Piloting an aircraft is popularly described as hours of abject boredom punctuated by periods of abject terror. Similarly, a spacecraft in transit to a distant target remains largely dormant but for periodic heightened activity required for maintenance and staying on course. Aircraft and spacecraft are complex systems of systems that must seamlessly work together, switching control through a carefully orchestrated hierarchy representing different levels of abstraction, e.g., exemplified by different timescales for events. Each on-board system presents its own verification challenge; verifying that the symphony of all of them playing together at the same time, in the face of potentially unexpected environmental inputs, is particularly daunting. We can supplement design-time verification with efficient runtime verification engines, but they need to grow to be able to reason about the hierarchical nature of complex systems-of-systems, where single requirements may need to encapsulate multiple levels of abstraction. The final result must be able to execute in real time, within system resource constraints. Existing tools for runtime verification aren't capable of obeying constraints imposed by running them on real systems (or in real missions), and don't have parameters to focus their computational demands on the tasks most impactful on system safety. Achieving safe CPS depends on growing the tools and algorithms of real-time verification to integrate realistic safety checks into their control architectures and dynamic environments.

This project adapts techniques from formal methods, control theory, hardware-software integration, and software engineering to design runtime monitors that inspect cyber-physical systems of systems without interfering with their normal operation. The project designs, analyzes, and implements fundamental runtime verification techniques by dealing with three general and orthogonal problems: mixed-abstraction-level granularity in specifications, resource-awareness to ensure non-intrusiveness of runtime monitors, and augmenting monitors with model-prediction to enable on-deadline mitigation triggering. Key innovations stem from this rigorous foundation in establishing a new formal semantics for hierarchical, mixed-abstraction-level specification, and evaluating formal specifications without interfering with the system's normal operation, while maximizing utilization of resources within realistic constraints of embedded CPS. The project generalizes the new theory into specification patterns for hierarchical functional requirements and synthesize predictive models to enable better, more automated creation of runtime verification configurations to meet scalability demands of modern CPS. Flight tests of small aircraft swarms are used to validate this approach.

Origami-inspired structures that fold flat sheets along creases with designed patterns to create transformable structures have been widely applied in science and engineering, especially in space operations, e.g., for deployment of folded solar panels equipped on launched satellites. Although the deformation process plays an essential role in transitions between the origami states, few studies focus on the control and actuation of the origami folding mechanism toward high autonomy of the deformation process. This project aims to develop an autonomous origami-inspired transformable system to enable high-performance deformation maneuvering in space operations requiring frequent and/or time-responsive shape changes. The integrative research incorporating theory, analysis, algorithm development, and experimental verification will contribute to a theoretical and experimental platform to advance the autonomy of origami system operations in challenging environments. The research products will have significant impacts on the proliferated satellite marketplace where low mass, small volume, and adaptable structures/subsystems of space vehicles are in demand. Going beyond the applications in space missions, origami-inspired transformable systems have much broader applications in science and engineering. Moreover, the collaboration of experts in both cyber and physical areas promotes the creation of interdisciplinary products that bridge different disciplines.

Origami-inspired structures that fold flat sheets along creases with designed patterns to create transformable structures have been widely applied in science and engineering, especially in space operations, e.g., for deployment of folded solar panels equipped on launched satellites. Although the deformation process plays an essential role in transitions between the origami states, few studies focus on the control and actuation of the origami folding mechanism toward high autonomy of the deformation process. This project aims to develop an autonomous origami-inspired transformable system to enable high-performance deformation maneuvering in space operations requiring frequent and/or time-responsive shape changes. The integrative research incorporating theory, analysis, algorithm development, and experimental verification will contribute to a theoretical and experimental platform to advance the autonomy of origami system operations in challenging environments. The research products will have significant impacts on the proliferated satellite marketplace where low mass, small volume, and adaptable structures/subsystems of space vehicles are in demand. Going beyond the applications in space missions, origami-inspired transformable systems have much broader applications in science and engineering. Moreover, the collaboration of experts in both cyber and physical areas promotes the creation of interdisciplinary products that bridge different disciplines.

