Natick, MA. MathWorks has introduced Release 2018a (R2018a) with a range of new capabilities in MATLAB and Simulink. R2018a includes two new products: first, Predictive Maintenance Toolbox for designing and testing condition-monitoring and predictive-maintenance algorithms, and second, Vehicle Dynamics Blockset for modeling and simulating vehicle dynamics in a virtual 3D environment. In addition to new features in MATLAB and Simulink and the two new products, this release also includes updates and bug fixes to 94 other products.
MATLAB updates include live functions, documentation authoring, debugging, and interactive controls for embedding sliders and drop-down menus in the Live Editor as well as an app (UI) testing framework, C++ MEX interface, custom tab completion, and function assistants for advanced software development. And MATLAB Online now offers hardware connectivity for communicating with USB webcams.
Here are additional MATLAB product-family updates:
- Econometrics Toolbox offers an Econometric Modeler app for performing time series analysis, specification testing, modeling, and diagnostics.
- Image Processing Toolbox includes 3-D image processing and volume visualization.
- Partial Differential Equation Toolbox supports structural dynamic analysis to find natural frequencies, mode shapes, and transient response.
- Optimization Toolbox offers branching methods for solving mixed-integer linear problems faster.
Simulink updates include predictive quick insert to connect a recommended block to an existing block in a model. In addition, the Simulation Pacing feature runs simulations at wall-clock speed or other specified pace for improved visualization. And Simulation Data Inspector in the Live Editor supports directly adding, viewing, and editing plots.
In addition, Simulink 3D Animation offers collision detection for sensing collisions of virtual world objects using point clouds, raytracing, and primitive geometries. Simscape adds a moist-air domain and block library to model HVAC and environmental control systems. And a partitioning local solver increases real-time simulation speed.
R2018a includes new features for deep-learning, data-analytics, automotive, signal-processing and communications, and verification-and-validation applications as well as code-generation enhancements.
For example, for data analytics, the Statistics and Machine Learning Toolbox supports high-density data visualization with scatter plots in the Classification Learner app. Text Analytics Toolbox offers multiword phrase extraction and counting, HTML text extraction, and detection of sentences, email addresses, and URLs. And Predictive Maintenance Toolbox is the new product for designing and testing condition monitoring and predictive maintenance algorithms.
For automotive applications, Automated Driving System Toolbox offers the Driving Scenario Designer app for interactively defining actors and driving scenarios to test control and sensor fusion algorithms. Model Predictive Control Toolbox offers ADAS blocks for designing, simulating, and implementing adaptive cruise control and lane-keeping algorithms. Vehicle Network Toolbox provides CAN FD protocol support in Simulink and XCP over Ethernet to communicate with ECUs from MATLAB or Simulink. Model-Based Calibration Toolbox includes Powertrain Blockset integration for using measured data to calibrate and generate tables for Powertrain Blockset mapped engines. And Vehicle Dynamics Blockset is the new product for modeling and simulating vehicle dynamics in a virtual 3D environment.
For signal processing and communications, Signal Processing Toolbox offers the Signal Analyzer app for processing multiple signals and extracting regions of interest from signals. LTE System Toolbox includes NB-IoT support to model the narrowband Internet of Things transport and physical downlink shared channel. RF Blockset offers a power-amplifier model for capturing nonlinearity and memory effects based on input/output device characteristics. Wavelet Toolbox supports continuous and discrete wavelet transform filter banks. And Robotics System Toolbox supports lidar-based SLAM for localizing robots and map environments using lidar sensors.
R2018a is available immediately worldwide. For more information, visit R2018a Highlights.
