Diagnosability is an important issue in the design of diagnostic systems, because it helps identify whether sufficient information is available to distinguish all the faults. Diagnosability of hybrid systems, however, is challenging, because mode transitions may occur during fault isolation. We present an event-based framework for hybrid systems diagnosis based on a qualitative abstraction of measurement deviations from nominal behavior. We derive event-based fault models that describe the possible measurement deviations sequences due to faults, which, coupled with the mode transition structure of the system, are used to automatically synthesize an event-based diagnoser for hybrid systems. We introduce notions of diagnosability for hybrid systems and show how the event-based diagnoser can be used to verify the diagnosability of the system. We apply our diagnosability analysis scheme to a real-world electrical power distribution system.

Multiple fault diagnosis is a difficult problem for dynamic systems. Due to fault masking, compensation, and relative time of fault occurrence, multiple faults can manifest in many different ways as observable fault signature sequences. This decreases diagnosability of multiple faults, and therefore leads to a loss in effectiveness of the fault isolation step. We develop a qualitative, event-based, multiple fault isolation framework, and derive several notions of multiple fault diagnosability. We show that using Possible Conflicts, a model decomposition technique that decouples faults from residuals, we can significantly improve the diagnosability of multiple faults compared to an approach using a single global model. We demonstrate these concepts and provide results using a multi-tank system as a case study.

Complex engineering systems require efficient on-line fault diagnosis methodologies to improve safety and reduce maintenance costs. Traditionally, diagnosis approaches are centralized, but these solutions do not scale well. Also, centralized diagnosis solutions are difficult to implement on increasingly prevalent distributed, networked embedded systems. This paper presents a distributed diagnosis framework for physical systems with continuous behavior. Using Possible Conflicts, a structural model decomposition method from the Artificial Intelligence model-based diagnosis (DX) community, we develop a distributed diagnoser design algorithm to build local event-based diagnosers. These diagnosers are constructed based on global diagnosability analysis of the system, enabling them to generate local diagnosis results that are globally correct without the use of a centralized coordinator. We also use Possible Conflicts to design local parameter estimators that are integrated with the local diagnosers to form a comprehensive distributed diagnosis framework. Hence, this is a fully distributed approach to fault detection, isolation, and identification. We evaluate the developed scheme on a four-wheeled rover for different design scenarios to show the advantages of using Possible Conflicts, and generate on-line diagnosis results in simulation to demonstrate the approach.

Health management systems that more accurately and quickly diagnose faults that may occur in different technical systems on-board a vehicle will play a key role in the success of future NASA missions. We discuss in this paper the diagnosis of abrupt continuous (or parametric) faults within the context of probabilistic graphical models, more specifically Bayesian networks that are compiled to arithmetic circuits. This paper extends our previous research, within the same probabilistic setting, on diagnosis of abrupt discrete faults. Our approach and diagnostic algorithm ProDiagnose are domain-independent; however we use an electrical power system testbed called ADAPT as a case study. In one set of ADAPT experiments, performed as part of the 2009 Diagnostic Challenge, our system turned out to have the best performance among all competitors. In a second set of experiments, we show how we have recently further significantly improved the performance of the probabilistic model of ADAPT. While these experiments are obtained for an electrical power system testbed, we believe they can easily be transitioned to real-world systems, thus promising to increase the success of future NASA missions. **Reference:** B. W. Ricks and O. J. Mengshoel, "Methods for Probabilistic Fault Diagnosis: An Electrical Power System Case Study." In Proc. of the First Annual Conference of the Prognostics and Health Management Society (PHM-09), San Diego, CA, September 27 – October 1, 2009. **BibTex Reference:** @inproceedings{ricks09methods, author = {Ricks, B. W. and Mengshoel, O. J.}, title = {Methods for Probabilistic Fault Diagnosis: An Electrical Power System Case Study}, booktitle = {Proc. of the Annual Conference of the Prognostics and Health Management Society (PHM-09)}, address = {San Diego, CA}, month = sep, year = {2009} }

Model-based diagnosis enables efficient and safe operation of engineered systems. In this paper, we describe two algorithms based on a qualitative event-based fault isolation framework augmented with model-based fault identification that are applied to spacecraft power distribution systems. Although based on a common framework, the fundamental difference between the two algorithms is that one uses a global model for residual generation, fault isolation, and fault identification; whereas the other uses a set of minimal submodels computed using Possible Conflicts. We describe the implementation of the two algorithms and compare their diagnosis results on a representative spacecraft power distribution system.

