Towards mixed criticality task scheduling in cyber physical systems: Challenges and perspectives

Cyber physical systems (CPSs) are a fast-evolving technology based on a strong synergy between heterogeneous sensing, networking, computation and control modules. When coping with critical applications that require real-time performance and autonomous operation in uncertain conditions, the design of such complex systems is still facing significant difficulties. A particular challenge in this respect derives from the software intensive nature of these systems - the need to develop flexible and specifically tailored task scheduling techniques. In our view, an appropriate line of thinking is to take advantage of mixed criticality concepts following the lessons learned from avionics and automotive domains, where complexity, safety, determinism and real-time constraints are extreme. From this perspective, our work aims at facilitating the integration of mixed criticality systems-based strategy in cyber physical systems by identifying the particularities of the latter and their influence on scheduling mechanisms, by describing the standard mixed-criticality task model in the cyber physical systems context, and by analyzing and proposing the most suitable scheduling algorithms to be implemented in cyber physical systems. Moreover, the perspectives on future developments in this area are discussed, as new horizons in research arise with the integration of mixed criticality concepts in the cyber physical systems context. (C) 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.