These studies encompass both theoretical considerations and industrial applications. Activities in supervisory control have included the development of a hierarchical procedure for handling conflicting control objectives and the development strategies for optimizing control. Operability refers to the ability of a plant to perform satisfactorily under conditions different from the nominal operating conditions, and is most significantly influenced by plant design characteristics rather than a particular type of control system. Our research group has been involved in the development of optimization-based computational strategies for assessing plant operability. Current work involves both theoretical and computational studies, as well as industrial applications.
Dynamic optimization is another focus area within our group.
This involves the determination of optimal trajectories with respect to time of key process inputs in order to optimize an appropriate objective subject to prevailing operational constraints. A related project is concerned with on-line optimization of a batch process system. A mixed-integer programming formulation is being applied to determine the optimal sequence and schedule for this system. Research activities in process monitoring have focused on data reconciliation, fault detection and property estimation through the use of secondary measurements. Feel free to contact us .