**Abstract** Prognostics solutions for mission critical systems require a comprehensive methodology for proactively detecting and isolating failures, recommending and guiding condition-based maintenance actions, and estimating in real time the remaining useful life of critical components and associated subsystems. A major challenge has been to extend the benefits of prognostics to include computer servers and other electronic components. The key enabler for prognostics capabilities is monitoring time series signals relating to the health of executing components and subsystems. Time series signals are processed in real time using pattern recognition for proactive anomaly detection and for remaining useful life estimation. Examples will be presented of the use of pattern recognition techniques for early detection of a number of mechanisms that are known to cause failures in electronic systems, including: environmental issues; software aging; degraded or failed sensors; degradation of hardware components; degradation of mechanical, electronic, and optical interconnects. Prognostics pattern classification is helping to substantially increase component reliability margins and system availability goals while reducing costly sources of "no trouble found" events that have become a significant warranty-cost issue. **Bios** Aleksey Urmanov is a research scientist at Sun Microsystems. He earned his doctoral degree in Nuclear Engineering at the University of Tennessee in 2002. Dr. Urmanov's research activities are centered around his interest in pattern recognition, statistical learning theory and ill-posed problems in engineering. His most recent activities at Sun focus on developing health monitoring and prognostics methods for EP-enabled computer servers. He is a founder and an Editor of the Journal of Pattern Recognition Research. Anton Bougaev holds a M.S. and a Ph.D. degrees in Nuclear Engineering from Purdue University. Before joining Sun Microsystems Inc. in 2007, he was a lecturer in Nuclear Engineering Department and a member of Applied Intelligent Systems Laboratory (AISL), of Purdue University, West Lafayette, USA. Dr. Bougaev is a founder and the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Pattern Recognition Research. His current focus is in reliability physics with emphasis on complex system analysis and the physics of failures which are based on the data driven pattern recognition techniques.

Electrical power systems play a critical role in spacecraft and aircraft, and they exhibit a rich variety of failure modes. This paper discusses electrical power system fault diagnosis by means of probabilistic techniques. Specically, we discuss our development of a diagnostic capability for an electrical power system testbed, ADAPT, located at NASA Ames. We emphasize how we have tackled two challenges, regarding modelling and real-time performance, often encountered when developing diagnostic applications. We carefully discuss our Bayesian network modeling approach for electrical power systems. To achieve real-time performance, we build on recent theoretically well-founded developments that compile a Bayesian network into an arithmetic circuit. Arithmetic circuits have low footprint and are optimized for embedded, real-time systems such as spacecraft and aircraft. We discuss our probabilistic diagnostic models developed for ADAPT along with successful experimental results.

Model-based diagnosis typically uses analytical redundancy to compare predictions from a model against observations from the system being diagnosed. However this approach does not work very well when it is not feasible to create analytic relations describing all the observed data, e.g., for vibration data which is usually sampled at very high rates and requires very detailed finite element models to describe its behavior. In such cases, features (in time and frequency domains) that contain diagnostic information are extracted from the data. Since this is a computationally intensive process, it is not efficient to extract all the features all the time. In this paper we present an approach that combines the analytic model-based and feature-driven diagnosis approaches. The analytic approach is used to reduce the set of possible faults and then features are chosen to best distinguish among the remaining faults. We describe an implementation of this approach on the Flyable Electro-mechanical Actuator (FLEA) test bed.

It is an inescapable truth that no matter how well a system is designed it will degrade, and if degrading parts are not repaired or replaced the system will fail. Avoiding the expense and safety risks associated with system failures is certainly a top priority in many systems; however, there is also a strong motivation not to be overly cautious in the design and maintenance of systems, due to the expense of maintenance and the undesirable sacrifices in performance and cost effectiveness incurred when systems are over designed for safety. This paper describes an analytical process that starts with the derivation of an expression to evaluate the desirability of future control outcomes, and eventually produces control routines that use uncertain prognostic information to optimize derived risk metrics. A case study on the design of fault-adaptive control for a skid-steered robot will illustrate some of the fundamental challenges of prognostics-based control design.

Verification and validation (V&V) has been identified as a critical phase in fielding systems with Integrated Systems Health Management (ISHM) solutions to ensure that the results produced are robust, reliable, and can confidently inform about vehicle and system health status and to support operational and maintenance decisions. Prognostics is a key constituent within ISHM. It faces unique challenges for V&V since it informs about the future behavior of a component or subsystem. In this paper, we present a detailed review of identified barriers and solutions to prognostics V&V, and a novel methodological way for the organization and application of this knowledge. We discuss these issues within the context of a prognostics application for the ground support equipment of space vehicle propellant loading, and identify the significant barriers and adopted solution for this application.