Predictive maintenance is an approach based on technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and robust system architectures. It is widely used in industry and is increasingly adopted in the automotive sector, where its application is often limited to newer vehicles and trucks, excluding most older models. To fill this gap, we propose a solution for cars manufactured from 2010 onward with On-Board Diagnostics II (OBD-II). Our system has a low-cost onboard device, the Legacy Internet of Vehicles (IoV), which enables these vehicles to connect to the cloud server. The system’s initial goal is to send telemetry data to the cloud for analysis, identify anomalies, and predict potential future failures. The system alerts users through internet-connected devices when problems are detected, ensuring that notifications are sent directly to the user. By directing processing to the cloud, the system minimizes the complexity required onboard the vehicle, making it an accessible and scalable approach for a wider audience. To validate our solution, we conducted one of the application scenarios for this system. In this first stage, we performed tests with the system, identifying engine temperature alert problems that would immediately notify the user on the registered device, which in this case was the smartphone.

Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) rely on continuous communication between interconnected devices to increase the efficiency, safety, and sustainability of transportation networks. Among the key components of ITS are vehicles, which represent the largest and most dynamic data sources. However, current ITS infrastructures benefit modern vehicles equipped with native connectivity capabilities, leaving a massive portion of the existing fleet, especially in developing regions, excluded. To address this gap, we propose a low-cost onboard solution called the legacy Internet of Vehicle (IoV), designed for vehicles manufactured since 2010, which complies with the On-Board Diagnostic II (OBD-II) standard. The device allows older vehicles to interact with ITS ecosystems by collecting telemetry data offline and transmitting it to a cloud server when connectivity is available. Initial validation was conducted through an application scenario in which telemetry data were successfully collected from a stationary but running vehicle, demonstrating the feasibility and potential of integrating older vehicles into modern ITS frameworks.

The use of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies has become more readily available with the advent of cyber-physical systems. This context motivates concerns about cybersecurity and the occurrence of malicious attacks in IoT networks. This paper investigates the problem of the automatic detection of cyberattacks in MQTT-based IoT networks by deploying artificial intelligence algorithms for processing traffic data and indicating whether an attack is occurring or not. Thus, this paper trains different artificial intelligence binary classifiers based on machine learning and compares their performance for malicious attack detection in cyber-physical systems with MQTT-based IoT networks. For training and testing the classifiers, we employ the MQTTset dataset which contains many labelled samples with both legitimate traffic and observations under attack occurrence. By analyzing data features and preprocessing, the algorithms achieved good performance in classifying network traffic, contributing to the security of cyber-physical systems.

This Innovative Practice research paper describes an intelligent digital twin platform designed to enhance the virtualization of practical activities in the field of mechatronics education. In recent years, the classic concept of digital twins has significantly evolved in academia and industry. In education, especially in engineering, digital twins have brought countless alternatives for building environments close to the reality of students' practical activities. To improve these activities in the mechatronics area, intelligent digital twins will add added resources and technologies that assist the virtualization process. Therefore, a platform was developed to access remote laboratories in the mechatronics area and help correct the experiments offered. This platform will enable teachers to insert practical activities into remote laboratories on the platform. This platform has three central areas: teaching plans, teachers, and students. In teaching plants, it is possible to create a register of plants that provides information on the characteristics necessary to connect with their equipment and the number of plant elements. In the teachers' area, it is essential to create an activity for students to conduct, and this activity must be conducted for the system to capture the data and images to form a correction model. The correction model uses these data to help intelligent digital twins digitize practical activities. In the student area, it is possible to check all available experiments and their virtualizations and automatically correct the practical experiment.

