The emerging of new technology platforms such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Industrie 4.0 the Industrial Internet, Cloud/Fog Computing,
or the Human Intranet tremendously accelerate the adoption and commercialization of cyber-physical systems in a multitude of industrial domains
such as highly automated vehicles, smart energy, smart manufacturing, smart cities, smart medical devices, smart logistics, and smart material.
The more the intrusion of smartness in our physical world advances, the more we have to rely on their performance, their robustness, and their security.
Delivery of a new generation of technology platforms that perform well and are safe, secure, and dependable therefore creates an ever-increasing demand and
urgency for new and expanded science and technology foundations. What exactly seems to be missing is the foundational element, the glue between them, the
force that should bring those elements together.
The United States and the European Union face a number of common challenges to push forward the limits of the science and technology, including:
* Technical challenges for designing and operating trustworthy CPS to which we do not have adequate solutions, at the state-of-the-art;
* The lack of accepted open and interoperable technology and platforms for CPS (such as in smart cities);
* Differences in technical standards across domains, including for safety and security, make it more difficult and costly to produce end-to-end quality and assurance;
* It is uncommon for engineers to be trained with the right mix of skills to address the technical issues in CPS;
* Fragmented eco-systems of CPS platforms prevent and limit the implementation of many new business ideas.
Scientific-technological challenges that are being worked-on in both the EU and the US include the cross-disciplinary and socio-technical character of CPS;
the lack of a common, integrated systems theory including cross-domain modeling and integration of large-scale, heterogeneous CPS; the interoperability between platforms,
infrastructures, frameworks, methods, and tools; predicting the complex, evolving behavior of autonomous systems to exclude emergence of unintended behavior;
substantial deficits of current infrastructures concerning protection of data privacy; insufficient dependability technology to avoid propagation of faults
or cyber-attacks; new design paradigms such as data-driven development for resource-optimized operation of CPS; provable robust abstraction between
real-world artefacts and its digital models; and the lack of a systematic approach to collect, aggregate, and apply incomplete and uncertain information
to ensure provision of services with sufficient level of confidence, specifically in the interaction with humans.
The biggest part of the CPS avenue is still in front of us. Despite tremendous progress in the last ten years on developing an integrated CPS science, there
are still mountains of questions and challenges to be solved, some of them fundamental and rooting in mathematical science and logic. And we still have to get
the design principles and fundamentals right for mastering the engineering of trustworthy CPS. Indeed, the magnitude of the CPS foundational challenge is so
great that a cooperation would prove to be beneficial for industry, academia, and governments, including:
* A synergistic research campaign significantly accelerates developments by pooling some of the best research teams across the Atlantic on some of the hardest
CPS research challenges.
* Creation of industrial CPS platforms, standards, and applications on the basis of cross-cutting design principles enables the sound implementation of
cross-domain, and possibly global, CPS-based value chains.
* The sharing of infrastructure and large-scale test beds for experimenting and validating CPS applications has not only synergetic potential but also
promotes and encourages deployment of CPS applications in globalized marketplaces.
* Preparation of the future workforce/engineers by defining a globally applicable set of skills.
* Facilitation and promotion of an integrated education program on CPS engineering.
