Collaborative Research: Geometric and Algorithmic Techniques for Design and Verification of Hybrid Control Systems

本项目旨在开发新的工具和技术，用于设计和分析复杂、分布式、可重构的航空航天嵌入式系统的高置信度软件，并将这些方法转移给本科生和研究生、其他研究人员和工业界。直接关注的问题包括在多个自主航空和航天飞行器的控制和协调中出现的问题，以及在空中交通管制中发现和解决冲突的问题。本项目开发的技术也适用于其他需要类似可靠性和性能水平的系统，如公路交通自动化系统、医疗保健系统、电网和金融服务。这个项目的主要目标是更好地理解实时软件和动态系统之间的相互作用。这将为嵌入式系统的设计和分析带来新的和强大的工具和技术，以及实时系统需求规范的改进方法。该研究的核心目标是通过在建模工作中利用底层物理系统的几何结构，并在控制律和算法的设计中保留这种结构，从而大大降低嵌入式和混合系统设计和验证的复杂性。这将使完整系统（包括其物理和软件组件）的分析变得可行，否则将难以扩展的技术，如抽象解释和模型检查，并将为有效使用基于组合推理的技术提供手段。例如，车辆动力学中的群体对称性产生了等效控制轨迹族：这样的集合称为单个车辆的运动基元，以及车辆组的运动协调基元。机动自动机是有限数量的运动原语的集合。它提供了车辆动力学的离散模型，通过提供高层次的抽象，从而大大降低了描述和控制车辆行为的复杂性，同时提供了确保物理状态保持在某些已知范围内的不变量。该项目的教育部分通过新课程和课程开发以及学生指导来实施。主要的教育目标是为本科生和研究生提供理解关键问题的知识和技能，并确保在当前和未来的航空航天信息技术领域的技术领先地位。最后，正在开发一个互动网站，在那里可以取得研究项目和课程所开发的资料和软件。

Frazzoli - Branicky AbstractThis project is aimed at the development of new tools and techniques for the design and analysis of high-confidence software for complex, distributed, reconfigurable aerospace embedded systems, and to transfer these methods to undergraduate and graduate students, other researchers, and industry. Problems of direct interest include those arising in the control and coordination of multiple autonomous air and space vehicles, and in the detection and resolution of conflicts in Air Traffic Control. The techniques developed in this project are also applicable to other systems which require similar levels of reliability and performance, such as highway traffic automation systems, health care systems, power networks, andfinancial services.The primary goal of this project is a better understanding of the interactions between real-time software and dynamical systems. This will lead to new and powerful tools and techniques for the design and analysis of embedded systems, as well as an improved approach to the requirement specification for real-time systems.The core of the research is aimed at dramatically reducing the complexity of embedded and hybrid systems design and verification by exploiting the geometric structure of the underlying physical system in the modelling effort, and by preserving this structure in the design of control laws and algorithms. This will make feasible the analysis of the complete system (including its physical and software components) by otherwise poorly scalable techniques such as abstract interpretation and model checking, and will providethe means for the effective use of techniques based on compositional reasoning. For example, group symmetries in vehicle dynamics give rise to families of equivalent controlled trajectories: such sets are called motion primitives for single vehicles, and motion coordination primitives for groups of vehicles. A maneuver automaton is a collection of a finite number of motion primitives. It provides a discrete model of the vehicle dynamics, which leads to a dramatic reduction of the complexity of describing and controlling the vehicle behavior, by providing a high level of abstraction, and at the same time providing invariants which ensure that the physical state remains within some known bounds.The educational part of the project is implemented through new course and curriculum development, and student mentoring. The main educational objective is to provide both undergraduate and graduate students with the knowledge and the skills to understand the key issues and to ensure technical leadership in the current and future aerospace information technology arenas. Finally, an interactive web site is being developed, where it is possible to access information and software developed in the research project and for the courses.