Systems Engineering Research
Systems Engineering and Integration Lab
Director: John Baras; Associate Director: Mark Austin
Component-Based System
Design and Synthesis Process
Example: Networked Control – Swarms
•  Component-based Architectures
•  Communication vs Performance
Tradeoffs
•  Distributed asynchronous
•  Fundamental limits
•  First 25-50 years of the 21st century will be dominated by
advances in methods and tools for the synthesis of complex
engineered systems to meet specifications in an adaptive
manner
•  Evident from the areas emphasized by governments, industry and
funding agencies world-wide:
– energy and smart grids
– environment and
sustainability
– biotechnology
– intelligent buildings and cars
– systems biology – customizable health care
– nanotechnology – pharmaceutical manufacturing
innovation
– the new Internet – broadband wireless networks
– collaborative robotics
– sensor networks
– software critical systems
– transportation systems
– homeland security
– security-privacyauthentication
in wireless networks
– materials design at
– cyber-physical systems
sub-molecular level
– network science – web-based social and economic
networks
•  Encounter frequently system of systems
•  Complexity manifests itself through heterogeneity of
subsystems and components
•  The synthesis of complex engineered systems from
components so as to meet specifications: The next frontier in
engineering research and education
•  Advances in IT play a critical role in accomplishing this vision:
namely networked embedded systems (NEMS)
•  Heterogeneity of various physical components is translated
into a common language where design can be integrated
•  NEMS have revolutionized cars, networks, energy, biology
and many other fields; at scales from nano to macro
•  Implied programmability and re-programmability has
immense consequences
Example: Dynamic Network Trust
Example: Broadband Wireless -Shaping Societies and Civilization
System of Systems or
Network of Networks
●  Integrate: network
management, security,
routing, MAC, networks …
•  Innovative services
•  Net centricity
●
Hybrid MANET and
WSN
Component Based Networking
Example: FAA NextGen
Example: Automotive Control
Systems --The Future
•  Multiple Interacting Graphs
– Nodes: agents, individuals,
groups, organizations
– Directed graphs
– Links: ties, relationships
– Weights on links : value (strength,
significance) of tie
– Weights on nodes : importance of
node (agent)
•  Value directed graphs with
weighted nodes
•  Real-life problems: Dynamic,
time varying graphs, relations,
weights
Social/Cognitive
Information
Comms
Organizational needs
Network architecture
and operation
Example: Systems Biology -- The
Ultimate Systems Challenge
SYSTEMS BIOLOGY
Integrative approach in
which scientists study
pathways and networks
will touch all areas of
biology, including drug
discovery
Requires
•  Quantitative models of
properties of components
and their interactions
•  Computational methods to
manage complexity