Open Access

Peng ChenORCiD, Jia Gao, Yuhao Wu, Changbo He, Ge Xin, Shuai Fan, Junyu QiORCiD

• Gearboxes are critical mechanical components widely deployed in industrial applications, where their reliable operation directly impacts system safety and efficiency. However, conventional fault diagnostic approaches face significant challenges when operating under extraneous transient noise conditions, particularly with limited labeled fault samples. These challenges manifest as performance degradation with extremely sparse labeled datasets, vulnerability in pseudo-label generation mechanisms under intense transient noise, and inconsistent feature scale representations due to noise-induced interference. Furthermore, existing methods struggle to maintain diagnostic accuracy when confronted with both data scarcity and transient disturbances, often resulting in compromised model generalization and unreliable fault classification. To address these limitations, this research proposes the Semi-Supervised Transfer Graph Representation Learning with Few-Shot Adaptation (SSTGRL-FSA) framework, featuring three innovative components: a novel pseudo-label reliability enhancement mechanism leveraging systematic knowledge transfer from established source domains, an advanced label transmission and matching strategy exploiting homologous signal patterns across operational domains, and an integrated first-order Markov state probability transition matrix with amplitude-constrained scaling. SSTGRL-FSA significantly advances the field by effectively handling both labeled data scarcity and transient noise interference while enhancing model robustness through sophisticated temporal dependency modeling and stable feature scale maintenance, ultimately providing a more reliable and practical solution for industrial gearbox fault diagnosis under challenging operational conditions.