Physics-informed neural networks have shown significant potential in solving partial differential equations (PDEs) across diverse scientific fields. However, their performance often deteriorates when addressing PDEs with intricate and strongly coupled solutions. In this work, we present a novel Sharp-PINN framework to tackle complex phase field corrosion problems. Instead of minimizing all governing PDE residuals simultaneously, the Sharp-PINNs introduce a staggered training scheme that alternately minimizes the residuals of Allen-Cahn and Cahn-Hilliard equations, which govern the corrosion system. To further enhance its efficiency and accuracy, we design an advanced neural network architecture that integrates random Fourier features as coordinate embeddings, employs a modified multi-layer perceptron as the primary backbone, and enforces hard constraints in the output layer. This framework is benchmarked through simulations of corrosion problems with multiple pits, where the staggered training scheme and network architecture significantly improve both the efficiency and accuracy of PINNs. Moreover, in three-dimensional cases, our approach is 5-10 times faster than traditional finite element methods while maintaining competitive accuracy, demonstrating its potential for real-world engineering applications in corrosion prediction.

Semiconductors, crucial to modern electronics, are generally under-researched in foundational models. It highlights the need for research to enhance the semiconductor device technology portfolio and aid in high-end device fabrication. In this paper, we introduce sLAVA, a small-scale vision-language assistant tailored for semiconductor manufacturing, with a focus on electron microscopy image analysis. It addresses challenges of data scarcity and acquiring high-quality, expert-annotated data. We employ a teacher-student paradigm, using a foundational vision language model like GPT-4 as a teacher to create instruction-following multimodal data for customizing the student model, sLAVA, for electron microscopic image analysis tasks on consumer hardware with limited budgets. Our approach allows enterprises to further fine-tune the proposed framework with their proprietary data securely within their own infrastructure, protecting intellectual property. Rigorous experiments validate that our framework surpasses traditional methods, handles data shifts, and enables high-throughput screening.

Semiconductor imaging and analysis are critical yet understudied in deep learning, limiting our ability for precise control and optimization in semiconductor manufacturing. We introduce a small-scale multimodal framework for analyzing semiconductor electron microscopy images (MAEMI) through vision-language instruction tuning. We generate a customized instruction-following dataset using large multimodal models on microscopic image analysis. We perform knowledge transfer from larger to smaller models through knowledge distillation, resulting in improved accuracy of smaller models on visual question answering (VQA) tasks. This approach eliminates the need for expensive, human expert-annotated datasets for microscopic image analysis tasks. Enterprises can further finetune MAEMI on their intellectual data, enhancing privacy and performance on low-cost consumer hardware. Our experiments show that MAEMI outperforms traditional methods, adapts to data distribution shifts, and supports high-throughput screening.

The task of industrial detection based on deep learning often involves solving two problems: (1) obtaining sufficient and effective data samples, (2) and using efficient and convenient model training methods. In this paper, we introduce a novel defect-generation method, named DDPM-MoCo, to address these issues. Firstly, we utilize the Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Model (DDPM) to generate high-quality defect data samples, overcoming the problem of insufficient sample data for model learning. Furthermore, we utilize the unsupervised learning Momentum Contrast model (MoCo) with an enhanced batch contrastive loss function for training the model on unlabeled data, addressing the efficiency and consistency challenges in large-scale negative sample encoding during diffusion model training. The experimental results showcase an enhanced visual detection method for identifying defects on metal surfaces, covering the entire process, starting from generating unlabeled sample data for training the diffusion model, to utilizing the same labeled sample data for downstream detection tasks. This study offers valuable practical insights and application potential for visual detection in the metal processing industry.

Corrosion, a naturally occurring process leading to the deterioration of metallic materials, demands diligent detection for quality control and the preservation of metal-based objects, especially within industrial contexts. Traditional techniques for corrosion identification, including ultrasonic testing, radio-graphic testing, and magnetic flux leakage, necessitate the deployment of expensive and bulky equipment on-site for effective data acquisition. An unexplored alternative involves employing lightweight, conventional camera systems, and state-of-the-art computer vision methods for its identification. In this work, we propose a complete system for semi-automated corrosion identification and mapping in industrial environments. We leverage recent advances in LiDAR-based methods for localization and mapping, with vision-based semantic segmentation deep learning techniques, in order to build semantic-geometric maps of industrial environments. Unlike previous corrosion identification systems available in the literature, our designed multi-modal system is low-cost, portable, semi-autonomous and allows collecting large datasets by untrained personnel. A set of experiments in an indoor laboratory environment, demonstrate quantitatively the high accuracy of the employed LiDAR based 3D mapping and localization system, with less then $0.05m$ and 0.02m average absolute and relative pose errors. Also, our data-driven semantic segmentation model, achieves around 70\% precision when trained with our pixel-wise manually annotated dataset.

