The next five to ten years will show a dramatic increase in the number of sensors and actuators in use. Several advances in technology, namely integrated sensors, fast reliable communications, and powerful computers, are making such changes possible. Coordinating the complex interactions of multiple sensors and control settings can be too confusing for an ad-hoc approach. Applying modern model-based control theory to multi-input/multi-output systems has the potential of improving the yield and throughput in a computer integrated manufacturing environment.

Our expectation is that as more sensors and actuators become available, it will be important to handle internal communications between processing subsystems in a uniform manner to allow for incremental expansions to the processing equipment. Because of the wide assortment of physical sensors available for control equipment, an architecture is presented which attempts to unify the communications and control in a multiprocessor environment. The focus of this paper will be to explain one method of controlling a Rapid Thermal Multiprocessing chamber and how it is designed to handle future growth.

The implementation and experimentation are being performed on the Rapid Thermal Multiprocessor (RTM) at the Center for Integrated Systems (CIS) at Stanford University.