Research Thrusts

HAMMER’s will combine the concepts from Design, Tools and Process Convergence, Materials State Awareness and Control, Intelligence, and Autonomy, to develop multi-tool hybrid autonomous manufacturing systems that can create a variety of components with assured quality. This can address many use cases that are largely mirrored in the Testbeds.  The key construct here is an Autonomous Fabrication (Auto Fab) cell that can select, house and use multiple kinds of tools in one environment. 

hammer schematic

 

Design

To develop comprehensive system-level design methods that can concurrently design material, topology and flexible manufacturing processes sequence to meet social and economic needs.  There are many new options in how things are made that will be systematically evaluated and optimized. 

Tools and Process Convergence

To provide an extensible framework for design and control of “tools” to complete individual processes, sequence processes, measure results in situ and physically connect processes by part transfer without loss of dimensional or materials data.

Materials State Awareness

To develop fast-acting, reduced-order models, necessary to plan, execute and self-correct an Auto-FAB manufacturing sequence. Calculate and manage uncertainty in properties/performance of the manufactured part given the uncertainty in material state. Develop regulatory and QC strategies for autonomous Auto-FAB manufacturing

Control, Intelligence, and Autonomy

Developing manufacturing problem-centric AI methods and integrate them with empirical knowledge, process physics, high-fidelity simulations and in-situ sensing data to enable AI-enhanced control and intelligence for autonomous hybrid manufacturing processes.