Professional Documents
Culture Documents
A 21st Century Cyber Physical Systems Education 1st Edition and Medicine Engineering National Academies of Sciences
A 21st Century Cyber Physical Systems Education 1st Edition and Medicine Engineering National Academies of Sciences
https://ebookmeta.com/product/environmental-engineering-for-
the-21st-century-addressing-grand-challenges-1st-edition-and-
medicine-engineering-national-academies-of-sciences/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/graduate-medical-education-
outcomes-and-metrics-proceedings-of-a-workshop-1st-edition-and-
medicine-engineering-national-academies-of-sciences/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/future-financial-economics-of-
health-professional-education-proceedings-of-a-workshop-1st-
edition-and-medicine-engineering-national-academies-of-sciences/
Envisioning the Future of Health Professional Education
Workshop Summary 1st Edition And Medicine Engineering
National Academies Of Sciences
https://ebookmeta.com/product/envisioning-the-future-of-health-
professional-education-workshop-summary-1st-edition-and-medicine-
engineering-national-academies-of-sciences/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/a-new-vision-for-center-based-
engineering-research-1st-edition-and-medicine-engineering-
national-academies-of-sciences/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/measuring-trauma-workshop-
summary-1st-edition-and-medicine-engineering-national-academies-
of-sciences/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/triennial-review-of-the-national-
nanotechnology-initiative-1st-edition-and-medicine-engineering-
national-academies-of-sciences/
A 21ST CENTURY
CYBER-PHYSICAL SYSTEMS
EDUCATION
A Report of
THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS
Washington, DC
www.nap.edu
THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS 500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001
Additional copies of this report are available for sale from the
National Academies Press, 500 Fifth Street, NW, Keck 360,
Washington, DC 20001; (800) 624-6242 or (202) 334-3313; http://w
ww.nap.edu.
Staff
JON EISENBERG, Director, Computer Science and
Telecommunications Board
VIRGINIA BACON TALATI, Program Officer
SHENAE BRADLEY, Administrative Assistant
CHRISTOPHER JONES, Associate Program Officer
__________________
1 NAS, National Academy of Sciences.
2 NAE, National Academy of Engineering.
COMPUTER SCIENCE AND
TELECOMMUNICATIONS BOARD
Staff
JON EISENBERG, Director
LYNETTE I. MILLETT, Associate Director
VIRGINIA BACON TALATI, Program Officer
SHENAE BRADLEY, Administrative Assistant
JANEL DEAR, Senior Program Assistant
EMILY GRUMBLING, Program Officer
RENEE HAWKINS, Financial and Administrative Manager
CHRISTOPHER JONES, Associate Program Officer
KATIRIA ORTIZ, Research Associate
For more information on CSTB, see its website at http://www.cstb.or
g, write to CSTB, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and
Medicine, 500 Fifth Street, NW, Washington, DC 20001, call (202)
334-2605, or e-mail the CSTB at cstb@nas.edu.
Preface
BOX P.1
Statement of Task
An ad hoc committee will conduct a study on the current and
future needs in education for cyber-physical systems (CPS). Two
workshops would be convened early on to gather input and
foster dialogue, and a brief interim report would be prepared to
highlight emerging themes and summarize related discussions
from the workshops. The committee’s final report would
articulate a vision for a 2lst century CPS-capable U.S. workforce.
It would explore the corresponding educational requirements,
examine efforts already under way, and propose strategies and
programs to develop faculty and teachers, materials, and
curricula. It would consider core, cross-domain, and domain-
specific knowledge. It would consider the multiple disciplines
that are relevant to CPS and how to foster multidisciplinary
study and work. In conducting the study, the committee would
focus on undergraduate education and also consider
implications for graduate education, workforce training and
certification, community colleges, the K-12 pipeline, and
informal education. It would emphasize the skills needed for the
CPS scientific, engineering, and technical workforce but would
also consider broader needs for CPS survey courses.
The report examines the intellectual content of the emerging field
of CPS and its implications for engineering and computer science
education. Other National Academies reports have examined broader
related topics such as the future of engineering education more
generally2 and how to overcome barriers to completing 2- and 4-
year science, technology, engineering, and mathematics degrees.3
To gather perspectives on these topics, the Committee on 21st
Century Cyber-Physical Systems Education (committee biographical
information is provided in Appendix A) convened two workshops and
received briefings from additional experts (all presenters and briefers
are listed in Appendix B, and the workshop agendas are provided in
Appendix C). The committee’s interim report,4 released in 2015,
summarizes many of those presentations and discussions. This final
report also draws on an additional set of briefings (listed in Appendix
B) obtained since the interim report was issued. Informed by these
inputs as well as a review of current CPS courses, course materials,
and curricula and other information compiled for this study, the
committee’s findings and recommendations are based on the
committee’s collective judgment.
