DYVERSE: From formal verification to biologically-inspired real-time self-organizing systems

To predict the future of scientific thought and technological advance is a challenging venture, but it seems probable that progress lies in the multi-disciplinary approach. Multi-disciplinary research is a manner of sharing ideas across specialized areas in order to find answers to new technological challenges. The complexity of today’s technological applications means that automated and semiautomated processes have become proportionately more complicated. With consumers demanding more from automated services, the necessity for safety-critical and resilient systems – that is, systems capable of preserving stability and recovering from shock – becomes more pressing. The challenge is to accurately test the performance of complex systems, and, if necessary, to modify their behavior to meet desired specifications. But complexity is not only on the outside. The most safety-critical, resilient, and robust system of all is the human body. Could the lessons learned in engineering be applied to healthcare? Surprisingly, from the mathematical perspective, there are common features and dynamical behaviors in the synchronization of swarm satellites and, for example, the self-organization of cells in living organisms. Behind the surface appearance of each system are underlying patterns and points of similarity. Typically, they are highly nonlinear systems, and combine continuous and discrete, smooth and abrupt dynamics. Their combined dynamics can be interpreted as a hybrid dynamical system. DYVERSE is a computational-dynamical framework for the modeling, analysis and control of complex control systems under the framework of hybrid systems, and stands for the DYnamically-driven VERification of Systems with Energy considerations. DYVERSE methodology aims to bring together formal computational tools, dynamical systems theory and control engineering methodologies to advance the understanding of systems interconnected in a non-regular and nontrivial manner.