Abstract
Recent progress in sensing device technologies, including their miniaturization, has opened up vast possibilities in modern systems ranging from consumer electronics to embedded devices. Integrating multiple sensors opens up a new dimension, leading to cyber-physical systems that embed intelligence further into physical world. A body of new skills and techniques are needed to facilitate productive, economical and dependable system design, spanning concerns from devices to systems and applications. Three areas of focus are outlined in this talk. First, we describe challenges in the skills bring-up for existing and future engineers through the prism of several innovative educational programs. Second, outlined is the integrated design methodology that focuses on the optimization and validation of cyber-physical systems by focusing on the arithmetic values interchanged between sensing devices and digital control. Third, addressed is the dependable system design challenge, whereas the system design combats systematically the effects of noise, failures, imprecision and de-calibration. A direct application to the dependable glucose readouts is demonstrated within the Closed-loop Insulin Control (CLIC) project. Wider prospects of multi-sensor systems and applications will be discussed as well.
Biography
Z. Zilic is Associate Professor at ECE Department of McGill University. He has obtained his Ph. D. degree at the University of Toronto in 1997, and has worked at Lucent Technologies in 1997-98. Since joining McGill in 1998, he has graduated 40 M. Eng. or Ph. D. students. He has received Best Papers Awards from Design Verification Conference (DVCon) and Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems, and has held the Chercheur Strategique chair from Province of Quebec. For his teaching, he has received Wighton Fellowship, voted by National Council of Deans of Engineering. He has also served as a Director of IT Services at ECE Department, and in a number of other administrative and society service roles.