The key messages of the reports and the committee’s findings and
recommendations are presented in the Summary. Chapter 1 of this
report explores the need for CPS education, and Chapter 2 highlights
the essential knowledge and skills needed by a person developing
CPS. Chapter 3 provides examples of how these foundations in CPS
education might be integrated into various curricula, and Chapter 4
discusses how such curricula might be developed and
institutionalized.
__________________
1 Definition from National Science Foundation, 2016, “Cyber-Physical Systems,”
program solicitation 16-549, NSF document number nsf16549, March 4. https://w
ww.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=nsf16549.
2 National Academy of Engineering, 2005, Educating the Engineer of 2020:
Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century, The National Academies
Press, Washington, D.C.
3 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Barriers and
Opportunities for 2-Year and 4-Year STEM Degrees: Systemic Change to Support
Diverse Student Pathways (S. Malcom and M. Feder, eds.), The National Academies
Press, Washington, D.C., 2016, doi: 10.17226/21739.
4 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Interim Report on
21st Century Cyber-Physical Systems Education, The National Academies Press,
Washington, D.C., 2015.
Acknowledgment of Reviewers
__________________
1 NAE, National Academy of Engineering.
Contents
SUMMARY
APPENDIXES
Principles
CPS bridges engineering and physical world applications and the
computer engineering hardware and computer science cyber worlds.
Basic principles of the physical world include physics, mathematical
modeling, analysis, and algorithm and systems design and deal with
their associated uncertainty and risk. Principles of the computer
engineering and computer science (cyber) worlds deal with
embedded computation and communications hardware systems,
software programming, and networking, Because sensors are a key
hardware bridge between the physical and cyber worlds, it is
important to understand the properties of sensors and their real-
world behavior, and techniques for processing the signals they
produce. Control theory is an important tenet of CPS; relevant
elements include stability, optimization, and how to control
distributed, digital systems.
Foundations of CPS
Drawing on these principles, the committee identified the following
six key overarching intellectual foundations for a CPS curriculum:
System Characteristics
Many CPS are large, complex, and/or safety critical. Successful
development of such systems requires knowledge of how to ensure
that systems possess the following characteristics:
These topics are best introduced early and infused throughout the
CPS curriculum in coursework and projects, much as the best
practice in engineering is to address these issues from the outset of
system design.
Complementary Skills
The growing scale and complexity of engineering systems mean
that engineers are increasingly working collaboratively with experts
from multiple disciplines. “Soft” skills—in such areas as
communication, flexibility, and an ability to work on teams, including
multiple disciplines—are of particular importance for CPS engineering
because the work is inherently interdisciplinary. The pace of change
in science and engineering knowledge generally and the newness
and rapid flux of CPS suggest that CPS courses and programs
emphasizing learning and critical thinking, as well as specific
techniques and methods, are needed.
BOX S.1
Paths for Teaching Cyber-Physical Systems
FINDING 4.4: If they are to teach new CPS courses and build
CPS programs, universities will need to allocate time and
resources to develop CPS course materials and to provide the
necessary laboratory space and equipment (including both virtual
and physical testbeds).
***
__________________
1 Definition from National Science Foundation, 2016, “Cyber-Physical Systems,”
Program Solicitation 16-549, NSF document number nsf16549, March 4, https://w
ww.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=nsf16549.
2 The committee uses the terms “CPS engineering” and “CPS engineer” to mean
a set of skills and knowledge needed to design and build a CPS and a person with
those skills; the terms are not limited to a set of credentials or to someone who
has a degree or certification in CPS.
1
BOX 1.1
Areas Related to Cyber-Physical Systems
The field of cyber-physical systems (CPS) is closely related to
other fields and underpins several important technical visions.
BOX 1.2
A CPS-Enabled Future
Cyber-physical systems (CPS) can be used to provide
economically or societally important capabilities in the following
areas:
Transportation. CPS is already used in automobiles that can
sense impending crashes and perform various tasks to
protect passengers. CPS technologies promise to greatly
reduce the annual death toll from car crashes caused by
human error and to reduce greatly the time wasted and
pollution generated by highway congestion. CPS
technologies for aviation and airport safety technology
could relieve congestion and enable safe integration of
autonomous air vehicles into U.S. airspace.