This project proposes a novel cyber-physical paradigm for enhancing the security in networks of advanced robots from external malicious cyber attacks (and internal non-malicious malfunctions as well). Such systems have tremendous potential for improved productivity, but also carry new risks: malicious actors could exploit the connectivity of the devices to carry out attacks with consequences in the physical world.
The core idea of this project is to provide a novel layer of security against such threats by designing distributed security specifications based on introspection: agents use physical-sensing capabilities to surveil the behaviors of other agents in the team in addition to the task-specific mission objective. Such specifications will offer an additional layer of protection in emerging applications with networked robots.

This project aims to create a cyber physical system for remotely controlling cellular processes in real time and leverage the biomedical potential of synthetic biology and microrobotics to create pancreatic tissue. With 114,000 people currently on the waitlist for a lifesaving organ transplant in the United States alone, the ability to directly produce patient-compatible organs, obviating the need for animal and clinical studies can revolutionize personalized medicine. Tissues in the human body such as liver, kidney, and pancreatic islets comprise cells arranged in complex patterns spanning both 2D and 3D structures. However, scaffold- and microgel-based tissue engineering approaches along with 3D bioprinting are often unable to create these complex 3D structures. In this project, the team focuses on the pancreas, which has a unique anatomical structure composed of the regular arrangement of circular cell clusters called islets. The proposed research aims at overcoming the hurdle of recreating these spatial patterns in vitro by developing a cyber physical process by which swarms of microrobots will be steered in 3D to regulate the differentiation of genetically engineered stem cells and drive these cells into forming desired pancreatic tissue. The broader impacts of this line of work are significant because it is a key first step in the synthesis of new, or the repair of ailing, human organs, providing for interactive behavior between computer controlled microrobots and genetically programmed stem cells. Manufacturing living tissue is revolutionary as it could act as a bridge between preclinical and clinical trials, to ensure better drug testing models and develop more personalized precision medicine. For pancreatic components, in particular, generating human organoids compliant with pharmaceutical standards is an exceptional challenge, and current methods are laborious, time-consuming, expensive, and irreproducible, which has caused industry to shy away from this organ. The education and outreach activities that complement the research component of this project address the need to increase underrepresented minorities (that is, women and under-served populations) in problem-solving research careers, like Engineering in K-12.

Smartwatch-like wearables have enabled seamless tracking of vital signs and physical activities, but still lack a significant feature: they are currently unable to provide any information about brain states or to modulate brain function for optimizing human health and performance. This project aims to make it possible for wearables to feature such capabilities. Being aware of brain states is not only extremely valuable in clinical studies but is also crucial to improving human performance in various everyday life activities. While recording neural signals directly from the scalp region is possible, it is impractical for use in everyday life. In order to fill this gap, the goal of this project is to pioneer a closed-loop brain-aware wearable architecture called MINDWATCH. This enables (1) decoding multidimensional brain states from noninvasive wearable devices and (2) applying corrective control. MINDWATCH will transform healthcare delivery (e.g., aging, autism, dementia) as well as human performance and productivity enhancement (e.g., online learning, smart workplaces). For instance, knowledge of mental health and cognitive engagement can enable detecting if a student is depressed or is not cognitively engaged/learning, which makes it possible to take corrective action early on. The research is integrated with educational and outreach activities with an emphasis on increasing the participation of minorities in science and engineering. These activities include hosting hands-on STEM K12 events, supervising undergraduate research interns and capstone senior design projects, creating educational videos, and interdisciplinary course development.

