Cooperative task planning of multi-agent systems under timed temporal specifications

This paper studies the synthesis of controllers for cyber-physical systems (CPSs) that are required to carry out complex tasks that are time-sensitive, in the presence of an adversary. The task is specified as a formula in metric interval temporal logic (MITL). The adversary is assumed to have the ability to tamper with the control input to the CPS and also manipulate timing information perceived by the CPS. In order to model the interaction between the CPS and the adversary, and also the effect of these two classes of attacks, we define an entity called a durational stochastic game (DSG). DSGs probabilistically capture transitions between states in the environment, and also the time taken for these transitions. With the policy of the defender represented as a finite state controller (FSC), we present a value-iteration based algorithm that computes an FSC that maximizes the probability of satisfying the MITL specification under the two classes of attacks. A numerical case-study on a signalized traffic network is presented to illustrate our results.

It is well known that (timed) ω-regular properties such as 'p holds at every even position' and 'p occurs at least three times within the next 10 time units' cannot be expressed in Metric Interval Temporal Logic (MITL) and Event Clock Logic (ECL). A standard remedy to this deficiency is to extend these with modalities defined in terms of automata. In this paper, we show that the logics EMITL0, ∞ (adding non-deterministic finite automata modalities into the fragment of MITL with only lower- and upper-bound constraints) and EECL (adding automata modalities into ECL) are already as expressive as EMITL (full MITL with automata modalities). In particular, the satisfiability and model-checking problems for EMITL0, ∞ and EECL are PSPACE-complete, whereas the same problems for EMITL are EXPSPACE-complete. We also provide a simple translation from EMITL0, ∞ to diagonal-free timed automata, which enables practical satisfiability and model checking based on off-the-shelf tools.

This paper presents a fully automated procedure for controller synthesis for multi-agent systems under coupling constraints. Each agent has dynamics consisting of two terms: the first one models the coupling constraints and the other one is an additional bounded control input. We aim to design these inputs so that each agent meets an individual high-level specification given as a Metric Interval Temporal Logic (MITL). First, a decentralized abstraction that provides a time and space discretization of the multi-agent system is designed. Second, by utilizing this abstraction and techniques from formal verification, we provide an algorithm that computes the individual runs which provably satisfy the high-level tasks. The overall approach is demonstrated in a simulation example.

We present a verification framework exploiting τ-simulations as a way to preserve local linear properties checked on the components of real-time systems. Therefore, we consider a component-based modeling of real-time systems. Their properties are expressed in a timed logic, MITL (Metric Interval Temporal Logic).For component-based models, traditional verification techniques are generally applied to the complete composed model, even if some properties only concern some components of the system, if not only one. We show that it is possible to check such local linear properties (safety as well as liveness) on the components they concern, and then to ensure their preservation using τ-simulation relations. We show the interest of the method by applying it on two real-time systems examples and by comparing the results with traditional verification techniques.

We describe Breach, a Matlab/C++ toolbox providing a coherent set of simulation-based techniques aimed at the analysis of deterministic models of hybrid dynamical systems. The primary feature of Breach is to facilitate the computation and the property investigation of large sets of trajectories. It relies on an efficient numerical solver of ordinary differential equations that can also provide information about sensitivity with respect to parameters variation. The latter is used to perform approximate reachability analysis and parameter synthesis. A major novel feature is the robust monitoring of metric interval temporal logic (MITL) formulas. The application domain of Breach ranges from embedded systems design to the analysis of complex non-linear models from systems biology.

In the context of infrastructure resources deficiency, there is an increasing need to develop consistent approaches to the rational management of car traffic with a target level of reliability in providing consignors’ demand with cargo resources based on comprehensive interaction principle for all transportation process participants. Freight transportation simulation together with forecasting of its economic indicators, overcoming of difficulties arisen due to deficiency of infrastructure resources, and its prevention in further work is possible by using a hybrid intelligent system of cooperative transportation business planning. The key directions in this system are actualization of assessment criteria of car traffic volume management options in order to improve accuracy and promptness of their modification under operational conditions changes, establishment of train admission to port railway stations in automatic mode, discovery of conflicts and limiting elements based on cooperative planning. Implementation of this system will allow to make comprehensive decisions on transportation management based on the differentiated assessment of risks and economic efficiency, business activity.

6-DOF wheeled parallel robot and its automatic type synthesis method

Semantic relation plays an important role in knowledge acquisition research. This paper proposes a method of semantic relation acquisition and automatic synthesis based on Wikipedia. First of all, we obtain the three kinds of basic semantic relations from Wikipedia and extend the semantic of concept aiming at the problem of semantic fuzziness in the semantic relation. Then, an automatic synthesis method of semantic relations is proposed based on semantic extension. From the experimental results, this method can effectively extend semantic relation knowledge base through the reasoning of semantic relations.

