1,483 research outputs found
Federated Embedded Systems – a review of the literature in related fields
This report is concerned with the vision of smart interconnected objects, a vision that has attracted much attention lately. In this paper, embedded, interconnected, open, and heterogeneous control systems are in focus, formally referred to as Federated Embedded Systems. To place FES into a context, a review of some related research directions is presented. This review includes such concepts as systems of systems, cyber-physical systems, ubiquitous
computing, internet of things, and multi-agent systems. Interestingly, the reviewed fields seem to overlap with each other in an increasing number of ways
Architecting Robotics and Automation Societies over Reusable Software Frameworks: the Case of the G++ Agent Platform
This work presents a software framework that allows the implementation of societies made-up by autonomous collaborative devices. The framework is structured as a multi-layer reusable architecture, adopting the software agent as the design paradigm. In this paper, an overview of its main features is offered, and an example of its adoption in the design of a robot colony is provided
Model-Based Systems Engineering Approach to Distributed and Hybrid Simulation Systems
INCOSE defines Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) as the formalized application of modeling to support system requirements, design, analysis, verification, and validation activities beginning in the conceptual design phase and continuing throughout development and later life cycle phases. One very important development is the utilization of MBSE to develop distributed and hybrid (discrete-continuous) simulation modeling systems. MBSE can help to describe the systems to be modeled and help make the right decisions and partitions to tame complexity. The ability to embrace conceptual modeling and interoperability techniques during systems specification and design presents a great advantage in distributed and hybrid simulation systems development efforts. Our research is aimed at the definition of a methodological framework that uses MBSE languages, methods and tools for the development of these simulation systems. A model-based composition approach is defined at the initial steps to identify distributed systems interoperability requirements and hybrid simulation systems characteristics. Guidelines are developed to adopt simulation interoperability standards and conceptual modeling techniques using MBSE methods and tools. Domain specific system complexity and behavior can be captured with model-based approaches during the system architecture and functional design requirements definition. MBSE can allow simulation engineers to formally model different aspects of a problem ranging from architectures to corresponding behavioral analysis, to functional decompositions and user requirements (Jobe, 2008)
Big SaaS: The Next Step Beyond Big Data
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is a model of cloud computing in which software functions are delivered to the users as services. The past few years have witnessed its global flourishing. In the foreseeable future, SaaS applications will integrate with the Internet of Things, Mobile Computing, Big Data, Wireless Sensor Networks, and many other computing and communication technologies to deliver customizable intelligent services to a vast population. This will give rise to an era of what we call Big SaaS systems of unprecedented complexity and scale. They will have huge numbers of tenants/users interrelated in complex ways. The code will be complex too and require Big Data but provide great value to the customer. With these benefits come great societal risks, however, and there are other drawbacks and challenges. For example, it is difficult to ensure the quality of data and metadata obtained from crowdsourcing and to maintain the integrity of conceptual model. Big SaaS applications will also need to evolve continuously. This paper will discuss how to address these challenges at all stages of the software lifecycle
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Integrating information and knowledge for enterprise innovation
It has widely been accepted that enterprise integration, can be a source of socio-technical and cultural problems within organisations wishing to provide a focussed end-to-end business service. This can cause possible “straitjacketing” of business process architectures, thus suppressing responsive business re-engineering and competitive advantage for some companies. Accordingly, the current typology and emergent forms of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) technologies are set in the context of understanding information and knowledge integration philosophies. As such, key influences and trends in emerging IS integration choices, for end-to-end, cost-effective and flexible knowledge integration, are examined. As touch points across and outside organisations proliferate, via work-flow and relationship management-driven value innovation, aspects of knowledge refinement and knowledge integration pose challenges to maximising the potential of innovation and sustainable success, within enterprises. This is in terms of the increasing propensity for data fragmentation and the lack of effective information management, in the light of information overload. Furthermore, the nature of IS mediation which is inherent within decision making and workflow-based business processes, provides the basis for evaluation of the effects of information and knowledge integration. Hence, the authors propose a conceptual, holistic evaluation framework which encompasses these ideas. It is thus argued that such trends, and their implications regarding enterprise IS integration to engender sustainable competitive advantage, require fundamental re-thinking
Engineering of next generation cyber-physical automation system architectures
Cyber-Physical-Systems (CPS) enable flexible and reconfigurable realization
of automation system architectures, utilizing distributed control architectures
with non-hierarchical modules linked together through different communication
systems. Several control system architectures have been developed and validated in
the past years by research groups. However, there is still a lack of implementation
in industry. The intention of this work is to provide a summary of current alternative
control system architectures that could be applied in industrial automation domain
as well as a review of their commonalities. The aim is to point out the differences
between the traditional centralized and hierarchical architectures to discussed ones,
which rely on decentralized decision-making and control. Challenges and impacts
that industries and engineers face in the process of adopting decentralized control
architectures are discussed, analysing the obstacles for industrial acceptance and the
new necessary interdisciplinary engineering skills. Finally, an outlook of possible
mitigation and migration actions required to implement the decentralized control
architectures is addressed.The authors would like to thank the European Commission for the support,
and the partners of the EU Horizon 2020 project PERFoRM (2016b) for the fruitful discussions.
The PERFoRM project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research
and innovation programme under grant agreement No 680435.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Phenolic profiling, biological activities and in silico studies of Acacia tortilis (Forssk.) Hayne ssp. raddiana extracts
The authors are grateful to the Foundation for Science and
Technology (FCT, Portugal) for financial support through national
funds FCT/MCTES to CIMO (UIDB/00690/2020). L. Barros and R. C.
Calhelha thank the national funding by the FCT, P.I., through the institutional
scientific employment program-contract for their contracts.
M. Carocho also thanks the project ValorNatural for his research contract.
The authors are also grateful to the FEDER-Interreg España-
Portugal programme for financial support through the project
0377_Iberphenol_6_E.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
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