Distributed embedded systems that consist of multiple interacting subsystems with tightly integrated software components are pervading all aspects of our daily lives. Online fault detection and isolation (FDI) is the key to the safe and reliable operation of these safety critical systems that include automobiles, aircraft, hospital equipment, manufacturing processes, military systems, and nuclear plants. Contrary to its importance, FDI for the safe operation of large, distributed embedded systems is not a solved problem. As a result, in present day systems, almost all fault management and remedial tasks are left to human operators, who often face information overload and stringent time constraints when operating these systems in mission critical operations. The objective of this project is to develop systematic, scalable, robust, online model-based FDI schemes for distributed embedded systems. The novelty of the research centers on (i) hierarchical abstraction schemes for managing the complexity of the FDI task and enabling the design and development of online model-based FDI algorithms that are provably robust and reliable, (ii) a unified framework for diagnosis of multiple types of faults that occur in the physical and the computational parts of embedded systems as well as faults with different fault profiles (abrupt and incipient faults), and (iii) the development of a tool suite for distributed embedded systems for online FDI. Experimental test-beds are used to demonstrate and verify the effectiveness of the developed methods. The impact of the project lies on providing guarantees for reliable safe operation of complex, distributed safety-critical systems.

Personnel

• Matthew Diagle
• Indranil Roychoudhury

Publications

• M. Daigle, X. Koutsoukos, and G. Biswas, "Multiple Fault Diagnosis in Complex Physical Systems", 17th International Workshop on Principles of Diagnosis. June 2006.
  
  
• I. Rouchoudhury, G. Biswas, and X. Koutsoukos, "A Bayesian Approach to Efficient Diagnosis of Incipient Faults", 17th International Workshop on Principles of Diagnosis. June 2006.
  
  
• M. Daigle, X. Koutsoukos, and G. Biswas, "Distributed Diagnosis of Coupled Mobile Robots", 2006 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA 2006).
  
  
• F. Zhao, X. Koutsoukos, H. Haussecker, J. Reich, and P. Cheung, "Monitoring and Fault Diagnosis of Hybrid Systems". IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics - Part B 35(6), 1225-1240, December 2005.
  
  
• Matthew Daigle, Xenofon Koutsoukos, and Gautam Biswas "Relative Measurement Orderings in Diagnosis of Distributed Physical Systems". 43rd Annual Allerton Conference on Communication, Control, and Computing. September 2005.
  
  
• Indranil Roychoudhury, Gautam Biswas, Xenofon Koutsoukos, and Sherif Abdelwahed "Designing Distributed Diagnosers for Complex Physical Systems". 16th International Workshop on Principles of Diagnosis. pp. 31-36, June 2005.
  
  
• G. Biswas, S. Abdelwahed, X. Koutsoukos, J. Gandhe, and E. Manders, "Toward Distributed Diagnosis of Complex Physical Systems", In Proc. 42nd Annual Allerton Conference on Communication, Control, and Computing, Sept. 29 - Oct. 1, 2004.
  
  
• X. Koutsoukos, "Estimation of Hybrid Systems Using Discrete Sensors", In Proceedings of 42nd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (IEEE CDC 2003),pp. 155-160, 2003.
  
  
• X. Koutsoukos, J. Kurien, and F. Zhao, "Estimation of Distributed Hybrid Systems Using Particle Filtering Methods", Hybrid Systems: Computation and Control (HSCC 2003), Vol. 2623, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, pp. 298-313, Springer, 2003.
  
  
• R. Su, W.M. Wonham, J. Kurien, and X. Koutsoukos, "Distributed diagnosis of qualitative systems", 6th International Workshop on Discrete Event Systems, Zaragoza, Spain, pp. 169-174, October 2-4, 2002.
  
  
• X. Koutsoukos, J. Kurien, and F. Zhao, "Monitoring and Diagnosis of Hybrid Systems Using Particle Filtering Methods", Proceedings of the 15th International Symposium on Mathematical Theory of Networks and Systems - MTNS 2002, Notre Dame, IN, August 2002.
  
  
• J. Kurien, X. Koutsoukos, and F. Zhao, "Distributed Diagnosis of Networked Embedded Systems", Proceedings of the 13th International Workshop on Principles of Diagnosis (DX-2002), pp. 179-188, Semmering, Austria, May 2-4, 2002.
  
  
• J. Kurien, X. Koutsoukos, and F. Zhao, "Distributed Diagnosis of Networked Hybrid Systems", 2002 AAAI Spring Symposium on Information Refinement and Revision for Decision Making: Modeling for Diagnostics, Prognostics, and Prediction, pp. 37-44, Stanford, CA, March 25-27, 2002.
  
  
• X. Koutsoukos, F. Zhao, H. Haussecker, J. Reich, and P. Cheung, "Fault Modeling for Monitoring and Diagnosis of Sensor-Rich Hybrid Systems", Proceedings of the 40th IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 793-801, Orlando, FL, December 2001.
  
  
• Zhao, X. Koutsoukos, and J. Kurien, "Collaborative Embedded Sensing and Diagnosis", Proceedings of the SRDS 2001 Workshop on Reliability in Embedded Systems, pp. 23-27, New Orleans, LA, October 2001.
  
  
• F. Zhao, X. Koutsoukos, H. Haussecker, J. Reich, P. Cheung, and C. Picardi, "Distributed Monitoring of Hybrid Systems: A Model-Directed Approach", Proceedings of the 17th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI 2001), pp. 554-557, Seattle, WA, August 2001.
  
  

Patents

• James A. Kurien, Xenofon Koutsoukos, and Feng Zhao. "Systems and Methods for Distributed Algorithm for Optimization-Based Diagnosis", Patent No: US 6,687,653, Feb. 3, 2004.
  
  
• James A. Kurien, Xenofon Koutsoukos, and Rong Su. "Systems and Methods for Distributed Fault Diagnosis Using Precompiled Finite Automata", Patent No: US 6,778,943, Aug. 17, 2004.

Updated list of publications and preprints can be found at http://www.vuse.vanderbilt.edu/~koutsoxd/www/publications.html

For additional information or if you are interested for graduate student research positions, contact me at: Xenofon.Koutsoukos@vanderbilt.edu