New Research Lab: Dependable Embedded Systems Lab (DES Lab)

I will manage a new research lab that has been launched by TU Graz and Silicon Austria Labs (SAL). The TU Graz - SAL Dependable Embedded Systems Lab (DES Lab) will carry out fundamental research in order to provide dependability of modern computer-based systems. Top computer scientists from TU Graz will be working here together with researchers from SAL on the development of new methods to make intelligent and networked systems more dependable (safety, security, availability, correctness, ...). To this end, the DES Lab will conduct interdisciplinary basic research in the areas of testing, verification, machine learning, optimisation and hardware-related software development with a special focus on security and dependability.

Idea and Motivation. With recent advances in Internet connectivity, network enabled devices have become a substantial part of our everyday lives, extending into areas of increasing importance and criticality. Consequently, those systems must meet high standards with respect to dependability: Systems must be secure, safe, correct, reliable, maintainable, adaptable, and robust. However, these requirements for dependability are challenged by the growing complexity of modern embedded systems. On one hand, embedded systems are integrated into systems of systems that pool their resources and capabilities in order to offer more functionality and performance than simply the sum of its constituents. On the other hand, we face a paradigm shift towards more intelligent and highly adaptive systems where quality guarantees are hard to achieve. The opportunities seem unlimited, and yet these characteristics appear to be overwhelming in their complexity that any assurances of dependability seem out of reach. 

1. Our answer to this problem is twofold: dependable embedded systems require rigor: the complexity has to be mastered by precise abstraction techniques that enable compositional specification and verification; 
2.  smart embedded systems demand smart development methods: the complexity due to “intelligent” software has to be mastered by new "intelligent" and rigorous software and methods.

The following researchers from TU Graz together with researchers from SAL will collaborate in the DES Lab: 

• Bernhard K. Aichernig
• Roderick Bloem
• Marcel Baunach
• Robert Legenstein
• Stefan Mangard
• Thomas Pock

Further information on the general idea behind the joint research labs can be found in the press release.