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New paradigms such as the Industry 4.0, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), or industrial cyber-physical systems (ICPSs) have been impacting the manufacturing environment in recent years. Nevertheless, these challenging concepts are also being faced from the educational field: Engineering students must acquire knowledge and skills under the view of these frameworks. This paper describes the utilization of an Industry 4.0-oriented flexible manufacturing system (FMS) as an educational tool to develop final projects (FPs) of engineering degrees. A number of scopes are covered by an FMS, such as automation, supervision, instrumentation, communications, and robotics. The utilization of an FMS with educational purposes started in the academic year 2011-2012 and still remains active. Here, the most illustrative FPs are expounded, and successful academic outcomes are reported. In addition, a set of initial considerations based on the experience acquired by the FP tutors is provided.

Fuel Cells (FCs) constitute an enabling technology for the integration of renewable energies and for the deployment of the next generation of power grids, the so-called Smart Grids/Microgrids. These devices perform the process of converting hydrogen into electricity without emitting pollutant emissions. Characteristic curves, mainly polarization curves, are a paramount resource to study the performance of FCs and to determine accurate models that fit their behavior. This paper presents the characterization of a commercial Polymer Electrolyte Membrane (PEM) FC consisting of 24 cells in series with a nominal output of 500 W, used to supply electricity in a Smart Microgrid involving renewable energies and hydrogen. The process evolution takes place under different laboratory conditions, so voltage, current, and hydrogen flow are measured and plotted to build the polarization curves. The equipment and components involved in the operation of the FC are described, as well as their technical features. Namely, a metal-hydride bottle is used to store the hydrogen that feeds the FC, an electronic programmable load establishes different charge conditions, and a precision multimeter collects the measurements provided by a set of sensors physically coupled to the FC. The characterization conducted in this research is envisioned to be used to build a digital twin of the FC. The developed experimentation and achieved results are described. The obtained results show a proper match between the experimental data and the curves reported in the literature and in the FC datasheet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scarcity of fossil fuels and the increase in energy demand, which is growing year after year, have led to the rapid development of technologies and systems for harnessing renewable energy sources (RES). Among these, photovoltaic (PV) energy and its associated technologies stand out for their adaptability and versatility, highlighting among the rest for being one of the most efficient methods for harnessing energy from RES. Beyond the generation processes, the problems derived from the management and monitoring of these systems are outlined. This paper develops the design and implementation of a system based on Internet of Things (IoT) applications for a medium-scale power grid located within the university campus of Badajoz, Extremadura. This grid is partially powered by PV energy by means of a set of 56 panels, with a total power of 60 kW, installed on a solar tracker. The system presented develops the functions of acquisition, management, and monitoring of data from the solar tracker, the transformation center, and the consumption derived from the activities carried out at the School of Industrial Engineering, whose electricity supply comes from the two previous sources. The elements involved in the physical installation are described, as well as the sensors responsible for data acquisition. Regarding the software, the IoT programs used for the development of the system are presented, as well as their intercommunication and handling. Finally, the proposed system is shown under real operation conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interconnection between sensors, controllers and instruments through a communication network plays a vital role in the performance and effectiveness of a control system. Since its inception in the 90s, the Object Linking and Embedding for Process Control (OPC) protocol has provided open connectivity for monitoring and automation systems. It has been widely used in several environments such as industrial facilities, building and energy automation, engineering education and many others. This paper presents a novel OPC-based architecture to implement automation systems devoted to R&D and educational activities. The proposal is a novel conceptual framework, structured into four functional layers where the diverse components are categorized aiming to foster the systematic design and implementation of automation systems involving OPC communication. Due to the benefits of OPC, the proposed architecture provides features like open connectivity, reliability, scalability, and flexibility. Furthermore, four successful experimental applications of such an architecture, developed at the University of Extremadura (UEX), are reported. These cases are a proof of concept of the ability of this architecture to support interoperability for different domains. Namely, the automation of energy systems like a smart microgrid and photobioreactor facilities, the implementation of a network-accessible industrial laboratory and the development of an educational hardware-in-the-loop platform are described. All cases include a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) to automate and control the plant behavior, which exchanges