Origami-inspired structures that fold flat sheets along creases with designed patterns to create transformable structures have been widely applied in science and engineering, especially in space operations, e.g., for deployment of folded solar panels equipped on launched satellites. Although the deformation process plays an essential role in transitions between the origami states, few studies focus on the control and actuation of the origami folding mechanism toward high autonomy of the deformation process. This project aims to develop an autonomous origami-inspired transformable system to enable high-performance deformation maneuvering in space operations requiring frequent and/or time-responsive shape changes. The integrative research incorporating theory, analysis, algorithm development, and experimental verification will contribute to a theoretical and experimental platform to advance the autonomy of origami system operations in challenging environments. The research products will have significant impacts on the proliferated satellite marketplace where low mass, small volume, and adaptable structures/subsystems of space vehicles are in demand. Going beyond the applications in space missions, origami-inspired transformable systems have much broader applications in science and engineering. Moreover, the collaboration of experts in both cyber and physical areas promotes the creation of interdisciplinary products that bridge different disciplines.

This research will create and validate new approaches for optimally managing mobile observational networks consisting of a renewably powered ?host? agent and ?satellite? agents that are deployed from and recharged by the host. Such networks can enable autonomous, long-term measurements for meteorological, climate change, reconnaissance, and surveillance applications, which are of significant national interest. While the hardware exists for such networks, the vast majority of existing mission planning and control approaches treat energy as a finite resource and focus on finite-duration missions. This research will represent a paradigm shift, wherein the energy resource available to the network is renewable, but the instantaneously available power is limited. This demands strategies that continuously trade off energy harvesting and scientific information gathering. This research will establish a comprehensive framework for managing the aforementioned tradeoffs, with both simulation-based and experimental demonstrations. The specific observational framework considered in this work will involve a fleet of solar-powered autonomous surface vessels, unoccupied aerial vehicles, and undersea gliders to for characterizing atmospheric and oceanic interactions between the deep-ocean and near-shore waters adjacent to North Carolina's Outer Banks. The research will be complemented with targeted internship activities, K-12 outreach activities at The Engineering Place at NC State, and outreach activities with the Detroit Area Pre-College Engineering Program.

We are entering an age of unprecedented access to information, where transformational methodologies are demonstrating a clear vision of an autonomy-driven future. Self-driving cars, precision agriculture, robotic monitoring, and infrastructure inspection are but a few areas experiencing an autonomy revolution. To continue in this promising direction, it is critical that we facilitate the safe and reliable coordination of diverse cyber-physical systems (CPS).
Unfortunately, at present there is a wide gap in our understanding that limits this goal: a stark divide exists between algorithms for decision-making, sensing, and motion, and underlying computational resources. This project therefore seeks to define computation-aware autonomy by answering the following questions: (1) How does an environment impact computation? (2) How should autonomy adapt to improve computational awareness? (3) How are computational resources optimized at run-time in support of autonomy? and (4) How is autonomy software rendered resilient to errors? This project aims to answer these questions through optimization, computational resource management, and software resilience, with evaluation in an outdoor robotic testbed. Finally, the broader impacts of this work include: (1) K-12 academic experiences for underrepresented students in collaboration with Virginia Tech's Center for Enhancement of Engineering Diversity; (2) autonomy curriculum and design projects; and (3) participation in a series of symposiums through the Ridge and Valley chapter of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International.

This project explores frameworks, tools, and methodologies that enable fairness-aware, privacy-aware, society-in-the-loop, personalized Internet-of-Things (IoT) systems. Thanks to the rapid growth in mobile computing and wearable technologies, monitoring complex human context becomes feasible, which paves the way to develop human-in-the-loop IoT systems that naturally evolve to adapt to the human and environment state autonomously. Nevertheless, as we move forward towards a long-standing desire to build effective, pervasive computing systems that are both autonomous and personalized, we can push the envelope of these systems to have a positive collateral effect on society. We can design the personalized systems that are aware of and can mutually adapt to the context of their surroundings for the collective benefit of the users. This requires new computation paradigms and algorithms to achieve our vision for society-in-the-loop personalized computing.