This innovative practice WIP is about using serious games in robotics education. In the realm of STEM education, the professional development of students is intrinsically linked to practical experiences, such as hands-on exercises, experiments, and laboratory classes. However, the financial implications of acquiring and maintaining mechatronic devices such as robots, automation-related equipment, and instruments for these activities are high. These excessive costs, which cover initial funding and ongoing maintenance, pose challenges for educational institutions in establishing and maintaining well-equipped laboratories. In addition, access to these resources depends on their availability, creating restrictions on student learning opportunities. The state of Amazonas, Brazil, needs to solve these problems; as a city of numerous factories, there is a growing demand for well-trained professionals and a dwindling number of resources to apply to education. To address these challenges, we propose an approach that integrates simulation tools for application in educational games. These tools used to conduct simulations are essential for developing shop floor scenarios without physical equipment, effectively reducing the costs associated with mechanical collisions and problems related to student programming errors. The importance of using simulation tools in the learning process lies in their ability to offer a risk-free environment where students can experiment, learn, and perfect their skills without incurring additional expenses for corrective maintenance. Innovatively, the incorporation of gamification-based learning by simulating real problems based on the shop floor is gaining momentum. We believe this is the most attractive way for trainees or students to deliver fast, high-quality professionalism. This approach represents an appealing alternative for educators looking to enhance their educational experience. From this perspective, this paper presents the application of a serious game in the industrial laboratory at UFAM. The aim is to offer students a dynamic and engaging platform for learning about collaborative robots, taking advantage of the principles of the learning factory, and promoting good practices in an economical and risk-controlled virtual environment.

This research-to-practice full paper focuses on the use of technology in education, which enables a wide variety of activities. For example, a computer with internet access allows students to read articles, make video calls, perform group work, and even take tests. In 2021, this tool was relevant to face-to-face teaching because the interruption caused by COVID-19 resulted in social distancing. In this way, remote teaching was adopted as an emergency measure in the teaching process. Although remote teaching uses technological innovation, it lacks the inclusion of educational theories and remote practices in virtual classes. Thus, this approach analyzes Lev Vygotsky's theories of learning, specifically the zone of proximal development and scaffolding, to understand the satisfaction of learning the content alone or with other people's help through the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) technology. It then investigated IIoT, intending to build a remote virtual environment. In this context, it was possible to develop a remote teaching method called Hobots. This remote teaching method comprises six collaborative modules (the integrating platform, interfaced, MQTT broker, communication module, server, and Robot-X) for the remote teaching of industrial robotics. In addition, the method was evaluated by ten students using the ISO 9241 - Part 10 - Dialog Systems standard, with a view to their satisfaction with using the method in the remote teaching process, and the results were admissible. Therefore, in addition to theory and simulation, the proposed method stands out for the possibility of remote implementation.

This research-to-practice full paper presents a platform developed to support AI teaching, training, and evaluation. Artificial intelligence (AI) has revolutionized several fields, including pattern recognition, natural language processing, and computer vision. In this context, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have been effectively utilized to detect objects in images. In industry, AI has the potential to optimize processes and increase efficiency, becoming an essential factor in the evolution of manufacturing systems. However, the training of AI models is complex and requires a sophisticated level of knowledge for data manipulation and an understanding of model training. To simplify this process, a web-based platform has been proposed to facilitate the training of YOLO networks. The platform was developed via the Streamlit library, which provides an interface to guide users through model training. The platform aims to lead users through six steps to obtain and deploy a model directly through the platform, enabling performance evaluation and metric tracking.

This work aims at developing a fault detection system for photovoltaic systems (PVSs) based on the Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) clustering technique. A simulator is developed based on a mathematical model of the PVS by considering three groups of faults: shading, short circuit, and junction box to investigate the fault effects in photovoltaic systems. Several tests are carried out and indicate that the FCM is able to detect these faults and separate the data of a faulty PVS from that of a healthy one based on uncertain data obtained from different weather conditions.

Concepts such as the Internet of Things, big data, cloud computing, and cyber-physical systems support new scenarios for further research and application on the Industry 4.0 initiative. One of the most promising ones is the digital twin applied to the shop floor. In this work-in-progress paper, we briefly review fundamental concepts and definitions and present a lasting solution to problems related to the reliability of industrial equipment. More precisely, our approach is based on an industrial twin model that, after proving its reliability, shall be used in more sophisticated applications. Finally, we present a case study of a storage process plant that uses the proposed architecture to perform a reliability study. The results of this work in progress may contribute to understanding the needs and gaps that may be filled before reaching a consolidated product, and we would like to discuss them with the community.