operative data (measurements and signals) with a multiplicity of sensors, instruments and supervisory systems under the structure of the novel OPC architecture. Finally, the main conclusions and open research directions are highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are several specific solutions for accessing sensors and actuators present in any process or system through a TCP/IP network, either local or a wide area type like the Internet. The usage of sensors and actuators of different nature and diverse interfaces (SPI, I2C, analogue, etc.) makes access to them from a network in a homogeneous and secure way more complex. A framework, including both software and hardware resources, is necessary to simplify and unify networked access to these devices. In this paper, a set of open-source software tools, specifically designed to cover the different issues concerning the access to sensors and actuators, and two proposed low-cost hardware architectures to operate with the abovementioned software tools are presented. They allow integrated and easy access to local or remote sensors and actuators. The software tools, integrated in the free authoring tool Easy Java and Javascript Simulations (EJS) solve the interaction issues between the subsystem that integrates sensors and actuators into the network, called convergence subsystem in this paper, and the Human Machine Interface (HMI)--this one designed using the intuitive graphical system of EJS--located on the user's computer. The proposed hardware architectures and software tools are described and experimental implementations with the proposed tools are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper the design and implementation of a network for integrating Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC), the Object-Linking and Embedding for Process Control protocol (OPC) and the open-source Easy Java Simulations (EJS) package is presented. A LabVIEW interface and the Java-Internet-LabVIEW (JIL) server complete the scheme for data exchange. This configuration allows the user to remotely interact with the PLC. Such integration can be considered a novelty in scientific literature for remote control and sensor data acquisition of industrial plants. An experimental application devoted to remote laboratories is developed to demonstrate the feasibility and benefits of the proposed approach. The experiment to be conducted is the parameterization and supervision of a fuzzy controller of a DC servomotor. The graphical user interface has been developed with EJS and the fuzzy control is carried out by our own PLC. In fact, the distinctive features of the proposed novel network application are the integration of the OPC protocol to share information with the PLC and the application under control. The user can perform the tuning of the controller parameters online and observe in real time the effect on the servomotor behavior. The target group is engineering remote users, specifically in control- and automation-related tasks. The proposed architecture system is described and experimental results are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work a new, scalable and low cost multi-channel monitoring system for Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (PEFCs) has been designed, constructed and experimentally validated. This developed monitoring system performs non-intrusive voltage measurement of each individual cell of a PEFC stack and it is scalable, in the sense that it is capable to carry out measurements in stacks from 1 to 120 cells (from watts to kilowatts). The developed system comprises two main subsystems: hardware devoted to data acquisition (DAQ) and software devoted to real-time monitoring. The DAQ subsystem is based on the low-cost open-source platform Arduino and the real-time monitoring subsystem has been developed using the high-level graphical language NI LabVIEW. Such integration can be considered a novelty in scientific literature for PEFC monitoring systems. An original amplifying and multiplexing board has been designed to increase the Arduino input port availability. Data storage and real-time monitoring have been performed with an easy-to-use interface. Graphical and numerical visualization allows a continuous tracking of cell voltage. Scalability, flexibility, easy-to-use, versatility and low cost are the main features of the proposed approach. The system is described and experimental results are presented. These results demonstrate its suitability to monitor the voltage in a PEFC at cell level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The so-called Jar Test (JT) plays a vital role in the drinking water and wastewater treatments for establishing the dosage of flocculants and coagulant. This test is a well-proved laboratory instrumental procedure performed by trained personnel. In this work, a completely novel system for the automation and monitoring of a JT devoted to drinking water treatment is presented. It has been implemented using an industrial programmable controller and sensors and instruments specifically selected for this purpose. Once the parameters of the test have been entered, the stages that compose the JT (stirring, coagulant addition, etc.) are sequentially performed without human intervention. Moreover, all the involved measurements from sensors are collected and made accessible for continuous monitoring of the process. By means of the proposed system, the JT procedure is conducted fully automatically and can be locally and remotely monitored in real-time. Furthermore, the developed system constitutes a portable laboratory that offers advantageous features like scalability and transportability. The proposed system is described focusing on hardware and instrumentation aspects, and successful results are reported., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.