Industrial robotics are redefining inspection and maintenance routines across multiple sectors, enhancing safety, efficiency, and environmental sustainability. In outdoor industrial facilities, it is crucial to inspect and repair complex surfaces affected by corrosion. To address this challenge, mobile manipulators have been developed to navigate these facilities, identify corroded areas, and apply protective coatings. However, given that this technology is still in its infancy and the consequences of improperly coating essential equipment can be significant, human oversight is necessary to review the robot's corrosion identification and repair plan. We present a practical and scalable Augmented Reality (AR)-based system designed to empower non-experts to visualize, modify, and approve robot-generated surface corrosion repair plans in real-time. Built upon an AR-based human-robot interaction framework, Augmented Robot Environment (AugRE), we developed a comprehensive AR application module called Situational Task Accept and Repair (STAR). STAR allows users to examine identified corrosion images, point cloud data, and robot navigation objectives overlaid on the physical environment within these industrial environments. Users are able to additionally make adjustments to the robot repair plan in real-time using interactive holographic volumes, excluding critical nearby equipment that might be at risk of coating overspray. We demonstrate the entire system using a Microsoft HoloLens 2 and a dual-arm mobile manipulator. Our future research will focus on evaluating user experience, system robustness, and real-world validation.

Water utility operators around the world are under continuous pressure to operate efficiently, conserve water, reduce their environmental impact, and maintain a high level of supply and availability. The adoption of IoT sensors and artificial intelligence (AI) can help the water industry become more resilient and efficient. Many water utilities have started to implement technology such as IoT-connected sensors on pumps, valves, and meters, along with geographic information systems (GIS), supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), and advanced metering infrastructure (AMI). Each of these technologies helps to improve operations, and combined they produce a large volume of real-time data to which operators can apply artificial intelligence predictive modeling. Let's take a look at five benefits of IoT and AI.

Four University of South Australia researchers have been awarded ARC Discovery grants collectively worth $1.8 million, for projects starting in 2023. The project will investigate the ways in which existing Australian induction policies support "precariously employed" early career teachers – those on casual and short-term contracts – to effectively manage student classroom behaviour. "We hope to propose alternative policy and practice recommendations to support the transition of insecure replacement teachers within the profession," Prof Sullivan says. "The benefits of this research include improving teachers' classroom management practices; the retention of new teachers; improving teacher workforce development; and building a healthier education system." Australia's 117,000 km of concrete sewer pipes are currently internally corroding at a depth rate of 1-3 mm per annum.

Despite the widespread diffusion of renewable energy, oil and gas are among the highly valued commodities in the energy sector. However, commodity cycles, capital planning challenges, and increasing operational risk have propelled the oil and gas industry to make more intelligent and efficient decisions. In a 2018 Ernst & Young (EY) survey, Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) didn't even rank in the top five technologies used by seven global oil and gas supermajors (Figure 1). Further, they feel that in the coming years, technologies like robotic process automation (RPA) (25%) and advanced analytics (25%), but not AI/ML, will have the most significant and positive effect on their businesses. AI/ML have enormous potential in the oil and gas industry, and by not considering it, leaders in the sector risk being blindsided. It can help reduce costs, add capacity and capability, speed decision-making, and improve quality while managing risk.

In this paper, we propose a new technique that applies automated image analysis in the area of structural corrosion monitoring and demonstrate improved efficacy compared to existing approaches. Structural corrosion monitoring is the initial step of the risk-based maintenance philosophy and depends on an engineer's assessment regarding the risk of building failure balanced against the fiscal cost of maintenance. This introduces the opportunity for human error which is further complicated when restricted to assessment using drone captured images for those areas not reachable by humans due to many background noises. The importance of this problem has promoted an active research community aiming to support the engineer through the use of artificial intelligence (AI) image analysis for corrosion detection. In this paper, we advance this area of research with the development of a framework, CorrDetector. CorrDetector uses a novel ensemble deep learning approach underpinned by convolutional neural networks (CNNs) for structural identification and corrosion feature extraction. We provide an empirical evaluation using real-world images of a complicated structure (e.g. telecommunication tower) captured by drones, a typical scenario for engineers. Our study demonstrates that the ensemble approach of \model significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art in terms of classification accuracy.