Automating the multiprocessing environment

An approach to automate the programming and operation of tree-structured networks of multiprocessor systems is discussed. A conceptual, knowledge-based operating environment is presented, and requirements for two major technology elements are identified as follows: (1) An intelligent information translator is proposed for implementating information transfer between dissimilar hardware and software, thereby enabling independent and modular development of future systems and promoting a language-independence of codes and information; (2) A resident system activity manager, which recognizes the systems capabilities and monitors the status of all systems within the environment, is proposed for integrating dissimilar systems into effective parallel processing resources to optimally meet user needs. Finally, key computational capabilities which must be provided before the environment can be realized are identified

High-speed civil transport flight- and propulsion-control technological issues

Technology advances required in the flight and propulsion control system disciplines to develop a high speed civil transport (HSCT) are identified. The mission and requirements of the transport and major flight and propulsion control technology issues are discussed. Each issue is ranked and, for each issue, a plan for technology readiness is given. Certain features are unique and dominate control system design. These features include the high temperature environment, large flexible aircraft, control-configured empennage, minimizing control margins, and high availability and excellent maintainability. The failure to resolve most high-priority issues can prevent the transport from achieving its goals. The flow-time for hardware may require stimulus, since market forces may be insufficient to ensure timely production. Flight and propulsion control technology will contribute to takeoff gross weight reduction. Similar technology advances are necessary also to ensure flight safety for the transport. The certification basis of the HSCT must be negotiated between airplane manufacturers and government regulators. Efficient, quality design of the transport will require an integrated set of design tools that support the entire engineering design team

Uncertainty Theory Based Reliability-Centric Cyber-Physical System Design

Cyber-physical systems (CPSs) are built from, and depend upon, the seamless integration of software and hardware components. The most important challenge in CPS design and verification is to design CPS to be reliable in a variety of uncertainties, i.e., unanticipated and rapidly evolving environments and disturbances. The costs, delays and reliability of the designed CPS are highly dependent on software-hardware partitioning in the design. The key challenges in partitioning CPSs is that it is difficult to formalize reliability characterization in the same way as the uncertain cost and time delay. In this paper, we propose a new CPS design paradigm for reliability assurance while coping with uncertainty. To be specific, we develop an uncertain programming model for partitioning based on the uncertainty theory, to support the assured reliability. The uncertainty effect of the cost and delay time of components to be implemented can be modeled by the uncertainty variables with uncertainty distributions, and the reliability characterization is recursively derived. We convert the uncertain programming model and customize an improved heuristic to solve the converted model. Experiment results on some benchmarks and random graphs show that the uncertain method produces the design with higher reliability. Besides, in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of our model for in coping with uncertainty in design stage, we apply this uncertain framework and existing deterministic models in the design process of a sub-system that is used in real world subway control. The system implemented based on the uncertain model works better than the result of deterministic models. The proposed design paradigm has the potential to be generalized to the design of CPSs for greater assurances of safety and security under a variety of uncertainties

System architectures for telerobotic research

Several activities are performed related to the definition and creation of telerobotic systems. The effort and investment required to create architectures for these complex systems can be enormous; however, the magnitude of process can be reduced if structured design techniques are applied. A number of informal methodologies supporting certain aspects of the design process are available. More recently, prototypes of integrated tools supporting all phases of system design from requirements analysis to code generation and hardware layout have begun to appear. Activities related to system architecture of telerobots are described, including current activities which are designed to provide a methodology for the comparison and quantitative analysis of alternative system architectures

Integrated Application of Active Controls (IAAC) technology to an advanced subsonic transport project. ACT/Control/Guidance System study, volume 1

The active control technology (ACT) control/guidance system task of the integrated application of active controls (IAAC) technology project within the NASA energy efficient transport program was documented. The air traffic environment of navigation and air traffic control systems and procedures were extrapolated. An approach to listing flight functions which will be performed by systems and crew of an ACT configured airplane of the 1990s, and a determination of function criticalities to safety of flight, are the basis of candidate integrated ACT/Control/Guidance System architecture. The system mechanizes five active control functions: pitch augmented stability, angle of attack limiting, lateral/directional augmented stability, gust load alleviation, and maneuver load control. The scope and requirements of a program for simulating the integrated ACT avionics and flight deck system, with pilot in the loop, are defined, system and crew interface elements are simulated, and mechanization is recommended. Relationships between system design and crew roles and procedures are evaluated

