Keynote Speeches

Prof. Zili Wang
Beihang University, China

Title: Reliability Systems Engineering in the Era of a Quality-Driven Hegemony
Abstract: This talk is motivated by the national strategy of leveraging on quality to achieve supremacy in nation building. We first propose "Three Comprehensive Quality Concept" and the quality technology transformation for enhancing design quality. Then, we introduce the theoretical methodologies and engineering practices of reliability systems engineering, which serve as the two-prong approach of the proposed quality technology transformation. Topics include its background, conceptual connotation, theoretical framework, technical system, integration methods, digital engineering, integrated platforms, application models, and typical cases. Lastly, in view of the new technological trends in digitalization and intelligence, we explore the future developments of reliability system engineering in the context of cross-scale quality integrated design for large-scale systems, system reliability, intelligent equipment reliability, software reliability, reliability digital twins, maintenance testing, fault prediction, and health management.

Biodata: Zili Wang, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, is a professor and doctoral supervisor at Beihang University. He currently serves as the director of the Engineering Technology Center for Equipment Reliability and the National Key Laboratory of Reliability and Environmental Engineering Technology. He has long been engaged in theoretical research on reliability systems engineering and the management of major engineering projects, forming a comprehensive integration theory of reliability and developing an integrated platform. The products of these efforts have benefited more than 100 subsidiaries of 10 major defense enterprises in which more than 20 key models have been implemented. He has twice served as the chief scientist for the 973 Program, published over 150 papers, been granted more than 40 invention patents, authored 7 monographs, and supervised over 80 doctoral and master's students. As the primary contributor, he has received two second-class State Science and Technology Award and four first-class provincial and ministerial-level Science and Technology Progress Awards. His team has collectively won two special-class State Science and Technology Award.

Prof. Jinting Wang
Central University of Finance and Economics, China

Title: Reliability Modelling and Optimization of Queueing Systems
Abstract: The study of queues is essential in contexts such as traffic systems, computer networks, telecommunications, the Internet of Things (IoT), and service operations. Queueing theory delves into various foundational concepts, with the arrival process and service process being central. It shares a common modelling framework with reliability theory based on probability theory and stochastics processes. Over the past few decades, a significant amount of research has focused on the reliability analysis and optimization of queueing systems both in theoretic studies and in various application domains. Based on the interaction of queueing theory and reliability theory, the talk first review classic works on reliability analysis of queueing systems, and then presents the reliability-related issues and research on various queueing systems arising from healthcare, manufacturing, supply chains and so on. Several cutting-edge issues in the reliability of queueing systems will also be presented.

Biodata: Jinting Wang received the Ph.D. degree from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China, in 2000. He is currently a “Longma” Distinguished Professor at the Department of Management Sciences, School of Management Science and Engineering, Central University of Finance and Economics. His research interests focus on Stochastic Operations Research in the domain of Operations Management and Management Science, including reliability, queueing economics, supply chain management and the applications of stochastic optimization in operations management, applied economics, engineering management, wireless communication and networking. Prof. Wang is a life member of Operations Research Society of China (ORSC), and now he serves as the President of Reliability Society affiliated with ORSC. He also servs as the Associate Editor for Journal of the Operational Research Society (JORS), International Journal of Operations Research (IJOR) and several Chinese journals. He is the author or co-author of over 160 journal articles and the book entitled “Fundamentals of Queueing Game” (in Chinese, Science Press). Prof. Wang has received multiple teaching and scholar awards, including the Outstanding Research Award for Young Researchers from Operations Research Society of China (ORSC), the recipient of Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University by the Ministry of Education of China, the “Zhan Tian You” Railway Science and Technology Award, etc. He has been selected for Elsevier's “Highly Cited Scholars” list in the past years.

Prof. Yincai Tang
East China Normal University, China

Title: Stochastic Modeling for Two-Stage and Multivariate Degradation Processes
Abstract: In this talk, we will focus on modeling two typical degradation patterns: The first model is designed to capture degradation patterns with two-phase behavior, while the second model addresses multivariate degradation processes by considering common effects. We propose modeling methods based on the Wiener process and the inverse Gaussian process, which are respectively suitable for non-monotonic and monotonic degradation path data. Detailed presentations are made on parameter estimation, reliability analysis, and prediction of remaining useful life. Moreover, we present analyses of multiple degradation datasets, including those for OLEDs, lithium batteries, heavy machinery tools, and permanent magnet brakes.

Biodata: Tang Yincai, Ph.D. in Statistics, is a professor at East China Normal University, executive editor-in-chief of “Statistical Theory and Related Fields” and director of the editorial department of “Chinese Applied Probability and Statistics.” He has presided four projects of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, participated in and completed three major and key projects of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, completed more than 20 projects for enterprises including Huawei, and published over 100 academic papers. He has been honored with the Excellent Technical Achievement Award from Huawei Shanghai Research Institute, the Excellent Teacher Award for Graduate Education at East China Normal University, the Third Prize of Shanghai Science and Technology, the Third Prize of Shanghai Science and Technology Progress, and the Second Prize of National Statistical Science and Technology Progress, etc.