The COVID-19 pandemic has imposed numerous restrictions on face-to-face meetings, and one of the most impacted activities was engineering education. Most teaching professionals have adopted diverse solutions based on distance learning techniques. However, practical experiments that require laboratories could not be performed in most cases. One of the subjects studied in modern engineering that has been impacted is related to industrial automation systems. In April 2020, amidst tighter restrictions on social contact, we started cooperating with a local company to train our students on topics of interest to the corporation. Our research group was responsible for dealing with Industry 4.0 and its associated technologies. Over the past two years, we have conducted this interaction with the industry under the pandemic's constraints and obtained very interesting results. In this report, on an innovative experience in engineering education, we will describe our project’s syllabus, how the relationship was between students and teachers through online tools, and mainly how we managed to ensure that students had access to experiments close to the industrial reality.

Remote Access Labs (RAL) are hardware and software tools that allow students to remotely operate actual equipment in physical labs at schools or universities. This work presents the development of a system for students to use remote access laboratories in the mechatronics area without human supervision. This system verifies the activities the registered labs can offer through algorithms that use digital twin technology to learn the actual or virtual industrial plants’ operations. Registered laboratories are available for the practice of experiments where students can automatically follow the correction of activities through virtualization generated so that the student can understand their actions. With this system, students can monitor their learning in real time and receive evidence of successes and errors through gamification of their performance.

Much has been discussed recently about the implications and strategies adopted by higher education institutions concerning the realization of online practical classes due to COVID-19. Some teaching institutions used virtual meetings to reorganize the lesson plan to continue teaching and assessing the students due to the suspension of face-to-face classes due to this epidemic. Although the most adopted strategy among the courses has been direct communication between students and professors through e-mail, telephone, social networks, and message apps, education lives in a time when transitions seem to occur much faster than in recent decades. For example, online engineering courses, specifically robotics, face difficulty implementing practical activities online because the educational tools available remotely are scarce or very expensive, thus becoming an obstacle to circumvent. Given this, this article presents a methodological strategy for the teaching-learning practices of engineering through Learning-IoT. This is a methodology for teaching robotics using the Internet of Industrial Things (IIoT) concepts. It enables the connection of the student to a Physical Objects Framework proposed in practical online activities and by the project method responsible for stimulating critical thinking. Thus, the initial ergonomic interface test experiments and usability of the proposed methodology demonstrated in the experiments in online practical classes that memorization and decision-making fit new possibilities or functionalities.

This Research to Practice Work in Progress presents a solution for managing distance learning laboratories. Remote Access Laboratories are software and hardware tools that allow students to remotely operate real equipment located in physical facilities such as universities laboratories. This work presents the development of an Automatic Selection System for Remote Access of Mechatronic Laboratories. The system checks the current laboratory activities in real time, verifying if it is active, inactive, occupied or free, according to a student’s experiment. After analyzing those characteristics, the system examines the number of students and the state of the internet connection to determine the most appropriate laboratory. Finally, experiments using the selection functions and the proposed architecture are presented to investigate the system’s efficiency.

This Innovative Practice Work in Progress presents the proposal and the development of a simulator for an Evolvable Production System that aims to represent a complete mechatronic system, simulate its operation, and support the learning of associated subjects. A mechatronic system is composed of mechanical and electronic modules that in turn may be associated with a software layer that is responsible for the intelligence of the entire system. This intelligence comes through interactions among software agents belonging to the software layer. The mechatronic devices are described through Finite State Machines, whose transitions are triggered by mechatronic software agents. The output of the simulator is a list with the set of skill calls, the time in which such calls are made, the respective system's answer, and the set of communication messages exchanged among the agents' peers. By using this simulator in engineering classrooms, it is possible to construct several proposals of mechatronic systems, represent those systems as complete manufacturing processes, and use intelligent software agents to simulate the complete functionality of the designed system. Afterward, with the results obtained from the simulation, students are prepared to implement real systems. The proposed simulator has been used in engineering courses at the Federal University of Amazonas, and the goal of this paper is describing the characteristics of the simulator and the results of its use in engineering disciplines.