Manufacturing. The complexity of what can be designed
and built and what society demands is constantly
increasing. The time scale for product development cycles
is decreasing, even as product variety is increasing. CPS
technologies could enhance both product design (e.g., by
defining more functionality through software) and
manufacturing (e.g., by enabling more capable or efficient
manufacturing facilities).
Health care. CPS are found in today’s medical devices that
can sense glucose levels or heart rhythm abnormalities and
intervene to restore normal body function Applied more
broadly, CPS will help to scale access to care for a growing
aging population. CPS formal specification and verification
techniques could help in the design of more cost-effective,
easier-to-certify, and safer medical products.
Energy. Renewable electric energy resources are
intermittent and uncertain, necessitating new sensors,
switches, and meters, and also an infrastructure for
realizing an adaptive, secure, resilient, efficient, and cost-
effective electricity distribution system that allows
consumers to manage their energy use.
Agriculture. With global population projected to surpass 9
billion people by 2050, an uncertain and changing climate
future, and up to one third of food lost between production
and consumption,1 systems that generate food, fiber, feed,
and biofuels need to be more efficient. CPS technologies
could increase sustainability and efficiency (less waste)
throughout the value chain.
__________________
1 Food and Agriculture Organization, 2011, Global Food Losses and Food
Waste, Rome, Italy, http://www.fao.org/food-loss-and-food-waste/en/, p. v.
BOX 1.3
Global Investments in CPS Research
The following are examples of long-term research initiatives
in cyber-physical systems (CPS):
BOX 1.4
Comments on Industry Need for a CPS-Capable
Workforce
Workshop participants and briefers to the committee from
several industry sectors provided many comments about the
growing importance of CPS in industry and the resulting
demand for CPS skills. These included the following:
“B. O.
“Major-General Sir Thomas Brisbane was much pleased this
day with the general appearance and movements of the
Eighty-Eighth Regiment. He cannot refrain from expressing
how much, and how sincerely he regrets losing a regiment with
which he has so long served, and which has conducted itself
so creditably since its arrival in this country; but he confidently
looks forward to have it again in his brigade. The circumstance
of the regiment never having lost a man by desertion is highly
honourable to it, and can never be forgotten by the Major-
General.
(Signed) “J. Campbell,
“Brigade-Major.
“St. John’s, May 26, 1815.”
1816
1817
From January, 1816, to the end of the spring, 1817, the Eighty-
Eighth was in garrison at Valenciennes, when it returned to Great
Britain, and was quartered in Edinburgh about two years. Some time
after its arrival in Scotland, a letter was received from Lieutenant-
General the Honourable Sir Charles Colville, who had frequently had
it under his command, as part of the third division, in the Peninsula,
and more recently during its stay at Valenciennes, “expressing his
hearty wish for the honour and well-being of the regiment in
whatever situation it may be placed, and requesting the Officers,
Non-Commissioned Officers and Privates, to accept his thanks for
the ready attention paid to his orders during the period the regiment
was under his command.”
1818
“Garrison Orders.
“Brigade-Major’s Office, Corfu,
“Sept. 18th, 1828.
“Major-General Woodford will not allow the Eighty-Eighth
regiment to embark without his expressing the satisfaction he
feels at the invariably good conduct the regiment has
maintained in the garrison. Its interior order and general
soldier-like appearance sufficiently evince the assiduous
attention which has been bestowed on the regulation and
discipline of the corps. The Major-General feels this tribute to
be due to Lieutenant-Colonel O’Malley, and he requests he will
communicate his sentiments to the regiment.”
1830
“Sir,
“I have had the honour to submit to the General
Commanding-in-Chief your letter of the 22nd instant with its
enclosures, and am directed to acquaint you, that under the
circumstances therein stated, his Lordship has been pleased to
obtain his Majesty’s permission, that the Eighty-Eighth
Regiment, or ‘Connaught Rangers,’ may retain on its colours
and appointments the Harp and Crown, with the motto ‘Quis
separabit?’ in addition to the badges and devices which it has
been authorized to bear in commemoration of its distinguished
services on various occasions.
“I have, &c.,
“John Macdonald, A.G.
“Colonel O’Malley, Eighty-Eighth Regiment.”
“Gentlemen,
“Receive and guard with fidelity, in every danger, these
Colours which I have the honour of presenting to you! May the
Almighty protect and prosper you in this sacred duty, and may
you live to be distinguished in your country’s service!”