Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS)

Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) are integrations of computation, networking, and physical processes. Embedded computers and networks monitor and control the physical processes, with feedback loops where physical processes affect computations and vice versa. The economic and societal potential of such systems is vastly greater than what has been realized, and major investments are being made worldwide to develop the technology. The technology builds on the older (but still very young) discipline of embedded systems, computers, and software embedded in devices whose principal mission is not computation, such as cars, toys, medical devices, and scientific instruments. CPS integrates the dynamics of the physical processes with those of the software and networking, providing abstractions and modeling, design, and analysis techniques for the integrated whole.

See Also

• Internet of Things (IoT) - A closely related concept that involves the connection of physical devices to the internet; CPS extends this by including computational feedback loops.
• Systems Engineering - An interdisciplinary field focusing on how to design and manage complex systems over their lifecycles; CPS often involves systems engineering principles.
• Artificial Intelligence (AI) - CPS can incorporate AI algorithms for advanced functionalities like prediction and autonomous decision-making.
• Cloud Computing - Sometimes CPS data is stored and processed in the cloud for better scalability and performance.