INF609: Systems of Systems Engineering: Assignment 1 and 2
Assignment Title: Systems of Systems and Systems of Systems Engineering: Identifying Key Research Challenges
The emergence of Systems of Systems and Systems of Systems Engineering is largely driven by global societal needs including energy-water-food nexus, population demographics, emissions and global climate, community security and safety, resource utilization, transport, globalisation of economic and social activity, etc. The scale, complexities and challenges presented by these global drivers and the emergence of SoS require us to go beyond traditional Systems Engineering approaches and practices. Systems engineers face major challenges as the scale and complexity of SoS poses unique challenges. While current existing Systems Engineering techniques and approaches have coped well in dealing with single-centric systems, they cannot be simply scaled-up to deal with challenges posed by the emergence of SoS. Indeed, the discipline of ‘systems engineering’ as is currently practiced offers little guidance. Also while the study of ‘complex systems’ offers some tools, it has no coherent approaches that are capable to deal with the scale and complexity of SoS.
Therefore, the challenges laid down by the multidimensionality of these global problems including the interconnectedness of decisions across different policy sectors require new ways of thinking, new systems engineering approaches, evolving or scaling-up existing approaches The emergence of Systems of Systems (SoS) and Systems of Systems Engineering (SoSE) presents a potential for solving many of these challenges.
The other related, but distinct, area in which many of the systems engineering research challenges are similar to SoS is Cyber-Physical Systems. These are special types of systems of systems (e.g. Smart City) that are concerned with the increasing use of embedded software and, in particular, the direct and real-time interface between the virtual and physical worlds. It is predicted that by 2020, connected devices will potentially explode to 50 billion, outnumbering connected people by a ratio of six to one. The opportunities and challenges resulting from this amplified connectivity will influence nearly everything, nearly everyone and nearly everywhere. The emergence of Internet of Things is a global phenomenon. However, this convergence of the physical and virtual worlds presents challenges of technological complexity and dangers to personal privacy and security. The kind of complexity caused by such a large network systems of systems will be too difficult to maintain and evolve well. There will also be a disruption of business models established in the 20th century most notably in finance, health care, utilities and energy, transport and logistics, manufacturing, agriculture, etc. The convergence of Cloud Computing, Internet of Things and Big Data as an ecosystem poses major challenges to be met in a wide range of issues, from privacy and security, to the governance of these complex systems as well as changing the security landscape. In many ways, Cyber Physical Systems (CPSs) share similar challenges with Systems of Systems (SoS). For example, uncertainty in the environment, security attacks, and errors in physical devices and in wireless communication pose a critical challenge to ensure overall system robustness, security, and safety. Also due to the amplified connectivity, modern societal world is already a System-of-Systems and as citizen, we have no choice with each individual citizen having their own SoS providing individual services.
The intention of this assignment is to identify critically systems engineering research challenges in SoSE. The assignment, encourages you to speculate on possible directions and the challenges faced by the research and systems engineering community that needs to start now in order to be relevant tomorrow. The emphasis is on long-term challenges in SOSE research, and ideas for attacking these challenges. The assignment is particularly looking for submissions that envision innovative solutions to cross-disciplinary challenges. So, you are encouraged to present truly visionary concepts
Some of the challenges include:
Requirements Engineering, Processes, Techniques and Tools, Modelling Approaches; Security, Requirements Traceability, Emergence Engineering, Trade-off Analysis, Standards, SoS Architectures, The Open Approach to SoS Engineering, SoS Modelling and Simulation, SoS Network Enablement, SoS Validation and Verification, SoS Qualification and Assurance, Management, Control and Operation of SoS, Complex Socio-Technical Features of SoS, SoS Performance Measurement, SoS Technical and Engineering Governance, Risk Mitigation in SoS, Training, etc
Assignment Task:
This assignment is therefore seeking for a paper reporting case studies, experience reports, practices, approaches, techniques, and guidelines. The paper will be judged on the articulation of challenges that reach beyond the current state-of-the-art and state-of-the-practice, and on the likelihood that the ideas proposed can address those challenges and define new research directions
The assignment is in two parts.
PART A: 70% - Due 8th July 2018. This part to be single-authored, i.e. no co-authorship
In this part of the assignment please discuss the current state-of-the-art and state-of-the-practice in Systems of Systems Engineering and Systems-of-Systems and then identify some long-term challenges in systems engineering research. You should then propose some ideas for overcoming those challenges and report some case studies, experience reports, practices, approaches, techniques, and guidelines that address the likelihood that the ideas proposed can address those challenges and define new research directions.
Your paper should be in IEEE double column format and should not exceed 10 pages including all text, references, appendices and figures. Papers that fail to conform to these requirements will be rejected without review.
Evaluation
Submissions will be reviewed by at least two members. The main criterion for acceptance will be the originality and innovation in the ideas presented and their underlying intuitions, and for the validity of the argumentation.
The assessment will be performed according to the following criteria: originality (25%); relevance, soundness and the rationale for the proposed ideas (25%), appropriate consideration of relevant literature (25%), and quality of presentation (25%).
PART B: 30% - Due 1st Week of September 2018
Paper Presentation to an open invited audience in a conference setting. In this part of the assignment, you should prepare a professional power point oral presentation on your research paper. Your presentation should 30 minutes long including questions from the audience. The assessment will be performed according to the following criteria: quality of presentation (25%); clarity of presentation in line with the submitted paper (20%); quality and handling the Q & A session (30%); presentation style (25%)