Measuring Thermal Profiles in High Explosives using Neural Networks

We present a new method for calculating the temperature profile in high explosive (HE) material using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). To train/test the CNN, we have developed a hybrid experiment/simulation method for collecting acoustic and temperature data. We experimentally heat cylindrical containers of HE material until detonation/deflagration, where we continuously measure the acoustic bursts through the HE using multiple acoustic transducers lined around the exterior container circumference. However, measuring the temperature profile in the HE in experiment would require inserting a high number of thermal probes, which would disrupt the heating process. Thus, we use two thermal probes, one at the HE center and one at the wall. We then use finite element simulation of the heating process to calculate the temperature distribution, and correct the simulated temperatures based on the experimental center and wall temperatures. We calculate temperature errors on the order of 15{\deg}C, which is approximately 12% of the range of temperatures in the experiment. We also investigate how the algorithm accuracy is affected by the number of acoustic receivers used to collect each measurement and the resolution of the temperature prediction. This work provides a means of assessing the safety status of HE material, which cannot be achieved using existing temperature measurement methods. Additionally, it has implications for range of other applications where internal temperature profile measurements would provide critical information. These applications include detecting chemical reactions, observing thermodynamic processes like combustion, monitoring metal or plastic casting, determining the energy density in thermal storage capsules, and identifying abnormal battery operation

Techniques and Patterns for Safe and Efficient Real-Time Middleware

Over 90 percent of all microprocessors are now used for real-time and embedded applications. The behavior of these applications is often constrained by the physical world. It is therefore important to devise higher-level languages and middleware that meet conventional functional requirements, as well as dependably and productively enforce real-time constraints. Real-Time Java is emerging as a safe, real-time environment. In this thesis we use it as our experimentation platform; however, our findings are easily adapted to other similar platforms. This thesis provides the following contributions to the study of safe and efficient real-time middleware. First, it identifies potential bottlenecks and problem with respect to guaranteeing real-time performance in middleware. Second, it presents a series of techniques and patterns that allow the design and implementation of safe, predictable, and highly efficient real-time middleware. Third, it provides a set of architectural and design patterns that application developers can use when designing real-time systems. Finally, it provides a methodology for evaluating the merits and benefits of real-time middleware. Empirical results are presented using that methodology for the techniques presented in this thesis. The methodology helps compare the performance and predictability of general, real-time middleware platforms

A Three-Tier Approach for Composition of Real-Time Embedded Software Stacks

CORE A.International audienceMany component models and frameworks have been proposed to abstract and capture concerns from Real-Time and Embedded application domains, based on high-level component-based approaches. However, these approaches tend to propose their own fixed-set abstractions and ad-hoc runtime platforms, whereas the current trend emphasizes more flexible solutions, as embedded systems must constantly integrate new functionalities, while preserving performance. In this paper, we present a two-fold contribution addressing this statement. First, we propose to express these concerns in a decoupled way from the commonly accepted structural abstractions inherent to CBSE, and provide a framework to implement them in open and extensible runtime containers. Second, we propose a three-tier approach to composition where application, containers and the underlying operating system are designed using components. Supporting a homogeneous design space allows applying optimization techniques at these three abstraction layers showing that our approach does not impact on performance. In this paper, we focus our evaluation on concerns specific to the field of real-time audio and music applications

