Wideband OFDM-Based Communications in Bus Topology as a Key Enabler for Industry 4.0 Networks

Abstract

The Industry 4.0 paradigm conceives a cyber-physical supporting framework for the manufacturing processes in smart factories. In this context, solutions concerning the wired communications at the field-level have been reported which utilize either fieldbuses, which exhibit a huge distance range but a reduced data rate in a bus topology, or Ethernet-based technologies, which provide an increased data rate but reduced distance in a ring topology. To overcome this shortage, we propose the use of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) to significantly increase the achievable data rates over large distances in industrial bus systems. Also, we establish a novel methodology to compute the signal-tonoise ratio between arbitrary pairs of nodes, which in turn allows to compute the communication capacity. Our wideband system was validated by connecting up to 32 nodes in the distance range 100 m-1 km. Compared to fieldbuses, the results of the proposal exhibit an amazing improvement in data rate of about fifty times for 100 m distance and more than ten times for 0.5 km. Moreover, with respect to Ethernetbased solutions, the results show a relevant improvement in the data rate of around five times for 100 m distance, but Ethernet-based systems cannot go beyond this distance, to which our proposal is not limited.

An Efficient Algorithm for Reliability Evaluation of the Bus Network

“…Simulations showed that the methods can improve the data transmission speed and reduce the transmission delay. Rios et al [21] proposed a new idea to use orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) in bus topology. The proposed method can improve the speed of data transmission during longdistance transmission in industrial sites.…”

“…This can guide the actual layout of the bus network. Currently, for the bus network, researchers mostly focus on the performance of the network based on the bus topology architecture [20,21]. Although Chaturvedi et al [22,23] proposed methods for calculating network reliability, these methods fail for the bus network.…”