This Research to Practice Full Paper presents a didactic framework for teaching C programming language. The difficulty of understanding abstraction presented by engineering students in computational problems solving is one of the main reasons for numerous pitfalls in the early college semesters. When teaching abstract contents, such as computer programming, it is relevant to include as many practical exercises and laboratories experiments as possible, to facilitate a better understanding. These practical approaches allow the students to achieve, by simulations or by real experiences, good notions of the basic concepts of the subject being studied. To motivate engineering students to be acquainted with formal definitions and high-level abstractions, a Didactic Framework focused on the teaching of the C programming language for embedded systems was developed and tested. Moreover, the students were supposed to develop a software project in teams that work together to solve basic tasks, and that compete at the end of the semester by solving a common programming challenge. This work is divided into two main parts: one focusing on the creation of practical strategies that make easier understanding complex definitions; and another concerning to the motivational strategies through cooperation and competition. The final goal was to increase the students understanding and satisfaction as well as reduce the dropout rates.

This paper presents an indoor navigation system built in a wearable device. The system allows visually impaired users to perform guided audio navigation safe, fast and has a low computational complexity. The methodological approach chosen divides the process into two phases: offline and online. In offline phase, the indoor mapping is done by data fusing of radio frequency and visual markers, constructing a unique and consistent representation. In the online phase navigation and recognition of each of the internal positions are performed through the fusion representation or only by the wi-fi or visual signals when one of the sensors is strongly affected by noises or other interferences. The results showed that the recognition levels of wi-fi, visual and fusion markers were 87.59%, 90.92%, and 92.03%, respectively. The error margin after the data fusion application was 0.8 m, with an average time of 0.62 ms.

One simulator reproduces the behavior of real systems in order to facilitate testing new approaches, study the systems under new environmental conditions, and evolve the available platform. In this paper one simulator of an Evolutionary Production System will be described. The simulator reproduces the characteristics of mechatronic agents as interaction, cooperation, and evolution helping the analysis of the time of execution, self-organization, and performance improvement of the real system. Inputs of the simulator are simple descriptions of the mechatronic agents, finite state machines, and production orders. Tests considering one real system were performed and proved the good functioning of the simulator. The analysis of the functioning and efficiency of the proposed system is presented along the paper.

New production paradigms have been proposed along the industrial evolution in the attempt to solve problems like product customization, industrial manufacture of low quantities, and high variety of products in the same production plant (or even production line). Diverse architectures and devices have been used in order to achieve an optimum solution. Notably, the Evolvable Production Systems (EPS) proven to be an interesting alternative to deal with issues of mass customization. These systems make use of mechatronic and software agents to construct manufacturing plants, where the former may be associated to the systems' muscles (actuators and other mechanical devices), while the later are the systems' intelligence (software). Although such systems are becoming popular among many research groups all over the world, the construction of simulation plants capable of implementing the main EPS properties are not that easy. This paper describes a purpose of a Didactic Evolvable Production System, based on an open architecture, constructed purpose at the Federal University of Amazonas in Manaus - Brazil.

There is a huge difference among the universities located in Brazil. It happens mainly because of the different development stage of the local industry, as well as, the amount of money invested in local colleges. Particularly this is true for courses demanding expensive laboratories and well-trained professors. In many Brazilian states, there are no graduate opportunities offers in engineering for the local community. The only possible choice for the ones who wish to attend to such an engineering master/doctorate program is to move to another city, and it means, sometimes, travelling more than 4.000km around Brazil. Manaus, capital from Amazonas state, is one of those distant cities with lack of advanced courses opportunities. In order to solve this problem, one local School of Engineering, the Institute of Education, Science and Technology of Amazonas (IFAM) proposed two different programs together with two of the best engineering schools of Brazil. The first one aimed one Master degree in mechanical and materials engineering and were developed by the Federal Technological University of Paraná (based on Curitiba city), and the second was a Doctorate program on electrical engineering together with the Federal University of Minas Gerais (based on Belo Horizonte). This paper goal is to present the developed work, to discuss this model of education, and finding ways to improve such programs.

