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

Adaptive Process Management in Cyber-Physical Domains

The increasing application of process-oriented approaches in new challenging cyber-physical domains beyond business computing (e.g., personalized healthcare, emergency management, factories of the future, home automation, etc.) has led to reconsider the level of flexibility and support required to manage complex processes in such domains. A cyber-physical domain is characterized by the presence of a cyber-physical system coordinating heterogeneous ICT components (PCs, smartphones, sensors, actuators) and involving real world entities (humans, machines, agents, robots, etc.) that perform complex tasks in the “physical” real world to achieve a common goal. The physical world, however, is not entirely predictable, and processes enacted in cyber-physical domains must be robust to unexpected conditions and adaptable to unanticipated exceptions. This demands a more flexible approach in process design and enactment, recognizing that in real-world environments it is not adequate to assume that all possible recovery activities can be predefined for dealing with the exceptions that can ensue. In this chapter, we tackle the above issue and we propose a general approach, a concrete framework and a process management system implementation, called SmartPM, for automatically adapting processes enacted in cyber-physical domains in case of unanticipated exceptions and exogenous events. The adaptation mechanism provided by SmartPM is based on declarative task specifications, execution monitoring for detecting failures and context changes at run-time, and automated planning techniques to self-repair the running process, without requiring to predefine any specific adaptation policy or exception handler at design-time

Towards a Security, Privacy, Dependability, Interoperability Framework for the Internet of Things

A popular application of ambient intelligence systems constitutes of assisting living services on smart buildings. As intelligence is imported in embedded equipment, the system becomes able to provide smart services (e.g. control lights, airconditioning, provide energy management services etc.). IoT is the main enabler of such environments. However, the interconnection of these cyber-physical systems and the processing of personal data raise serious security and privacy issues. In this paper we present a framework that can guarantee Security, Privacy, Dependability and Interoperability (SPDI) in IoT. Taking advantage of the underlying IoT deployment, the proposed framework not only implements the requested smart functionality but also provide modelling and administration that can guarantee those SPDI properties. Moreover, we provide an application example of the framework in a smart building scenario

Intelligent flight control systems

The capabilities of flight control systems can be enhanced by designing them to emulate functions of natural intelligence. Intelligent control functions fall in three categories. Declarative actions involve decision-making, providing models for system monitoring, goal planning, and system/scenario identification. Procedural actions concern skilled behavior and have parallels in guidance, navigation, and adaptation. Reflexive actions are spontaneous, inner-loop responses for control and estimation. Intelligent flight control systems learn knowledge of the aircraft and its mission and adapt to changes in the flight environment. Cognitive models form an efficient basis for integrating 'outer-loop/inner-loop' control functions and for developing robust parallel-processing algorithms

The THREAT-ARREST Cyber-Security Training Platform

Cyber security is always a main concern for critical infrastructures and nation-wide safety and sustainability. Thus, advanced cyber ranges and security training is becoming imperative for the involved organizations. This paper presets a cyber security training platform, called THREAT-ARREST. The various platform modules can analyze an organization’s system, identify the most critical threats, and tailor a training program to its personnel needs. Then, different training programmes are created based on the trainee types (i.e. administrator, simple operator, etc.), providing several teaching procedures and accomplishing diverse learning goals. One of the main novelties of THREAT-ARREST is the modelling of these programmes along with the runtime monitoring, management, and evaluation operations. The platform is generic. Nevertheless, its applicability in a smart energy case study is detailed