"This book opens up the world of simulation to you by providing the basics of general simulation techonology, identifying the skills needed for successful simulation projects, and introducting a state-of-the-art simulation package." --

This book presents novel approaches to formulate, analyze, and solve problems in the area of distributed service networks, notably based on AI-related methods (parallel/cloud computing, declarative modeling, fuzzy methods). Distributed service networks are an important area of research and applications. The methods presented are meant to integrate both emerging and existing concepts and approaches for different types of production flows through synchronizations. An integration of logistics services (e.g., supply chains and projects portfolios), public and multimodal transport, traffic flow congestion management in ad hoc networks, design of high-performance cloud data centers, and milk-run distribution networks are shown as illustrations for the methods proposed. The book is of interest to researchers and practitioners in computer science, operations management, production control, and related fields.

This current book comprises state-of-the-art research results in the field of mechatronics and reliable systems engineering, gathering papers from almost all continents. Since the chapters represent contributions of research scholars who work in both governmental financed institutions and in the business environment, one could infer that they certainly reflect a clear picture of the developments in these cutting-edge sciences. Moreover, the contributions are not limited to mechatronics, as nowadays it has grown to embed all smart technical sciences. Medical applications based on nano-technologies – seemingly the most promising of all newly developed branches – could not be left out of this work. It is our belief that the book is useful to both students, who want to learn from the best scholars (as most of the authors hold a Ph.D. degree and are well-known professors), and to researchers in all areas of smart engineering, who will definitely find here hot topics meant to inspire them in their line of work.

At the crossroads of artificial intelligence, manufacturing engineering, operational research and industrial engineering and management, multi-agent based production planning and control is an intelligent and industrially crucial technology with increasing importance. This book provides a complete overview of multi-agent based methods for today’s competitive manufacturing environment, including the Job Shop Manufacturing and Re-entrant Manufacturing processes. In addition to the basic control and scheduling systems, the author also highlights advance research in numerical optimization methods and wireless sensor networks and their impact on intelligent production planning and control system operation. Enables students, researchers and engineers to understand the fundamentals and theories of multi-agent based production planning and control Written by an author with more than 20 years’ experience in studying and formulating a complete theoretical system in production planning technologies Fully illustrated throughout, the methods for production planning, scheduling and controlling are presented using experiments, numerical simulations and theoretical analysis Comprehensive and concise, Multi-Agent Based Production Planning and Control is aimed at the practicing engineer and graduate student in industrial engineering, operational research, and mechanical engineering. It is also a handy guide for advanced students in artificial intelligence and computer engineering.

One critical barrier leading to successful implementation of flexible manufacturing and related automated systems is the ever-increasing complexity of their modeling, analysis, simulation, and control. Research and development over the last three decades has provided new theory and graphical tools based on Petri nets and related concepts for the design of such systems. The purpose of this book is to introduce a set of Petri-net-based tools and methods to address a variety of problems associated with the design and implementation of flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs), with several implementation examples.There are three ways this book will directly benefit readers. First, the book will allow engineers and managers who are responsible for the design and implementation of modern manufacturing systems to evaluate Petri nets for applications in their work. Second, it will provide sufficient breadth and depth to allow development of Petri-net-based industrial applications. Third, it will allow the basic Petri net material to be taught to industrial practitioners, students, and academic researchers much more efficiently. This will foster further research and applications of Petri nets in aiding the successful implementation of advanced manufacturing systems.