A Multimodal Manufacturing Safety Chatbot: Knowledge Base Design, Benchmark Development, and Evaluation of Multiple RAG Approaches

Ensuring worker safety remains a critical challenge in modern manufacturing environments. Industry 5.0 reorients the prevailing manufacturing paradigm toward more human-centric operations. Using a design science research methodology, we identify three essential requirements for next-generation safety training systems: high accuracy, low latency, and low cost. We introduce a multimodal chatbot powered by large language models that meets these design requirements. The chatbot uses retrieval-augmented generation to ground its responses in curated regulatory and technical documentation. To evaluate our solution, we developed a domain-specific benchmark of expert-validated question and answer pairs for three representative machines: a Bridgeport manual mill, a Haas TL-1 CNC lathe, and a Universal Robots UR5e collaborative robot. We tested 24 RAG configurations using a full-factorial design and assessed them with automated evaluations of correctness, latency, and cost. Our top 2 configurations were then evaluated by ten industry experts and academic researchers. Our results show that retrieval strategy and model configuration have a significant impact on performance. The top configuration (selected for chatbot deployment) achieved an accuracy of 86.66%, an average latency of 10.04 seconds, and an average cost of $0.005 per query. Overall, our work provides three contributions: an open-source, domain-grounded safety training chatbot; a validated benchmark for evaluating AI-assisted safety instruction; and a systematic methodology for designing and assessing AI-enabled instructional and immersive safety training systems for Industry 5.0 environments.

Reliable Decision Support with LLMs: A Framework for Evaluating Consistency in Binary Text Classification Applications

This study introduces a framework for evaluating consistency in large language model (LLM) binary text classification, addressing the lack of established reliability assessment methods. Adapting psychometric principles, we determine sample size requirements, develop metrics for invalid responses, and evaluate intra- and inter-rater reliability. Our case study examines financial news sentiment classification across 14 LLMs (including claude-3-7-sonnet, gpt-4o, deepseek-r1, gemma3, llama3.2, phi4, and command-r-plus), with five replicates per model on 1,350 articles. Models demonstrated high intra-rater consistency, achieving perfect agreement on 90-98% of examples, with minimal differences between expensive and economical models from the same families. When validated against StockNewsAPI labels, models achieved strong performance (accuracy 0.76-0.88), with smaller models like gemma3:1B, llama3.2:3B, and claude-3-5-haiku outperforming larger counterparts. All models performed at chance when predicting actual market movements, indicating task constraints rather than model limitations. Our framework provides systematic guidance for LLM selection, sample size planning, and reliability assessment, enabling organizations to optimize resources for classification tasks.

How Generative AI models such as ChatGPT can be Used in SPC Practice, Education, and Research? An Exploratory Study

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) models such as OpenAI's ChatGPT have the potential to revolutionize Statistical Process Control (SPC) practice, learning, and research. However, these tools are in the early stages of development and can be easily misused or misunderstood. In this paper, we give an overview of the development of Generative AI. Specifically, we explore ChatGPT's ability to provide code, explain basic concepts, and create knowledge related to SPC practice, learning, and research. By investigating responses to structured prompts, we highlight the benefits and limitations of the results. Our study indicates that the current version of ChatGPT performs well for structured tasks, such as translating code from one language to another and explaining well-known concepts but struggles with more nuanced tasks, such as explaining less widely known terms and creating code from scratch. We find that using new AI tools may help practitioners, educators, and researchers to be more efficient and productive. However, in their current stages of development, some results are misleading and wrong. Overall, the use of generative AI models in SPC must be properly validated and used in conjunction with other methods to ensure accurate results.