This integrative systems proposal focuses on the integration of networked control and wireless communication technologies for real-time, remote monitoring and control. Advancement in wireless sensing and networking have provided convenient and flexible information delivery, and it can also extend our control scope by expanding our space accessibility, thus empowering control systems toward challenging applications in hospitals, robotics control, and manufacturing plants, etc. Driven by real-world demands, many of these applications are characterized by timing constraints that must be satisfied for proper operation, i.e., quick response to external events. Moreover, for remote control, task directives are sensitive in that any alteration or damage will induce erroneous actions, decisions, and even widespread destruction. Thus, the contradiction of random network delay and time-sensitive commands, and open fields and sensitive data transmission makes wireless network-based control systems significantly challenging.
Intellectual Merit: This research plan concerns not only the development of data-sensitive control systems, it also studies the design of transport algorithms and computing models which play an important role in facilitating real-time control based on wireless sensing and networking. By integrating a middleware-based approach to compensate for random network delay, we will apply our solutions to time-sensitive, feedback control systems in a case study for motion tracking and control.
Broader Impacts: The results of such a wireless network-based control system, which integrates multidisciplinary characteristics, will be used to reveal great potential for industrial electronics, health care, and robotics, and will make a significant impact on people's daily lives. This work will also be used as an experimental concentration for innovative curriculum design of intelligent control. Research and educational results will be broadly disseminated and made available to the public by being posted on the Internet in a timely manner.
