Tag: dse2.0

William Ford Successfully Defends Master Thesis on Network Delay Models for dCPS

Posted on by bennyakesson

On Wednesday, William Ford, a master student from VU/UvA defended his master thesis “Network Delay Model Creation and Validation for Design Space Exploration of Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems“. This thesis was executed in the context of the MasCot project DSE2.0 and was supervised by Benny and Faezeh Sadat Saadatmand, PhD student at Leiden University.

William’s thesis focuses on improving the development process of complex distributed cyber-physical systems (dCPS), such as the equipment developed by high-tech companies like ASML, Canon Production Printing, and Philips. Building physical prototypes for these systems is complex and costly, so the thesis explores automated and scalable model-based Design Space Exploration (DSE) as a solution. The research addresses the challenge of modeling network delays in dCPS, aiming to create models that balance speed and accuracy for DSE purposes. The methodology includes formalizing network topology and traffic concepts, resulting in an open-source framework for synthetic network generation called GeNSim. Three analytical network delay models—Constant Delay, Constant Bandwidth, and Latency-Rate, and a simulation-based approach using the INET framework—are proposed and evaluated synthetic networks and an industry case study at ASML. The findings reveal that each model has its strengths and weaknesses, with no single model meeting all requirements perfectly. Therefore, a multi-step modeling approach is suggested to leverage the strengths and mitigate the weaknesses of the different models.

William confidently presented his thesis. In particular, the committee was very happy with the Q&A session after the presentation, which resulted in a lively back and forth with interesting questions and answers. Having defended his thesis, William can now apply for his diploma and graduate. We thank William for his contributions to the DSE2.0 research and wish him all the best with his future career.

Faezeh Saadatmand Wins Best Paper Award at ICPS

Posted on by bennyakesson

Good news everyone! Our paper “Automated Derivation of Application Workload Models for Design Space Exploration of Industrial Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems” won the Best Paper Award at the 7th IEEE International Conference on Industrial Cyber-Physical Systems (ICPS). This is an impressive feat, especially considering that it is the first paper first-authored by Faezeh Saadatmand, PhD student at Leiden University. Congratulations Faezeh!

The paper tackles an urgent issue: the growing complexity of industrial cyber-physical systems, which is driving up development and maintenance costs. As these systems incorporate more functions, the number of hardware and software components increases rapidly, making it harder to analyze and optimize their performance. Model-based methodologies have been proposed as a means to manage complexity and increase productivity of engineers by using models as a base for specification, communication, analysis, and synthesis of artifacts like documentation, simulation models, and code. But who is going to make models of systems with tens of compute nodes and hundreds of software processes, especially when increased customization results in a unique configuration for each manufactured system? This research addresses this need by introducing an automatic method for deriving an application workload model. This model, based on trace analysis, captures computation and communication activities within an application in a timing-agnostic manner. The method was validated through a case study on an ASML Twinscan lithography machine, showing high accuracy in representing real application workloads.

This paper is a result from the Design Space Exploration 2.0 (DSE2.0) project, one of four academic projects co-funded by TNO-ESI and NWO as a part of the Mastering Complexity (MasCot) program.

 

 

ESI Symposium 2024: A Showcase of Cutting-Edge Research in High-tech Equipment

Posted on by bennyakesson

I had a blast at the ESI Symposium in Veldhoven! It may have been the best ESI Symposium I have visited so far! It is great to see the innovation chain for Dutch high-tech equipment come together and share challenges, exciting new research results, as well as success stories from our implementation partners.

The Symposium also showcased the progress of our academic programs. The Mastering Complexity (MasCot) program, now a veteran at the ESI Symposium, contributes new engineering methodologies to help us manage increasing system complexity and develop next-gen high-tech equipment efficiently and cost-effectively through all development phases, from early architecting to implementation, testing, and evolution. As the program enters its fourth year, the current focus is on rounding off much of the research and transfer developed knowledge and proof-of-concepts to ESI and the industry partners.

The Symposium also introduced our recently started ZORRO project, which is set to change the way we handle system malfunctions in cyber-physical systems. With intelligent diagnostics, ZORRO is on a mission to significantly reduce downtime costs and enhance system reliability. Interested to learn more? Reach out or stay tuned to hear more as the research develops!

Automatic Workload Inference Improves Scalability of DSE in Complex Systems

Posted on by bennyakesson

I am happy to announce that the paper “Automated Derivation of Application Workload Models for Design Space Exploration of Industrial Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems” has been accepted for publication at the 7th IEEE International Conference on Industrial Cyber-Physical Systems (ICPS). The paper is first-authored by Faezeh Saadatmand in the context of the DSE2.0 project, a part of the academic research program MasCot, co-funded by TNO-ESI and NWO. Congratulations Faezeh!

