Towards a Platform for Widespread Embedded Intelligence - ERCIM

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SPECIAL THEME: Embedded Intelligence
Introduction to the Special Theme
Embedded Intelligence
Illustration by Pertti Jarla.
by Erwin Schoitsch
and Amund Skavhaug
Embedded Systems are a key if Europe
is to remain in the forefront of digital
technology and as such they have been
classified as an important research area
for the European Union's Seventh
Framework Programme - the main
financial tool through which the EU
supports research and development
activities. The IST/FET (Future and
Emerging Technologies) programme
'Beyond the Horizon', coordinated by
ERCIM, points out that Embedded
Systems, in combination with pervasive
- or ubiquitous - computing, (cognitive)
intelligence and software-intensive
systems, which in fact means
'embedded intelligence', or 'smart
systems' in the broader context of
'smart environments', are the most
important challenge for strategic, longterm
research, with a huge impact on
society and the economy. The ITEA2
Roadmap (Information Technology for
European Advancement) reaches the
same conclusion - that Embedded
Systems are a crucial technology for
European competitiveness.
ERCIM News No. 67, October 2006
ARTEMIS
(Advanced
Research and
Technology for Embedded
Intelligence and Systems) is a strong,
industry-driven European Technology
Platform (ETP) which aims to establish a
coherent, integrated European research
and development strategy for embedded
systems (http://www.artemis-office.org).
EPoSS, another ETP launched in July this
year (see separate article by the author in
this edition) focuses on smart systems
integration, which is considered an
important emerging area. The key aspects
are building systems from components,
interdisciplinarity, a holistic approach to
pervasive and ubiquitous computing, fast
integration of a variety of technologies,
energy autonomy and networking
(http://www.smart-systems-integration.org).
Several national research programmes in
Europe cover essential aspects of this
theme, for example FIT-IT in Austria
(BMVIT, Federal Ministry for Transport,
Innovation and Technology), with topics
such as Embedded Systems, System on
Chip, Semantic Systems and Security,
focusing on radical innovations in these
areas.
'Intelligence' takes account of autonomous
reasoning and acting in a co-operative
manner. 'Ambient Intelligence' refers to an
exciting new paradigm in information
technology, "in which people are
empowered through a digital environment
that is aware of their presence and context
and is sensitive, adaptive and responsive
to their needs, habits, gestures and
emotions." (ISTAG scenarios, and
Schoitsch, E., Bloomfield, R. et al. (2003),
AMSD – Dependable Embedded Systems
Roadmap, IST project 37553) . This
applies not only for people-centred tasks,
which, of course, seems the most exciting,
science-fiction-type, aspect, but also for
purely technical solutions like smart
sensors, actuators and control systems,
especially in safety related applications.
Heterogeneity (of environment,
applications, protocols, etc.), autonomy
(self-awareness, self healing, selforganizing,
etc.), nomadic mobility (ad
hoc, unreliable, heterogeneous, etc.) and
scale-less (number of users, geography,
structure, etc.) are the new emerging
embedded systems challenges (Neeraj
Suri, Keynote at DECOS Conference,
ME’06 Conference, 2006).
This special theme fits in very well with
the current European framework and
strategic research discussions. The areas
addressed - with the related European
research projects are referenced in
brackets - include:
Embedded Systems Applications
This part provides an overview of four
different, but nevertheless typical applications
of embedded systems, ie, some
work on autonomous systems, on intelligent
road safety through co-operative
networks (COOPERS); on ambient
assisted living support for the ‘aging
society’ (BelAmI) and on an experiment
with iCat, a personal robot platform with
emotional feedback. This wide spectrum
of projects is typical for the broad range
of foci addressed by the engineering of
AmI applications for the future intelligent
environment of people.
Embedded Systems Design
and Development
This provides an overview of the DECOS
(EU-FP6 project) tool chain for the
development of dependable embedded
systems in a cost-efficient manner; of a
project on reconfigurable hardware for
'Embedded Architectures on Demand'
(AHEAD); on system-level design of
fault-tolerant systems (SynDEx); on a
tool to model the behaviour of embedded
system designs (mCRL2); on reactive
processing for reactive embedded sys