This action continues the life cycle of the multi-university Industry/University Cooperative Research Center for Intelligent Maintenance at the University of Cincinnati, the University of Michigan and the University of Missouri-Rolla. This I/UCRC is in the forefront of research on predictive monitoring and prognostic and decision support tools. The I/UCRC aims to maintain its commitment to intellectual and technical excellence by horizontally fostering stronger international partnerships and vertically deepening its impacts to the current members, as well as to the advancement of scientific knowledge and tools for next-generation autonomous maintenance systems.
The vision of the Intelligent Maintenance Systems Center (I/UCRC) is "to enable products and systems to achieve and sustain near-zero breakdown performance, transforming the traditional "fail and fix" maintenance practices to a "predict and prevent" methodology". Since this Center Site was founded in 2006, the Site Director collaborated with the other two sites and with over 10 companies. For the past project year there were three affiliated universities: University of Cincinnati, University of Michigan and Misosuri S&T. The Missouri S&T joined the other two sites in 2006. The Missouri S&T developed a new tool set for diagnostics and prognostics of mechanical and electronics components. A total of 25 journal papers and over 40 conference articles and 2 patents awarded to the investigators. During the last year, the methods developed were being converted to a software tool with the help of an industry member National Instruments. This tool will be available for the users. A total of 16 graduate students after obtaining hands on training went to work for member companies. Many of the methods developed as part of the research have been transferred to the members. A recent report by NSF stated that the Center has created a significant impact in working and transferring the technologies. The return of investment appears to be around $300 dollars for ever dollar invested..
