Integrated optimisation of human-robot collaborative disassembly planning and adaptive evaluation driven by a digital twin

Abstract

With the continuous development of intelligent manufacturing and human-oriented manufacturing, human-robot collaborative disassembly is becoming a new trend in intelligent remanufacturing. The application of digital twin technology in human-robot collaborative disassembly (HRCD) can significantly increase work efficiency and improve human well-being. Herein, we propose a reference framework for digital twin-driven HRCD planning and adaptive evaluation, which integrates three modules: HRCD digital twin environment construction, HRCD sequence optimisation, and HRCD adaptive evaluation. Subsequently, based on the physiological and psychological fatigue of workers, we establish a planning model with disassembly time and disassembly complexity, and propose an improved heuristic algorithm to determine the task allocation scheme. To enable adaptive evaluation of HRCD strategies, a digital twin-driven kernel point convolution neural network model (DTKPN) and a digital twin-driven Bayesian neural network human posture estimation model (DT-BSHP) are implemented for robot recognition and human pose evaluation. The proposed model can leverage the skills of humans and robots, satisfy ergonomic requirements, improve disassembly efficiency, and reduce disassembly complexity. Finally, the method is applied to a simplified satellite disassembly case. It is shown that the proposed model significantly reduces the disassembly time and complexity and thus the effectiveness and sensitivity of the proposed model are verified.

KEYWORDS:

• Disassembly planning
• digital twin
• human-robot collaboration
• adaptive evaluation
• sustainability manufacturing

SDG 9:

• Industry
• innovation and infrastructure

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Gang Yuan: Conceptualisation, methodology, writing original draft, software, supervision. Feng Lv & Jin Shi: Conceptualisation, Software. Guangdong Tian & Yixiong Feng: Conceptualisation, Project administration, Supervision, Writing review & editing. Duc Truong Pham & Zhiwu Li: Critical review & editing.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Data will be made available on request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Jiangsu Excellent Postdoctoral Program [grant number 2023ZB634]; the National Postdoctoral Researcher Grant Program [grant number GZC20230429] and the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 51775238].

Notes on contributors

Gang Yuan

Gang Yuan received the Ph.D. degree in 2022, Jilin University, Changchun, China. He also spent a year as a visiting PhD student at the Industrial Engineering Department of the National University of Singapore. He is currently a ‘Zhishan’ postdoctor in Southeast University, Nanjing, China. His research interests include digital twin, disassembly optimisation and efficiency evaluation with applications. He has published over 20 journal and conference proceedings papers in the above research areas.

Feng Lv

Feng Lv received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, China, in 2018 and 2021, respectively. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree at Southeast University. His research interests include digital twin and production process optimisation.

Jin Shi

Jin Shi received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, China, in 2019 and 2022, respectively. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree at Southeast University. His research interests include digital twin and smart assembly planning.

Guangdong Tian

Guangdong Tian is currently a Professor of School of Mechanical Engineering, Beijing University of Civil Engineering and Architecture, China. His research focuses on remanufacturing and green manufacturing, green logistics and transportation, intelligent inspection and repair of automotive, decision making and intelligent optimisation. He has published over 100 journal and conference proceedings papers in the above research areas including IEEE Trans. Autom. Sci. Eng., IEEE Trans. Cybernetics and IEEE-ACM Trans.

Yixiong Feng

Yixiong Feng is currently a Professor with the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Zhejiang University, and also a Member of the State Key Laboratory of Fluid Power and Mechatronic Systems, Zhejiang University. He has authored or coauthored more than 100 journal and conference proceeding papers on the topics of his current research interests, which include mechanical product design theory, intelligent automation, and advance manufacture technology.

Zhiwu Li

Zhiwu Li is a professor of Xidian University. He was a Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto, Technion, Martin-Luther University, Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, Meliksah Universitesi, King Saud University, and the University of Cagliari. He is now with the Institute of Systems Engineering, Macau University of Science and Technology, Taipa, Macau. His current research interests include Petri net theory and application, supervisory control of discrete event systems, work flow modelling and analysis, system reconguration, game theory, and data and process mining.

Duc Truong Pham

Duc Truong Pham is currently a Professor of School of Mechanical Engineering, University of Birmingham. He is a Fellow of the royal academy of engineering, learned society of Wales, society of manufacturing engineers, institution of engineering and technology, and institution of mechanical engineers. He is the recipient of several prizes including the Sir Joseph Whitworth prize awarded by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in 1996 and 2000 and the Institution's Thomas Stephens Group Prize in 2001 and 2003 and Donald Julius Groen Prize in 2004, and the 5th ICMR Best Paper Prize in 2007. His research focuses on remanufacturing and green manufacturing, intelligent inspection and repair of automotive, decision making and intelligent optimisation.