New research reports shows that important progresses for controlling electric-powered wheelchair have been made recently aiming people with severe disabilities. In fact, a significant amount of people affected by those physical disabilities still cannot take advantage of autonomous mobility, even electronic or automated ones. For those people, the use of proper biological signals to control the assisted environment may be the only existing solution. In such scenario, the act of commanding an electric-powered wheelchair without proper training may be a serious safety risk. To avoid this kind of dangerous situation and to permit users to make use of such technology, one viable solution would be to be trained by using virtual driving simulators. Nevertheless, when using biomedical signals as commands it is not possible to ensure a continuous and reliable control of the wheelchair, it is necessary to associate the control possibilities with autonomous features such as semiautomatic obstacle detection or contour. Thus, it is interesting to offer to new wheelchair users the possibility of using simulators to allow them to learn to drive at distance, making use of telematics techniques combined with mobile and wearable devices, and publishing their progress and worries in social networks, which is the objective of this work. This project joints complementary skills from researchers from the Federal University of Amazonas, Federal University of Espirito Santo, and Federal University of Uberlandia, with the collaboration of researches from the University of Lorraine in Metz-France.

One of the biggest problems with chronical patients in treatment is medication adherence. Studies indicate that taking drugs out of time influence the patient's treatment decreasing the drugs effect. To minimize this problem, we developed a ubiquitous and intelligent system able to monitor the taking of medicines and to identify whether the patient is meeting the requirements prescribed by the doctor. An architecture provided with a decision system based on rules and trees to evaluate data collected from an intelligent medicine cabinet, sensors and electronic devices available in the patient's home was designed. The system classified the drugs taken pattern and released messages on social networks, SMS, and consumer electronic devices such as TV, smartphone and tablets, without human interference. Its goal is to help keeping the medication on time and helping to decide what to do in case of missing the right time. The algorithms J48, Rep and Random tree, were tested to classify the taking medicine patterns and to chose the right services available. The obtained results are very promising and reached an acceptable accuracy rate.

One of the most important problems of the engineering courses in Brazil is that they do not cover subjects related to computer science deeply enough to attend the needs of the modern industry. It is uncommon to find young electrical engineers able to deal with programming techniques for applications like web engineering, embedded systems, mobile devices, or new digital TV systems. Indeed, that is a new problem for engineering educators, to keep teaching the classical approaches as well as to keep path with new technologies. One of these actual hot topics in Brazil is the programming for Digital TV Systems. The goal is not only to produce basic software but also applications that may be used in new smart TV devices. In fact, we need a novel academic program that could introduce new subjects without changing the official curriculum. This kind of program would help to keep the students aligned with novel themes and help them understand the linkage of fundamental topics with new technological trends. Moreover, this program also helps to bring the industry closer to the university. Complete analyses of the adopted curriculum as well as the activities done are going to be presented in this paper. We will also present some examples of the developed software.

Unibral is a program that supports research and education cooperation actions between German and Brazilian universities. This work in progress paper will describe a new version of such an old experience of Unibral, a project between the Federal University of Amazonas and the University of Stuttgart. This edition started in 2013 and joined two institutes related to the electrical and computer engineering courses. The German side is represented by the Institute of Industrial Automation and Software Engineering (IAS) and the Brazilian side by the Electrical and Computer Engineering Courses. The main topics of the research and technology transfer are related to the new industrial automation issues concerning modularity and flexibility, product automation (focusing on health), and cyber physical systems. The project will evaluate the introduction of new curricular directions and new subjects in both sides, as well as, joint research action that will put together people from both institutions. This paper will describe the experiences already done in this work in progress emphasizing the new directions in this project phase. Our goal is to contribute with other universities all over the world wishing to establish similar cooperation actions.

In this paper a new model for controlling and monitoring industrial Automation Systems will be described. The architecture of this model does not limit it to be connected to only one specific Industrial Automation System, but enables it to be connected to different systems simultaneously, as well as reused for new systems, packing any industrial communication protocol. Controlling and monitoring is then done through a network service that allows remote devices to access the Automation Systems. The basic components have their hardware and software described, as well as the interfaces with the industrial Automation System and components in between. Thus, the proposed structure is presented and later it is shown how it is possible to reuse this system for other applications.

