In March of 2025, Control Engineering readers looked at articles about open process automation, telecom hacks and handling deadtime.
In March of 2025, Control Engineering readers looked at articles about open process automation, telecom hacks and handling deadtime. Shows like the ARC Industry Leadership Forum took place this month, highlighting industry trends and emerging best practices.
Learn more about these topics and what engineers should know from our top 10 articles below.
1. New insights: 100-controller ExxonMobil Open Process Automation
ARC Industry Leadership Forum, 2025: ExxonMobil runs Open Process Automation (OPA) system in a large-scale Lighthouse Project, with a 1000 I/O and 100 controllers at a resin finishing plant in Baton Rouge, providing reliable interoperability, without glitches.
2. How to mitigate the ongoing Salt Typhoon telecom hack: CISA
ARC Leadership Forum, 2025: CISA expert offers risk mitigation tips in the ongoing Salt Typhoon telecom hack, worst in U.S. history, with other industrial cybersecurity advice.
3. How to handle the deadtime that hampers process control
Deadtime is the interval between the application of a control effort and its first discernible effect on the process variable. Deadtime is most common in processes that involve a transport delay between the actuators and the sensors, such as water flowing through a bathroom’s plumbing from the hot water valve to the shower head.
4. The future of automation lies beyond a system-of-systems approach
An enterprise operations platform evolved from the control system unlocks a more effective, efficient and future-proofed automation stack.
5. AI’s challenges and opportunities at the industrial edge
There are both opportunities and complexities involved when implementing artificial intelligence (AI) at the industrial edge, highlighting the role of specific hardware, example use cases, regulatory impacts and strategic considerations for sustainable, adaptable AI investments.
6. APC 2.0 spotlight, part 1: What is APC 2.0?
For better understanding of what’s possible in advanced process control (APC), learn what APC 2.0 is and why it is important. Explore APC agility and importance of APC technology mastery for control-loop optimization. This starts an APC 2.0 series.
7. PID spotlight, part 15: Open loop tuning of near integrating process
Slow, self-limiting processes can be very time-consuming and difficult to tune. However, a self-limiting process with a high lag/deadtime ratio looks a lot like an integrating process. Can we tune these processes as if they are integrating processes, treating them like near-integrating processes? Yes, we can.
8. Improving visual inspections with AI and edge computing
Visual inspections have always been an integral part of the industrial engineering workflow. Now, advances in computer vision and frameworks like edge computing are making the inspection process even more efficient and precise.
9. These emerging technologies are coming to the industrial ethernet
Advancements are coming to industrial Ethernet, including emerging technologies like Single Pair Ethernet (SPE) and more established Ethernet with Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN).
10. How to drive visibility through centralized monitoring techniques
Centralized monitoring of process plants can be a critical enabler for operational excellence, but it requires easy access to contextualized data from automation systems.
