Networking physical and virtual entities in CPPS - Augmented reality as a human-machine interface

In the future, conventional manufacturing strategies will increasingly be replaced by complex cyber-physical product ion systems (CPPS). Fully connected value-adding networks will emerge with a high information density, confronting employees with significantly increased amount of data. Therefore, the human-machine interface (HMI) represents an important aspect of the production process, for which new technologies such as augmented reality are highly promising. Such applications require a continuous communication from field level device to the appliance. This article describes how existing communications standards can be deployed and depicts an exemplary implementation. Furthermore, it proposes a communication architecture which enables interoperable communication between physical and virtual entities based on the Asset-Administration Shell (AAS).