A Framework for Prognostics and Health Management of Electronic Systems

Prognostics and health management (PHM) of engineered systems have long been recognized as an important and integral part of reliable and safe performances of these systems, especially when their failures cause catastrophes. Blind system routine maintenance is no longer acceptable; it is both costly and inconvenient for system owners and/or users. Engineered systems, like humans, require health monitoring and management. We monitor the current health of these systems via diagnostics methods, and predict their future performance and remaining useful life via prognostics methods. Considerable research has been done on PHM with respect to mechanical systems, but the same is not true with regard to electronic systems. The contribution of this paper is two fold. First, it provides a review of PHM research with a focus on electronic systems. Second, it provides the context to identify a general PHM framework for electronic systems. The framework offers PHM guidelines to the research community in this area. The body of knowledge on PHM of electronic system fits well into the framework. The proposed framework draws on the authors' work on monitoring, diagnostics, and holistic product lifecycle via embedded sensors. The paper presents the extensions to the present research work.