Anpassen verteilter eingebetteter Anwendungen im laufenden Betrieb

The availability of third-party apps is among the key success factors for software ecosystems: The users benefit from more features and innovation speed, while third-party solution vendors can leverage the platform to create successful offerings. However, this requires a certain decoupling of engineering activities of the different parties not achieved for distributed control systems, yet. While late and dynamic integration of third-party components would be required, resulting control systems must provide high reliability regarding real-time requirements, which leads to integration complexity. Closing this gap would particularly contribute to the vision of software-defined manufacturing, where an ecosystem of modern IT-based control system components could lead to faster innovations due to their higher abstraction and availability of various frameworks. Therefore, this thesis addresses the research question: How we can use modern IT technologies and enable independent evolution and easy third-party integration of software components in distributed control systems, where deterministic end-to-end reactivity is required, and especially, how can we apply distributed changes to such systems consistently and reactively during operation? This thesis describes the challenges and related approaches in detail and points out that existing approaches do not fully address our research question. To tackle this gap, a formal specification of a runtime platform concept is presented in conjunction with a model-based engineering approach. The engineering approach decouples the engineering steps of component definition, integration, and deployment. The runtime platform supports this approach by isolating the components, while still offering predictable end-to-end real-time behavior. Independent evolution of software components is supported through a concept for synchronous reconfiguration during full operation, i.e., dynamic orchestration of components. Time-critical state transfer is supported, too, and can lead to bounded quality degradation, at most. The reconfiguration planning is supported by analysis concepts, including simulation of a formally specified system and reconfiguration, and analyzing potential quality degradation with the evolving dataflow graph (EDFG) method. A platform-specific realization of the concepts, the real-time container architecture, is described as a reference implementation. The model and the prototype are evaluated regarding their feasibility and applicability of the concepts by two case studies. The first case study is a minimalistic distributed control system used in different setups with different component variants and reconfiguration plans to compare the model and the prototype and to gather runtime statistics. The second case study is a smart factory showcase system with more challenging application components and interface technologies. The conclusion is that the concepts are feasible and applicable, even though the concepts and the prototype still need to be worked on in future -- for example, to reach shorter cycle times.Eine große Auswahl von Drittanbieter-Lösungen ist einer der Schlüsselfaktoren für Software Ecosystems: Nutzer profitieren vom breiten Angebot und schnellen Innovationen, während Drittanbieter über die Plattform erfolgreiche Lösungen anbieten können. Das jedoch setzt eine gewisse Entkopplung von Entwicklungsschritten der Beteiligten voraus, welche für verteilte Steuerungssysteme noch nicht erreicht wurde. Während Drittanbieter-Komponenten möglichst spät -- sogar Laufzeit -- integriert werden müssten, müssen Steuerungssysteme jedoch eine hohe Zuverlässigkeit gegenüber Echtzeitanforderungen aufweisen, was zu Integrationskomplexität führt. Dies zu lösen würde insbesondere zur Vision von Software-definierter Produktion beitragen, da ein Ecosystem für moderne IT-basierte Steuerungskomponenten wegen deren höherem Abstraktionsgrad und der Vielzahl verfügbarer Frameworks zu schnellerer Innovation führen würde. Daher behandelt diese Dissertation folgende Forschungsfrage: Wie können wir moderne IT-Technologien verwenden und unabhängige Entwicklung und einfache Integration von Software-Komponenten in verteilten Steuerungssystemen ermöglichen, wo Ende-zu-Ende-Echtzeitverhalten gefordert ist, und wie können wir insbesondere verteilte Änderungen an solchen Systemen konsistent und im Vollbetrieb vornehmen? Diese Dissertation beschreibt Herausforderungen und verwandte Ansätze im Detail und zeigt auf, dass existierende Ansätze diese Frage nicht vollständig behandeln. Um diese Lücke zu schließen, beschreiben wir eine formale Spezifikation einer Laufzeit-Plattform und einen zugehörigen Modell-basierten Engineering-Ansatz. Dieser Ansatz entkoppelt die Design-Schritte der Entwicklung, Integration und des Deployments von Komponenten. Die Laufzeit-Plattform unterstützt den Ansatz durch Isolation von Komponenten und zugleich Zeit-deterministischem Ende-zu-Ende-Verhalten. Unabhängige Entwicklung und Integration werden durch Konzepte für synchrone Rekonfiguration im Vollbetrieb unterstützt, also durch dynamische Orchestrierung. Dies beinhaltet auch Zeit-kritische Zustands-Transfers mit höchstens begrenzter Qualitätsminderung, wenn überhaupt. Rekonfigurationsplanung wird durch Analysekonzepte unterstützt, einschließlich der Simulation formal spezifizierter Systeme und Rekonfigurationen und der Analyse der etwaigen Qualitätsminderung mit dem Evolving Dataflow Graph (EDFG). Die Real-Time Container Architecture wird als Referenzimplementierung und Evaluationsplattform beschrieben. Zwei Fallstudien untersuchen Machbarkeit und Nützlichkeit der Konzepte. Die erste verwendet verschiedene Varianten und Rekonfigurationen eines minimalistischen verteilten Steuerungssystems, um Modell und Prototyp zu vergleichen sowie Laufzeitstatistiken zu erheben. Die zweite Fallstudie ist ein Smart-Factory-Demonstrator, welcher herausforderndere Applikationskomponenten und Schnittstellentechnologien verwendet. Die Konzepte sind den Studien nach machbar und nützlich, auch wenn sowohl die Konzepte als auch der Prototyp noch weitere Arbeit benötigen -- zum Beispiel, um kürzere Zyklen zu erreichen

