A Cyber Collaborative Protocol for Real-Time Communication and Control in Human-Robot-Sensor Work

Abstract

Real-time communication and control are essential parts of the Cyber Physical System (CPS) to optimize effective performance and reliability. To gain a sustainable competitive advantage with Automation 5.0, as needed in Work-of-the-Future, this article addresses the concept of real-time communication and control in the case of an agricultural work setting, along with a newly designed Cyber Collaborative Protocol, called CCP-RTC2. The developed protocol aims to minimize information delay and maximize JIN (Just In Need) information sharing, to enable collaborative decisions among system agents. Two experiments are conducted to compare the designed protocol’s performance in agricultural CPS against the current non-CPS practice. The results demonstrate that the CCP-RTC2 is superior compared with current practice in terms of information sharing in a normal operation scenario. When the system obtains an unplanned request, the CCP-RTC2 can integrate such a request to the original work plan while minimizing the system’s objective function (lower is better). Hence, the system has relatively smaller information delays, as well as better timely information shared with system agents that need it.