Grant: Alliance Grants

Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) are typically distributed systems running and communicating on different hardware/devices (e.g., drones, vehicles, satellites, aircafts) each having different capabilities (e.g., size, weight, power, etc.). Hence, CPS systems are inherently sophisticated and complex making their maintenance and evolution more challenging compared to conventional software. This prevents CPSs from making major changes or from modernizing their stack and used technologies. A typical example of major changes is the modernization and migration of communication technology among the different components of a CPS, which connect the cyber and physical worlds. With data being a 'first-class citizen' in CPSs, the modernization of the way data flows among the components is critical. Yet, such a modernization is risky since the system itself often suffers from a large amount of defects and accumulated technical debt as well as inefficient development and operations (DevOps) pipelines that make the CPS more difficult to maintain and evolve. This collaborative research project will develop approaches, solutions and tools to enable assisting CPS systems through an efficient, secure, and fast modernization of their Stack, including the communication among the CPS components, software quality assurance, and improving development pipelines/processes in a cost effective and scalable manner. Such solutions will leverage various AI-based techniques to streamline the complex process of maintaining and evolving CPS systems that small to large-sized companies in Canada experience in the software industry sector. Both the industrial (Ultra TCS) and academic (ÉTS Montreal) partners are world-recognized leaders in software engineering. The research builds on their extensive experience and will train eleven HQPs in software engineering, cyber physical systems, and artificial intelligence, as well as essential communication and presentation skills. It will also dig the foundations of a major CPS software engineering research hub in the region of Montreal that will also benefit to broader Canadian industrial sectors.