(Press-News.org) DETROIT — A grant to Wayne State University from the National Science Foundation (NSF) is opening new doors for researchers and students to explore the future of autonomous vehicles, machines and drones.
Zheng Dong, Ph.D., assistant professor of computer science in Wayne State’s School of Engineering, was awarded a five-year, $595,611 NSF grant for the project, "CAREER: ChronosDrive: Ensuring Timing Correctness in DNN-Driven Autonomous Vehicles with Accelerator-Enhanced Real-Time SoC Integration."
“We are in an age of artificial intelligence,” said Dong. “Deep neural networks and autonomous vehicles are opening new frontiers in real-time systems research, which demands new solutions to ensure these systems are safe and effective.”
Autonomous machines, particularly those powered by deep neural networks (DNNs) in autonomous vehicles, must meet strict timing requirements that necessitate rigorous real-time safety certifications. Such certifications rely on advanced analytical methods combining worst-case execution time analysis with schedulability analysis to ensure operational safety and reliability. However, significant challenges persist in integrating worst-case execution time and schedulability analysis, especially in evaluating the timing accuracy of systems that use computing accelerators for autonomous driving.
Dong’s project aims to develop an integrated architecture that leverages hardware-software co-design to address these complex issues with the aim of significantly enhancing the safety and reliability of autonomous driving systems and other autonomous machines.
“Even though we are talking about artificial intelligence, advancements in this field still rely on human innovation and creativity,” said Dong. “We hope our research lays a solid foundation for the development of safe and effective autonomous vehicle and machine systems.”
“NSF CAREER awards are prestigious honors to rising researchers that emphasize the integration of research and education,” said Ezemenari M. Obasi, Ph.D., Wayne State’s vice president for research & innovation. “Dr. Dong’s important research will incorporate AI to address the complex problems associated with autonomous driving systems and machines. Through this award, he will train computer science and engineering students to create the next generation of autonomous machines and vehicles to be safer and more reliable.”
The grant number for this award from the National Science Foundation is 2441179.
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About Wayne State University
Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit research.wayne.edu.
Wayne State University’s research efforts are dedicated to a prosperity agenda that betters the lives of our students, supports our faculty in pushing the boundaries of knowledge and innovation further, and strengthens the bonds that interconnect Wayne State and our community. To learn more about Wayne State University’s prosperity agenda, visit president.wayne.edu/prosperity-agenda.
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Wayne State University research making strides in autonomous vehicle and machine systems to make them safer, more effective
2025-03-18
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