Prof. Yu Liu
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, China

Title: Reinforcement Learning in Reliability and Maintenance Optimization
Abstract: The increasing complexity of engineering systems presents significant challenges in addressing intricate reliability and maintenance optimization problems. Advanced computational techniques have become imperative. Reinforcement learning, with its strong capability of solving complicated sequential decision-making problems under uncertainty, has emerged as a powerful tool to reliability and maintainability community. This talk offers a guideline on the utilization of reinforcement learning algorithms for resolving reliability optimization and maintenance optimization problems. We first introduce the Markov decision process modeling framework for these problems and elucidate the design and implementation of solution algorithms, including dynamic programming, reinforcement learning, and deep reinforcement learning. Case studies, including a pipeline system mission abort optimization and a manufacturing system condition-based maintenance decision-making, are included to demonstrate the utility of reinforcement learning in reliability and maintenance applications.

Biodata: Yu Liu is the Dean and Full Professor of the School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. He received his PhD degree in Mechatronics Engineering from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. He was a Visiting Pre-doctoral Fellow in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Northwestern University, Evanston, U.S.A. from 2008 to 2010, and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada from 2012 to 2013. He has published two Springer books and over 100 peer-reviewed papers in international journals, such as IEEE Transactions on Reliability, IISE Transactions, Naval Research Logistics, European Journal of Operational Research, Reliability Engineering and System Safety. He has been recognized as one of the Most Cited Chinese Researchers by Elsevier since 2016 and the World’s Top 2% Scientists since 2020. He was a recipient of the Chang Jiang Scholars Program Distinguished Professors, National Science Fund for Excellent Young Scholars, IISE QCRE Teaching Award, the Youth Science and Technology Award of Operations Research Society of China, the Youth Science and Technology Award of Sichuan Province, and the HIWIN Doctoral Dissertation Award sponsored by Chinese Society of Mechanical Engineers and HIWIN Technologies Corporation. He serves as an Associate Editor of IISE Transactions and IEEE Transactions on Reliability and one of the editorial board members of Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Quality and Reliability Engineering International, Engineering Optimization, International Journal of Reliability, Quality and Safety Engineering, and Chinese Journal of Aeronautics. He also serves as the Vice President of the Reliability Committee of Operations Research Society of China and the Chair of IEEE Reliability Society Chengdu Section Chapter. He is an ISEAM Fellow.

Prof. Xian Zhao
Beijing Institute of Technology, China

Title: Operation, Maintenance and Mission Abort Optimization of Balanced Systems
Abstract: As a type of system widely applied in the field of energy production and aerospace, the balanced system has attracted a lot of research attention in recent years. The most distinctive feature of balanced systems is that the functioning components must be balanced for the system to be operational. For different types of balanced systems, the requirements for system balance and the mechanisms to regain balance are different. Accordingly, this talk first presents the designing and optimization of operation policies for different types of balanced systems, such as component restarting policy and system rebalancing policy. Thereafter, the optimization of maintaining policies, including the maintenance policy and the component reassignment policy for balanced systems, are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of various operational managements in enhancing system reliability. For mission-based balanced systems, this talk further demonstrates the optimization of mission abort policies by integrating the reliability analysis of balanced systems.

Biodata: Xian Zhao is the Vice Dean and Full Professor of the School of Economics at the Beijing Institute of Technology. His research directions include the system reliability and management, as well as the quality management. He has published over 80 peer-reviewed papers in highly recognized international journals, such as European Journal of Operational Research, IISE Transactions, Risk Analysis, Reliability Engineering & System Safety, and IEEE Transactions on Reliability. He was granted by the Young Talent Scholars Program by the Ministry of Education in 2021, the Beijing Young Talent Program in Higher Education in 2013, the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University in 2012, and the Beijing Excellent Talent Support Program in 2009. He serves as the Vice President and Secretary-General of the Reliability Committee of Operations Research Society of China, the Vice President of the Industrial Engineering Committee of Chinese Society of Optimization, Overall Planning and Economic Mathematics, etc.

Prof. Hongwei Wang
Zhejiang University, China

Title: Data Driven Diagnosis and Prediction of Complex Systems: Progress and Challenges
Abstract: The diagnosis and prediction of complex systems holds the key to improving system reliability and resilience. However, traditional mechanism-based fault diagnosis methods highly depend on specific application domains and as such the generalization of these methods to other applications is very difficult. As the development of deep learning models, data driven diagnosis and prediction has become increasingly popular. This talk gives an introduction to data-driven fault diagnosis and condition prediction, describes the recent progresses, and discusses the challenges of their applications in industrial scenarios.

Biodata: Prof. Hongwei Wang is the vice dean of the Zhejiang University – UIUC Institute, Zhejiang University. He has a broad interest in the application of Knowledge-Based Systems (KBS) in the design, analysis, manufacture and maintenance of complex systems. He has been focusing on industrial knowledge graph, knowledge-based reasoning and decision making, data-driven fault diagnosis in the past few years. He has published over 160 papers in well-established journals and international conferences such as IEEE Trans. on Industrial Informatics, IEEE Trans. on Services Computing, IEEE Trans. on Neural Networks and Learning Systems, CVPR, IJCAI, ACL, EMNLP, NAACL, etc. His research has been recognized in the winning of several research rewards including four best paper awards in international conferences.