Cyber-Physical Production System Gateway Based on a Programmable SoC Platform

Abstract

The communication needs of the different stages of production proposed in the new industrial generation (INDUSTRY 4.0), demand devices that can handle high availability protocols. This paper presents an architecture of a cyber physical production system gateway that can be implemented in an SoC, integrating high availability communication interfaces as the high-availability seamless redundancy/ parallel redundancy protocol (HSR/PRP), industrial ethernet communication interfaces (e.g. Profinet), and connections to sensors and actuators (e.g. Modbus series). Considering the software and hardware adaptability that the architecture should have, field programmable gate array and reconfigurable devices, in general, are considered as the best options for implementation, since the architecture requires high levels of hardware and software flexibility. The proposed architecture was validated in an experimental environment that is implemented utilizing electronic design automation tools, IP cores, and Python libraries developed by third parties is presented, to achieve a device which handles high availability communication HSR/PRP, Profinet, Profibus, and Modbus.