Civil aircraft advanced avionics architectures - an insight into saras avionics, present and future perspective

Traditionally, the avionics architectures being implemented are of federated nature, which means that each avionics function has its own independent, dedicated fault-tolerant computing resources. Federated architecture has great advantage of inherent fault containment and at the same time envelops a potential risk of massive use of resources resulting in increase in weight, looming, cost and maintenance as well. With the drastic advancement in the computer and software technologies, the aviation industry is gradually moving towards the use of Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) for civil transport aircraft, potentially leading to multiple avionics functions housed in each hardware platform. Integrated Modular Avionics is the most important concept of avionics architecture for next generation aircrafts. SARAS avionics suite is purely federated with almost glass cockpit architecture complying to FAR25. The Avionics activities from the inception to execution are governed by the regulations and procedures under the review of Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). Every phase of avionics activity has got its own technically involvement to make the system perfect. In addition the flight data handling, monitoring and analysis is again a thrust area in the civil aviation industry leading to safety and reliability of the machine and the personnel involved. NAL has been in this area for more than two decades and continues to excel in these technologies

Streamroller : A Unified Compilation and Synthesis System for Streaming Applications.

The growing complexity of applications has increased the need for higher processing power. In the embedded domain, the convergence of audio, video, and networking on a handheld device has prompted the need for low cost, low power,and high performance implementations of these applications in the form of custom hardware. In a more mainstream domain like gaming consoles, the move towards more realism in physics simulations and graphics has forced the industry towards multicore systems. Many of the applications in these domains are streaming in nature. The key challenge is to get efficient implementations of custom hardware from these applications and map these applications efficiently onto multicore architectures. This dissertation presents a unified methodology, referred to as Streamroller, that can be applied for the problem of scheduling stream programs to multicore architectures and to the problem of automatic synthesis of custom hardware for stream applications. Firstly, a method called stream-graph modulo scheduling is presented, which maps stream programs effectively onto a multicore architecture. Many aspects of a real system, like limited memory and explicit DMAs are modeled in the scheduler. The scheduler is evaluated for a set of stream programs on IBM's Cell processor. Secondly, an automated high-level synthesis system for creating custom hardware for stream applications is presented. The template for the custom hardware is a pipeline of accelerators. The synthesis involves designing loop accelerators for individual kernels, instantiating buffers to store data passed between kernels, and linking these building blocks to form a pipeline. A unique aspect of this system is the use of multifunction accelerators, which improves cost by efficiently sharing hardware between multiple kernels. Finally, a method to improve the integer linear program formulations used in the schedulers that exploits symmetry in the solution space is presented. Symmetry-breaking constraints are added to the formulation, and the performance of the solver is evaluated.Ph.D.Computer Science & EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/61662/1/kvman_1.pd

Space station systems technology study (add-on task). Volume 3: Technology advancement program plan

Program plans are given for an integrating controller for space station autonomy as well as for controls and displays. The technical approach, facility requirements and candidate facilities, development schedules, and resource requirements estimates are given

Simulation of speed tracking for brushless DC motor using fuzzy logic controller

Brushless DC motors are normally used in an automotive application, robotics, medical, industrial automation equipment and machine tools due to its advantages. The advantages are long life operation, easy to construct, noiseless operation and has a better speed performance. This project presents a simulation model for BLDC motor using MATLAB/Simulink. Usually, the speed control is achieved by using PI controller. Then, the dynamic response of the BLDC motor such as speed, torque as well as current and voltage are observed and been analyzed using the MATLAB model. It is quite hard and difficult to tune the conventional PI controller parameters. Therefore, a suitable speed controller is been developed by using MATLAB Fuzzy Logic tool box. The objectives of this project are to minimize the maximum overshoot (%OS), settling time (Ts) and also peak time (Tp). Besides, the purpose is to improve the speed performance of the motor drive system. In order to verify the effectiveness of the controller, both control algorithms (Fuzzy logic control and PID) are compared. The simulation results show that the FLC controller has better performance which has reduced and minimized the percentage of maximum overshoot, settling time, peak time and rise time compared with the used of conventional PI controller