Transfer learning algorithms for bearing remaining useful life prediction: A comprehensive review from an industrial application perspective

Accurate remaining useful life (RUL) prediction for rolling bearings encounters many challenges such as complex degradation processes, varying working conditions, and insufficient run-to-failure data. Transfer learning (TL), one paradigm of artificial intelligence technology, has demonstrated its powerful performance and great effectiveness for such challenges. As a result, many TL-based solutions have been widely developed and extensively studied for rolling bearing RUL prediction. Admittedly, several review articles have been published on RUL prediction. Nevertheless, the majority of these articles only concentrated on deep learning-based RUL prediction methods, and a review article that systematically overviews the status of TL-based RUL prediction has not been published. Therefore, it is urgent and significant to thoroughly summarize the academic publications and industrial applications related to TL-based RUL prediction, and present its potential challenges and future research directions. With such goals, the problem definitions of TL-based RUL prediction, the general procedure of RUL prediction, and typical TL-based RUL prediction algorithms are first introduced to help researchers quickly overview the state-of-the-art approaches and recent developments. Thereafter, relevant TL-based RUL prediction solutions are comprehensively discussed from the perspectives of three industrial scenarios, providing suggestions to researchers and engineers for selecting appropriate solutions in practical industrial applications. Finally, the key challenges and future trends in RUL prediction are presented to conclude this paper. We hope that this review of TL-based RUL prediction for rolling bearings can contribute to a better understanding of intelligent prognostic technology and will inspire researchers to extend their work on RUL prediction.