Projects

Please Check Out the Projects Page for Papers, Posters, and Pictures!!

Project Results

Highway Traffic Flow Analysis and Control			Dominique Duncan
Dominique Duncan	Significant inspiration of computer network topology and communication comes from an empirical understanding of how road networks function. This project takes foundational work by CHESS researchers in hybrid systems to investigate a macroscopic switching-mode model (SMM) of traffic. The goal is to learn how hybrid systems are used for traffic modeling, experiment with different techniques for reachability analysis, implement a controller for the system, and then study the system behavior in the presence of disturbances. The end result will be MATLABsimulations which show the impact of the work.		Final Paper Final Poster
Tool for probabilistic safety verification of stochastic hybrid systems			Nandita Andromeda Mitra
Nandita Mitra	Many safety critical systems like air traffic control involve modeling their behavior as hybrid systems. The effect of uncertain system dynamics and external inputs can be incorporated by modeling the system as a controlled stochastic hybrid system (SHS). Design of controllers for SHS that guarantees a certain safety criterion can be posed as a quantitative verification problem. The goal of this project is to develop a computational tool for stochastic reachability analysis of a benchmark SHS.		Final Paper Final Poster
Autopilot for an Ultra-Light, Flying Wing			Nashlie H. Sephus
Nashlie Sephus	The purpose of this project is to develop an auto-pilot for a small, light fixed-wing aircraft named the Zagi. This aircraft is interesting because it is inexpensive, simple and fast to deploy, and is virtually indestructible since it is made of expanded polypropylene (EPP) foam. This aircraft is also challenging from a control perspective because it is vulnerable to wind and can only carry a minimal payload. First, we develop optimal local trajectories given current wind conditions. These local trajectories are used to determine the path that the vehicle should try to maintain between widely-spaced waypoints, and should trade off between overshooting corners and maintaining the desired trajectory. The testing and results of this portion are performed in MATLAB in order to plot and view the optimizing functionality. We then implement these local trajectories in the Zagi autopilot (written in C) to enable it to follow an incrementally-specified global trajectory with future planning. Initial tests are performed using the CRRCsim simulator interfaced to the Zagi hardware. Results from these tests prove that the planning autopilot is better than the existing autopilot because it directs a path along three points at a time versus only one point. Also, this higher level planner is greedy in that it reaches a desired optimal trajectory without using extra minimizing functionality. Future work involves final testing on a real Zagi at Richmond Field Station.		Final Paper Final Poster
Multihop Routing Simulation of TinyOS-Based Wireless Sensor Networks in Viptos			Heather Taylor
Heather Taylor	Wireless Sensor Networks are a burgeoning area of research and applications in embedded systems. The purpose of this project is to understand and further develop Viptos (Visual Ptolemy and TinyOS), an integrated graphical development and simulation environment for TinyOS-based wireless sensor networks. TinyOS is the operating system for the Berkeley Motes, which are small embedded systems capable of collecting audio, temperature and other kinds of sensor data and transmitting it via a radio. A TinyOS simulator called TOSSIM is used, a key piece of which is the ability to simulate a network topology once it is functioning. Viptos extends the capabilities of the TinyOS simulator to allow simulation of heterogeneous networks. The final goal of this research is to create a graphical representation of the communication between motes in a multihop network simulationin Viptos. This will be done by adding an entity to Viptos which will collect transmitted information and display a graphical representation of that communication between nodes.		Final Paper Final Poster

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