Fanxin Kong, assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Notre Dame, has received a National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award, one of the highest honors awarded to young faculty.
Kong’s CAREER research project will advance the security and safety of learning-enabled cyber-physical systems (CPS)—computing systems that integrate physical components with data and algorithms. These systems monitor and perform tasks autonomously via sensors and actuators, often in extremely complex environments. Some examples of learning-enabled CPS systems are drones, self-driving cars and robotic systems.
Kong’s particular focus within CPS is “safe learning,” the process embedded in a CPS system that allows it to autonomously perform various tasks in challenging conditions—all with the aim of maximizing performance while meeting safety constraints.
“Because CPS systems are vulnerable to cyber attacks,” Kong says, “my research will address the current lack of security foundations for safe learning and generate innovative solutions to identify vulnerabilities as well as to mitigate and defend against attacks, during both training and inference.”
For the educational component of his CAREER grant, Kong and his lab will use self-driving as the application and 1/10-scale, autonomous vehicles—miniature, open-source, fully autonomous vehicles designed for research, education, and competition—as the platform, with the goal of building interest in STEM fields within the K-12 age group, as well as motivating undergraduates to learn CPS and engage in research related to it.
—Mary Hendriksen