also engages with the general public and policy-makers. It enables research oriented debates about specific fields (like Energy, Robotics or Mobility) as well as about systematic issues of these fields (like Risk, Nonknowledge or Digitalization). As MCTS director Prof. Maasen is also a member of acatech (National Academy of Science and Engineering) and the „Zukunftsrat der Bayerischen Wirtschaft“. Dr. Jan-H. Passoth is Head of the Digital/Media/Lab at MCTS which focuses on how science and technology shape the current transformation towards digital society and culture, paying particular attention to the changing role of data, algorithms and software in different fields of modern society for example in the case of smart energy systems, health technologies and personal and public media.

TUM will be work package leader for WP6 “HMI and sociotechnical arrangement”. Therein, the focus lies on strengthening the ties of operators and machines through visualization techniques combined with novel control mechanisms and an integrated learning center. Within this project, results from prior projects have to be extended in order to allow application of the concepts and to achieve a TRL 6-7 Demonstrator. Moreover, TUM will contribute to WP1 “Requirements Analysis and Overall Architecture”, WP2 “Synchronized Data Acquisition and Management”, WP4 “Simulation and Optimization”, WP5 “Condition Monitoring and Diagnosis”, and WP7 “Demonstrator/Prototype”. Within these fields, TUM profits from great experience from a number of successful projects such as FAVA, SPP1593, FoF-08-2015: ICT-enabled modelling, simulation, analytics and forecasting technologies 51 Artemis, ZuMaTra, CogniOnt, KreAgentUse and IMIP as well as from further industry cooperations.

Team

  • Photo of Birgit Vogel-Heuser
    Prof. Dr.-Ing. Birgit Vogel-Heuser
  • Photo of Sabine Maasen
    Prof. Dr. Sabine Maasen
  • Photo of Jan-H. Passoth
    Dr. Jan-H. Passoth