In this paper an automation system for controlling industrial and building plant using voice commands, spoken in natural language, will be described. This system uses cloud computing services to process spoken sentences and to identify the user's desired request, i.e. it converts voice commands in electronic commands. It also presents a software and hardware architecture that allows the system to be connected to several different Automation Plants, enabling this voice control feature for a larger number of devices without requiring the development of a new control system. Thus, the proposed structure is presented and later it is shown the first prototype that uses this system.

Recent news have reported an increasing number of people victims of drug-induced deaths. The reason is the fact that many patients do not have medical background or they might simply neglect certain information about the medicine they take. With a careful analysis of the requirements involved in taking medicines and by consulting physicians, it was possible to propose an intelligent medicine cabinet concept; designed to be as simple as using a conventional medicine cabinet, increasing its usability and acceptance by the construction of an electronic solution. Radio Frequency Identification was used in this work to get information from the user, medicines and prescriptions automatically, allowing a guided medication process. The proposed concept described in this paper is an attempt to facilitate people's lives to take medicines, improving medication adherence and managing related information.

This project was developed aiming at increasing the number of student candidates for undergraduate courses in the field of Engineering. In Brazil and particularly in the Amazon region, official numbers point to a big deficit on the necessary quantity of new engineers in order to fulfill the actual demand of new job positions in the industry. This should be achieved with the use of new teaching methodologies on the basic sciences for high school students coming from public schools in Manaus, Amazon's capital. High school students are invited to attend to workshops and practical laboratory classes, in two University campuses in Manaus, on the subjects of Mathematics, Physics, Biology and Chemistry. The workshops shall develop their creativity and give them motivation to learn more complex topics related to those subjects. The lab practical classes are planned to show the students the interface between different subjects and its practical application in the engineering world. This should show the students the relevance and applicability of what they learn in the school as the basis for real problems solutions. Moreover, the chosen topics of each science are related to specific engineering topics.

The curricula of engineering courses are well defined by the central government for all Brazilian universities. Indeed, there are some mandatory determinations that must be fulfilled prior to the accreditation of any engineering course in Brazil. Modifications must be submitted for evaluation beforehand, resulting in a process that sometimes takes years to be approved. That is a secure way to guarantee that the fundamentals of each engineering program will be part of the students' carrier all over the country, and at the same time a problem when you need to introduce new technological subjects. That poses a problem when you have new demands for technological curricular components that could express the actual state of the art of modern subjects. Trying to solve these issues some professors from the Federal University of Amazonas developed a flexible extra-curricular program for electrical and computer engineering courses, named Gift Young Engineers. This paper describes the philosophy of these extra-curricular programs. Some examples of successful particular partnerships are also discussed. Indeed the proposed training programs for Digital TV Systems (hardware and software) will be presented and analyzed in details. The obtained results will also be discussed in order to contribute to similar experiences worldwide.

Digital TV systems open a new world of possibilities. Since December 2007 the Brazilian people has been experiencing this new technology. Among the most promising applications are the ones that enable TV-sets to work as the central processing unit of a house. This paper presents the most recent strategies to implement convergence models between digital TV systems and residential gateway platforms. The first goal of this paper is showing how the already proposed models implement convergent scenarios between the two involved worlds: at one side the function-oriented MHP (multimedia home platform) middleware, a set of standardized Java APIs for digital TV and, at the home networks side, the services-oriented OSGi (open services gateway initiative) framework. Our final goal is to identify the most relevant features for our country in order to propose a new collaboration model supported by OSGi and the Brazilian declarative reference middleware (Ginga-NCL). This model is validated on a convergent scenario Ginga-NCL-OSGi.

This article describes a successful education technology transfer between Germany and Brazil applied to the teaching of software engineering for undergraduate students of the electrical engineering course at the Federal University of Amazonas - UFAM. The result of this experience was a significant increase on the interest of the students, i.e. the amount of enrolled students increased reaching numbers never met before and the drop out rate was smaller than the average of the other lectures. The main reason for the observed changes was the introduction of a laboratory platform in the lecture. This guided the students during the development of a software system used in a robot race at the end of the term. The robot race itself may also be another reason for the great motivation observed, when the students compete to show which team produced the best software. This experience is one of the results of the Unibral project, a scientific and academic cooperation between UFAM and the Institute of Industrial Automation and Software Engineering of the University of Stuttgart