Investigation of Real-Time Operating Systems: OSEK/VDX and Rubus

The aim of this work was to investigate the possibilities and consequences for Haldex Traction of starting to use the OSEK/VDX standard for realtime operating systems. This report contains a summary of the realtime operating system documents produced by OSEK/VDX. OSEK/VDX is a committee that produces standards for realtime operating systems in the European vehicle industry. The report also contains a market evaluation of different OSEK/VDX realtime operating systems. The main differences between OSEK/VDX OS and a realtime operating system named Rubus OS are also discussed. There is a design suggestion of how to change an application that runs under Rubus OS to make it work with an OSEK/VDX OS. Finally a test of changing a small test application's realtime operating system from Rubus OS to the OSEK OS osCAN is presented

Molybdenum Oxide/Antimony Nanobelts Embedded in Asymmetric Membranes for Use as High-Capacity Lithium/Sodium-Ion Battery Anodes

Lithium-ion batteries (LIB) are a key aspect of our daily lives, from smartphones to electric vehicles. Commercially available LIB use graphite anodes due to their reliability and safety. Graphite anodes present one key disadvantage: a relatively low theoretical capacity of 372 mAh g-1. It is of great importance that new research focuses on high-capacity anode materials to further our sustainability and usage of LIB. While increasing the performance of LIB is of great interest, developing alternative energy storage devices is gaining attention in academia and industry R&D. Sodium has become a topic of interest in recent years due to sodium’s much higher abundance relative to lithium. Intensive research has been done on one-dimensional morphologies of anode materials, such as nanobelts for lithium/sodium-ion batteries alike. One-dimensional electrode materials are believed to provide superior cycling performance due to the continuous framework for electron transfer they provide. To increase the performance of LIB, molybdenum oxides are considered due to the relatively high theoretical capacity of 838 mAh g-1 for molybdenum dioxide (MoO2). MoO2 has one significant flaw: upon lithiation, a severe volume expansion is experienced. To accommodate this volume expansion we present a scalable, low-cost method of embedding MoO2 nanoplatelets and nanobelts into a conductive carbon asymmetric membrane structure. The large voids within the asymmetric membrane structure can provide an area for the active materials to undergo volume expansion without damaging the electrode. Anodes consisting of both MoO2 nanoplatelets and nanobelts exhibit excellent capacity retentions of 97.3% and 97.4%, respectively, after nearly 160 cycles. In spite of the difference in morphologies used, we have found that the incorporation of either morphology into asymmetric membranes presents highly stable anode materials, as the lithium-ion diffusion is a limiting factor. We also present promising preliminary findings of antimony nanomaterials embedded in asymmetric membranes for sodium-ion battery anodes. It has been determined that the choice of polymer, active material concentration/morphology, and surface coating play important roles in the performance of the anodes. These two projects can further our understanding of LIB/SIB anode materials, as well as present promising alternatives to commercially available energy storage devices