The paper addresses challenges with respect to designing their next-generation distributed cyber-physical systems (dCPS). Efficient Design Space Exploration (DSE) techniques are needed to evaluate possible design decisions and their consequences on non-functional aspects of the systems. To enable scalable and efficient DSE of complex dCPS, it is essential to have abstract and coarse-grained models that are both accurate and capable of capturing dynamic application workloads. However, manually creating such models is time-consuming and error-prone, and they need to be continuously updated as the system evolves. This research addresses this need by introducing an automatic method for deriving an application workload model. This model, based on trace analysis, captures computation and communication activities within an application in a timing-agnostic manner. The approach has been validated through a case study on an ASML Twinscan lithography machine, demonstrating high accuracy in capturing real application workloads. Next steps in this research involves combining this model with an automatically inferred hardware platform model to enable DSE exploring different hardware, software, and mapping alternatives.

MasCot Program: Bridging Academia and Industry for High-Tech Innovation in Bits & Chips Feature

Posted on by bennyakesson

An article about strategic academic programming at TNO-ESI has appeared in Bits & Chips. The MasCot program, a collaboration co-funded by ESI and the Dutch research council NWO, is designed to tackle the increasing complexity of high-tech equipment.  The program addresses the pressing need for advanced engineering methodologies through four projects covering essential topics, such as design space exploration during early system design, scheduling, verification, and restructuring of evolving software. In the article, I explain how the 3-million-euro program facilitates the transition of academic research into practical industrial applications, creating an innovation funnel that spans from academic research through applied research to industrial embedding. The program’s strategic approach not only mitigates the risks associated with high-reward, complex projects but also fosters a symbiotic relationship between academia, industry, and TNO, allowing for a continuous exchange of knowledge, challenges, and innovations.

3rd Annual MasCot Program Day 2023 Focuses on Technology Transfer and Industry-Academia Collaboration

Posted on by bennyakesson

In a bid to spearhead advancements in engineering methodologies and manage the increasing complexity of industrial systems, the third annual Mastering Complexity (MasCot) Program Day was successfully held on Tuesday, October 10, 2023. The MasCot program, a six-year strategic academic initiative jointly funded by TNO-ESI and NWO, has brought together leading universities and research organizations to pioneer the next generation of engineering methods, promoting cost-effective and high-quality development of industrial systems. The program consists of four key projects: 1) Scheduling Adaptive Modular Flexible Manufacturing Systems (TU/e, TU Delft, Radboud University), 2) Programming and Validating Software Restructurings (TU Delft, TU/e), 3) Testing in Times of Continuous Change (Radboud University, Twente University), and 4) Design Space Exploration 2.0: Towards Optimal Design of Complex, Distributed Cyber Physical Systems (UvA, Leiden University).

This year, Radboud University hosted the event at Hotel Van der Valk Nijmegen-Lent, drawing a crowd of 38 attendees from academia, industry, NWO, and TNO-ESI. With the first MasCot projects set to conclude in 2024, the theme of this year's gathering revolved around technology transfer. The event commenced with project updates from each of the four projects. During breaks, attendees had the opportunity to engage in technical dialogues with PhD students, who presented their work on posters. A highlight of the day was the keynote address delivered by Sjoerd Verduyn Lunel, head of ASML research (a.i.). Verduyn. A key message of his presentation was the required improvement of productivity of design engineers by a factor of 2.5 in the next ten years to keep up the pace of innovation. ASML is therefore engaging in defining road maps and establishing long-term collaborations with academic partners and research organization, such as TNO. He also described how ASML are differentiating projects at different levels of maturity, from fundamental research to proofs-of-concept, and how they scale up and transfer knowledge between these phases. This keynote was well-appreciated and many participants were inspired by this structured approach to programming and managing research and innovation.

The afternoon was dedicated to breakout sessions where participants shared their perspectives on technology transfer and discussed the roles that various MasCot stakeholders—universities, industry, NWO, and ESI—can concretely play in facilitating this critical process. The day concluded with a networking session and dinner, marking another successful edition of the MasCot Program Day.

Scaling the Future: Master Thesis Defense on Scalability in Simulation Environments for Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems

Posted on by bennyakesson

Today, we celebrate that Herman Kelder successfully defended his master thesis “Scalability in System-Level Simulation Environments for Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems“. This work was carried out in the context of the DSE2.0 project, where we address the complex scientific challenges involved in performing design-space exploration (DSE) for complex distributed cyber-physical systems (dCPS), such as lithography machines. Three key challenges in this context are: 1) automatically modelling the application and platform based on data from the running system, 2) scalable search and pruning algorithms that help navigate large design spaces efficiently, and 3) scalable simulation environments that allow many design points to be efficiently evaluated concurrently.

