CPS: Medium: Collaborative Research: Data-Driven Modeling and Preview-Based Control for Cyber-Physical System Safety

This project will develop the theory and algorithmic tools for the design of provably-safe controllers that can leverage preview information from different sources. Many autonomous or semi-autonomous cyber-physical systems (CPS) are equipped with mechanisms that provide a window of projecting into the future. These mechanisms can be forward looking sensors like cameras (and corresponding perception algorithms), map information, forecast information, or more complicated predictive models of external agents learned from data. Through these mechanisms, at run-time, the systems have a preview of what lies ahead. Leveraging this information to improve performance of CPS while keeping strong guarantees on their safety, therefore, holds great promise for multiple technologies of national interest. We will use driver-assist systems in connected vehicles as the main application. Education and outreach activities will involve undergraduate and graduate students along with stakeholders from local automotive companies. To develop the theory for learning- and prediction-enabled safety for CPS we will: (i) develop a modeling formalism, namely preview automata, for systems with preview information and correct-by-construction control algorithms that consider structured inaccuracies in the predictions for resilience; (ii) investigate how cooperation can assist in enriching the preview information; (iii) learn, via finite-sample data analysis, trustworthy dynamical models of the behaviors of non-cooperative agents with provable uncertainty bounds; and (iv) design methods for selecting compatible models from the learned dynamical models and for deriving safe controllers in the presence of cooperative and non-cooperative agents. Our innovations will enable safety-critical CPS to take full advantage of emerging technologies on sensing, perception, communication, and learning. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.