The task of creating in our country a system of optimum planning and management of the economy acquires special significance in the light of the decisions promulgated by the September (1965) Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee. The utilization of the advantages of the sector principle of management, the granting to enterprises and to associations of broad economic rights, the strengthening of material incentives in the development of production - all this determines the need for a new approach to the problem of optimum planning as a most urgent practical task of state importance. Needless to say, one article cannot elucidate exhaustively this problem which, incidentally, includes many unresolved questions. We will therefore examine the general features of the system of optimum planning as the most important method of improving the existing system of planning and managing the national economy.

Over the last couple of years, multiview autostereoscopic displays (MADs) have become commercially available which enable a limited glasses-free 3D experience. The main problem of MADs is that they require several (typically 8 or 9) views, while most of the 3D video content is in stereoscopic 3D (S3D) today. In order to bridge this gap, the research community started to devise automatic multiview synthesis (MVS) methods. These algorithms require real-time processing and should be portable to end-user devices to develop their full potential. In this paper, we present a complete hardware system for fully automatic MVS. We give an overview of the algorithmic flow and corresponding hardware architecture, and provide implementation results of a hybrid FPGA/ASIC prototype — which is the first complete hardware system implementing image-domain-warping-based MVS. The proposed hardware IP could be used as a co-processor in a system-on-chip (SoC) targeting 3D TV sets, thereby enabling efficient content generation in real-time.

In this paper I shall concentrate on one of the aspects of the broad range of problems in long-term planning, namely, on its place and role in the whole system of the central planning and management of the national economy. I intend thus to discuss these specific tasks and functions of long-term planning which influence, to a considerable extent, the quality of the whole system of central planning which includes also the five-year and annual plans and the system of controlling the functioning of the economy based on these plans. Starting with these premises, I think, one should consider the approaches and solutions, specific to long-term planning, concerning the methods, the procedure and organisation of the process of planning.

Scene synthesis is crucial to computer graphics. However, the current interactive scene synthesis methods usually cost the user too much time and interactions to edit objects. This paper presents a new interactive scene synthesis method that alleviates the designer from interacting with the 3D scene and its objects. Designers only need to select an object group in an independent panel through coarse clustering and fine clustering. Then, the furniture objects will be automatically added to the scene. This paper proposes a two-level clustering that applies the Affinity Propagation Algorithm (APA) to groups of furniture objects such that the object groups can even be clustered without linear representations, latent encoding, etc. To fully apply the APA, we also propose quantitatively measuring how different the two layouts are, i.e., how quantitatively the arrangements of two object groups differ. Experiments first show that our method is more user-friendly and interactively efficient than other interactive synthesis methods. By comparing our method with recent automatic scene synthesis methods, we demonstrate that our methods still have competitive plausibility. We also verify that our method does not harm the diversity and generalization of 3D scenes.

One of the efficient design methodologies for large scale system on a chip (SoC) is IP-based design. In this methodology, a system is considered as a set of components and interconnects among them. The designers try to reuse existing IPs as much as possible. Communications among components have to be conducted using a common protocol, however, IPs available today use various communication protocols. Thus the protocol conversion is one of the most important topics in IP-based design (Gajski et al., 2000). In this paper, we propose a method for automatic protocol transducer synthesis which is applicable to complex protocols. The main idea of our proposed method is division of the exploration space into smaller ones for avoiding explosion of the exploration space, namely with a divide and conquer approach. We demonstrate our method by synthesizing transducers which translate between the real and complicated protocols with advanced features such as non-blocking transactions and out-of-order transactions.

A new method of automatic multicriterion synthesis of plasma processes and apparatuses is proposed. The method is applied to multicriterion optimization of reduction plasma production with the recovery of blast-furnace gas in a direct steel-making process.

Energetic materials can instantly combust and release a large amount of energy in responding external impulses. Due to its energy characteristics, it has a wide range of practical applications: military and civilian. Designing high-energy-density materials with better performance, lower sensitivity, and more environmental friendliness has become a hotspot in the field of energetic materials in recent years. Energetic salts are formed by acid-base or metathesis reactions of different types of anions and cations. Energetic salts are a new class of energetic materials which were developed in recent years. Usually, they have high nitrogen content, high enthalpy of formation, high detonation performance, are relative stable to external stimuli, and have a wide range of application prospects in the fields of new explosives: low characteristic signal propellants, gas generators, low smoke or smokeless pyrotechnics. The synthesis method of energetic salts is simple, and the types of energetic materials are greatly enriched. This research takes energetic salts as the synthesis target and adopts multi-channel automation technology for high-throughput synthesis, which can improve the efficiency, reduce labor costs, and greatly increase the synthesis speed, which is of great significance for accelerating the synthesis of new energetic salts.