Herman’s thesis addresses the last of these three challenges. To facilitate scalable and efficient DSE for dCPS, an evaluation environment is proposed, implemented, and evaluated. The research considers key design considerations for developing a distributed evaluation workflow that can dynamically be adapted to enable efficient and scalable exploration of the vast design space of complex, distributed cyber-physical systems. Evaluation of the proposed environment employs a set of system models, representing design points within a DSE process, to assess the solution and its behavior, performance, capability, and applicability in addressing the scalability challenge in the context of DSE for dCPS. During the evaluation, the performance and behavior are investigated in three areas: (i) Simulation Campaign, (ii) Task Management Configuration, and (iii) Parallel Discrete-Event Simulation (PDES). Throughout the evaluation, it is demonstrated that the proposed environment is capable of providing scalable and efficient evaluation of design points in the context of DSE for dCPS. Furthermore, the proposed solution enables designers and researchers to tailor it to their environment through dynamic complex workflows and interactions, workload-level and task-level parallelism, and simulator and compute environment agnosticism.

Herman executed his project meticulously and delivered excellent research results, both in terms of concepts and implementation. Thank you very much for your contributions Herman and we hope to work with you again at some point.

Advancing Design Space Exploration: Literature Review Explores Network Delay Models for Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems

Posted on by bennyakesson

Another literature review has been completed in the context of the DSE2.0 research project. William Ford completed his review entitled “Network Delay Model Creation and Validation for Design Space Exploration of Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems“.

Design-space exploration (DSE) in early phases of design of a distributed cyber-physical system (dCPS) requires models. In the DSE2.0 project, we are particularly interested in models that capture the timing behavior of hardware and software, allowing temporal system performance to be evaluated for different design points. One important part of the system to model is the network that connects the subsystems of the CPS. This study reviews previous work in the fields of analytical network modeling, network simulation, and network model validation. In addition, a recommended plan is presented to create and validate such a network model for the DSE2.0 project, based on this previous work. Two main directions are recommended at different levels of abstraction. For the lower level of abstraction, we will make a model using the existing INET framework that models each network element explicitly. At a higher level of abstraction, we will use a latency-rate server to capture the behavior of the network using only two parameters, latency and rate.

Having delivered his literature review. William has started his master project to pursue this research along these directions. The team looks forward to working with him.

Literature Review on Scalable System-level Simulation

Posted on by bennyakesson

Herman Kelder has joined the DSE2.0 research project as a master student. DSE2.0 is a project that aims to propose a methodology for design-space exploration of complex distributed cyber-physical systems, like lithography machines manufactured by ASML. One of the great challenges is to improve the scalability to handle the complexity of such systems, a challenge that needs to be addressed both in terms of how the system (performance) is modelled and evaluated (simulated) for a particular design point, as well as how design points to evaluate is being chosen. Hermans thesis will focus on how to improve the scalability of system-level simulation to allow more design points to be evaluated faster.

One of Herman’s first assignments was to put together a literature review on this topic. The literature review, entitled “Exploring Scalability in System-Level Simulation Environments for Distributed Cyber-Physical Systems“, investigates state-of-the-art scalability techniques for system-level simulation environments, i.e. Simulation Campaigns, Parallel Discrete Event Simulations (PDES), and Hardware Accelerators. The goal is to address the challenge of scalable Design Space Exploration (DSE) for dCPS, discussing such approaches’ characteristics, applications, advantages, and limitations. The conclusion recommends starting with simulation campaigns as those provide increased throughput, adapt to the number of tasks and resources, and are already implemented by many state-of-the-art simulators. Nevertheless, further research has to be conducted to define, implement, and test a sophisticated general workflow addressing the diverse sub-challenges of scaling system-level simulation environments for the exploration of industrial-size distributed Cyber-Physical Systems.

We look forward to working with Herman and seeing how his research develops along these directions.

Mastering Complexity – Academia, Industry and TNO working intimately together

Posted on by bennyakesson

The 3rd Annual Program Day for the Mastering Complexity (MasCot) Partnership program took place on Wednesday October 19. This time, the event was hosted by the University of Amsterdam and was held in the Startup Village at Science Park. Approximately 40 participants from academia, industry, NWO, and TNO attended the event. After a brief introduction, project updates were given from the four academic projects in the program:

  1. Scheduling Adaptive Modular Flexible Manufacturing Systems (SAM-FMS)
  2. Programming and Validating Software Restructurings
  3. TiCToC – Testing in Times of Continuous Change
  4. Design Space Exploration 2.0: Towards Optimal Design of Complex, Distributed Cyber Physical Systems

This was followed by Q&A and a short interaction where participants tried to identify the general complexity management techniques used in the projects. In the afternoon, there were breakout sessions focusing on the way-of-working in MasCot projects, how to best involve and engage all stakeholders in the project: industry and academic partners, users, and ESI liaisons. This allowed the different projects to listen to how the others organized their work, e.g. in terms of regular meetings and working on industry location, during the first years and reflect on the best way-of-working to reach their goals for the next stage.

The event was followed by a social program with informal networking set to the tune of a boat ride with drinks on the beautiful canals of a sunny autumn-colored Amsterdam and a dinner at the restaurant In de Waag.