An open-standard smart sensor architecture and system for industrial automation

An enabling sensor technology for prognostic and health management (PHM) is the open-standard smart sensor architecture. Historically, closed or proprietary sensor buses were used to collect distributed analog sensor data to a central point for digitization. Such a system would satisfy its initial constraints, but suffer when the need for future expansion or flexibility was required. Digital sensor buses addressed technical performance issues, but also fell short of an open-standard that would enable any sensor to work on any bus. This work of establishing an open-standard smart sensor architecture and then implementing a sensor system for PHM is described.