Representation and estimation of multi-state system reliability by decision diagrams

Multi-State System (MSS) is one a mathematical model used in reliability analysis to describe a system having some working efficiency. A MSS and its components are allowed to have more than two levels of working efficiency These levels are interpreted as states of reliability of the system and its components. There are some methods for MSS representation. We propose new methods for MSS description by Decision Diagrams that well know in Algebra Logic. We use different types of Multiple-Valued Decision Diagrams for this representation. Multiple-Valued Decision Diagram is generalization of Binary Decision Diagram that is applied in reliability analysis of Binary-State System and permits to manipulate with system of large dimension. We propose algorithm for estimation of MSS reliability on basis of system representation by Decision Diagram.