The university is getting a new interdisciplinary research centre in the field of safety-critical systems. Here, scientists will develop and test socio-technical systems for cars, aeroplanes, ships and trains. The goal: safe and environmentally friendly mobility.
The scientists were successful with their proposal "Interdisciplinary Research Centre on Critical Systems Engineering for Socio-Technical Systems" - in the call for proposals jointly initiated by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and the Volkswagen Foundation to "strengthen the competitiveness of Lower Saxony's university locations". A total of 19.5 million euros is available for this from the "Niedersächsisches Vorab" funding programme. Five million euros of this will go to the Oldenburg research centre for safety-critical socio-technical systems. In addition to the University of Oldenburg, the OFFIS computer science institute, the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and the SafeTRANS competence cluster are also involved in the research centre. The spokesperson is Oldenburg computing scientist Prof. Dr Werner Damm.
"The new research centre ties in seamlessly with both the long-standing DFG Collaborative Research Centre on Safety-Critical Systems and the university's research focus on neurosensory science, marine technology and medicine," explains University President Prof. Dr Babette Simon.
Safety-critical systems are highly complex computer-based systems that are used in the automotive industry, aerospace, marine technology, automation technology, energy supply and healthcare. For example, they control the engine in vehicles, assist with navigation, lane keeping and accident avoidance, and contribute to safe air and sea traffic as autopilot and collision avoidance systems in aeroplanes and ships. The increasing networking of these systems and the inclusion of human behaviour create so-called socio-technical systems in which people and technical devices work together to solve tasks such as safe, environmentally friendly mobility while at the same time providing comfort and efficiency for users. In order to guarantee compliance with the required safety standards in the development of such systems, new, interdisciplinary approaches are needed that go far beyond those of traditional engineering disciplines such as Computing Science, Electrical Engineering or Mechanical Engineering.
It is of central importance to understand the interaction between the people acting in the overall system, their assistance systems and their technical and natural environment. This is where the Oldenburg research centre comes in. The scientists examine and develop socio-technical systems, particularly in the transport sector, i.e. for cars, aeroplanes, ships and trains. Their goal: safe and environmentally friendly mobility. "Aeroplanes, ships and trains - they all function with safety-critical systems. When developing these highly complex systems, we have to take human factors into account. This requires high-precision investigations and an interdisciplinary research approach," emphasises Damm.
The reliability of safety-critical systems cannot be adequately tested in the laboratory. Large-scale simulations are necessary for this, which require close co-operation with industry. The co-operation partners OFFIS, the DLR with its "Application Platform Intelligent Mobility" (AIM) and SafeTRANS with a network in industry ensure that safety-critical systems can be tested under real conditions. "We see the research centre as a think tank in which experts from science and industry can jointly advance research into safety-critical systems at the highest level," says Damm. An integrated college is also dedicated to the training of young scientists.