Latency-Aware Control for Wireless Cloud Fog Automation: Framework and Case Study

The development of wireless communication has indeed promoted cloud fog automation in the industry. It also introduces new issues of reliability and latency for control systems. This study sought to investigate the impacts of the commonly used industrial wireless network on the control performance parameters using a ball-and-beam (BB) time-critical balancing control system. An internal model control-inspired latency-aware wireless control framework (IMC-LA) is presented and employed in the BB system to handle the time delays and instability-creating elements introduced by wireless communication. A preliminary control assessment of the BB system under two new-generation wireless technologies, Wi-Fi 6 and 5G, was delivered. The correlation between network performance and control performance was analyzed statistically compared to the wired Ethernet condition. Test results show a dramatic decrease in position error after utilizing the proposed latency-aware wireless control framework. This study provides practical insights into the potential impacts of industrial wireless networks on control systems with a workable latency-aware wireless control approach.