Awareness in cyber-physical systems

Awareness, consisting of self-monitoring, situation awareness, and attention, is a key enabler for efficient cyber-physical systems. Attention is instrumental in balancing the competing tasks of data collection, processing and responses under tight resource constraints because it assigns priorities to tasks and goals. These priorities dynamically change depending on the situation. Thus, situation awareness assesses the observations and gives significance to data, attention directs scarce system resources to the most important tasks and, by means of self-awareness, the overall system performance is monitored in a dynamically changing environment. Our main research goals in the context of cost constrained cyber-physical systems include the key aspects of awareness, their efficient realization, on-line learning techniques, and group awareness.

Who are we?

projects publications  devices partners events

Axel JantschAxel Jantsh – TUW supervisor
Axel Jantsch has Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from TU Wien in 1992. After a few years in industry and as postdoc he became Associate professor in 1998 and full professor of Electronic Systems Design at KTH in Stockholm in 2002. Since 2014 he is professor of Systems on Chip at TU Wien, leading the SoC group. His main research topics are Networks on Chip, Awareness in Cyber-physical systems and predictive SoCs.

 

Jaroslav KotonJaroslav Koton – SIX supervisor
Jaroslav Koton has received Ph.D. in Teleinformatics from Brno Technical University in 2009. Being active in development of electronic devices and measurement equipment, in 2013 he became Associate professor at Brno Technical University. Since 2013 he works as a senior researcher for SIX Research Centre and is the vice-head of the Converged Systems group. His main research topics are Convergence issues in communication and information systems, Design of active elements for analogue and mixed signal processing, and Design of custom electronic devices.

 Projects & Cooperation

  • ICTT4RobustGrid – ICT requirements for operation of advanced and robust smart grids. Multi-agent systems (MAS) are able to cope with complex tasks in highly diverse fields. One of their applications is smart grids (intelligent power distribution systems), as their increasing complexity demands innovative and efficient control systems. The ICT4RobustGrid analyzes existing structures and identifies requirements for MAS. The project’s goal is to compile a research roadmap in order to prepare for the transition from currently dominating centralized to future decentralized control
  • SIRIUS – Solid state outdoor lighting with intelligent management for increasing energy efficiency. Lighting systems in public space make up a significant portion of municipal power consumption. The project’s goal is to develop, integrate, and evaluate a control mode for the intelligent, adaptive control of streetlights. By combining sensor data for the detection of road users and environmental influences, adapted lighting strategies can be developed.

 Publication record (selected)

  • N. Dutt, A. Jantsch, S. Sarma, “Towards smart embedded systems: A self-aware system-on-chip perspective”. ACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems, Special Issue on Innovative Design Methods for Smart Embedded Systems, 2015.
  • J.-S. Preden, K. Tammemae, A. Jantsch, M. Leier, A. Riid, E. Calis, “The benefits of awareness and attention in fog and mist computing”. IEEE Computer, Special Issue on Self-Aware/Expressive Computing Systems, pp. 37–45, July 2015
  • M. Stusek, J. Hosek, D. Kovac, P. Masek, P. Cika, J. Masek, F. Kropfl, “Performance Analysis of the OSGi-based IoT Frameworks on Restricted Devices as Enablers for Connected- Home”, in ICUMT 2015 Proceedings, Brno, Czech Republic, pp. 211-216, 2015.

 Devices

  • Wafer Prober PM8 Probe System from Suess MicroTec Systems GmbH
  • Climatic chamber Vötsch VC3 7018 – serves for performance evaluation of devices under test exposed to thermal and humidity effects.
  • Phoenix X-ray Micromex DXR-HD – suitable for disclosing of soldering defects on printed circuit boards, can be also used for defect detection inspection in mechanical components.

 Partners (selected)

  • UCI: We work with Nik Dutt at UC Irvine, USA, on researching SoC platforms for self-aware cyber-physical systems, based on CPSoC, which has been developed at UCI.
  • ProLab: With Jürgo Preden, head of ProLab at TTU in Tallinn, Estonia, we study awareness in sensor networks for medical and surveillance applications.
  • W.I.N.T.E.R. Group: With Sergey Andreev, coordinator of W.I.N.T.E.R. Group at Tampere University of Technology, Tampere, Finland, we cooperate on network assisted D2D communication with possible deployment in sensor networks.
  • Telekom Austria Group,
    development of Smart Multi-Purpose Home Gateway (SyMPHOnY), which merges detection and forwards alarm systems’ events. The technology behind may be raised in any smart home or industry building.
  • SEWIO Networks,
    cooperation in IoT, D2D communication, online learning techniques, development of algorithms for indoor localization.
  • Frequentis (frequentis.com) The Institute of Computer Technology at TU Wien has a long term relationship with Frequentis, an international leader in control center solutions.

 Events

  • iPack Annual Conference of the iPack Excellence Center in 2012, with over 70 participants, half from industry
  • iPack Annual Conference of the iPack Excellence Center in 2013, with over 100 participants, half from industry
  • CODES+ISSS 2004, IEEE Conference on HW/SW Codesign and System Synthesis in Stockholm