UKIERI Workshop on Socio-Technical Research Capabilities for Autonomous Electric Vehicles' Critical Safety, Security and Adoption

You do not require a background in security to attend this workshop. The workshop will offer a variety of related topics (not just security-related) and is open to all participants.

We are excited to invite undergraduate, postgraduate, and PhD students across the world to participate in a one-day workshop event "UKIERI Workshop on Socio-Technical Research Capabilities for Autonomous Electric Vehicles' Critical Safety, Security and Adoption", supported by the UKIERI British Council and SPARC India.  This event is dedicated to exploring the increasingly crucial intersection between the domains of Cyber-Physical Systems and sustainable energy and transportation sectors. The event will take place in-person and online at Cardiff University on the 20th of September 2024 at the Abacws Building, Cathays, Cardiff. The workshop aims to bring together academicians, industry professionals, researchers, and students to discuss and offer new insights and key highlights of the advancements of technologies in this sector. We strongly encourage applications from students of the UK's underrepresented groups, including women and disabled participants to apply and avail the benefits from this workshop.

The workshop aims to build and improve UG/PG students’ research skills in the area of autonomous electric vehicles’ critical safety, security and adoption. This includes calls for participation from meritorious students, offering bespoke training with workshops, brainstorming exercises to form collaborated mini projects from initial ideas, and providing the students with an environment and platform to explore commercialise opportunities in India and the UK to open their research idea to ’route to market’. The project not only addresses the technical issues but also explores the social aspects of modern technologies.

This workshop calls for poster ideas and helps to extend their research capabilities through mini-projects with international mentors and offers opportunities for international exposure. All in-person participants (with presentation) are required to submit a poster of their idea (A4 size, PDF only) that they want to consider for the route to market, are ready to discuss in this workshop and wish to create a startup/spinout out of it. This project will then connect them with the international team, other participating teams and the Cyber Innovation Hub (at Cardiff University) to get tips and tricks, and valuable feedback from the experts going forward in the process. 

This workshop is interdisciplinary in nature and will explore multidisciplinary aspects of computer science, power and energy systems, transportation systems covering cyber security and safety, autonomous systems, and electric vehicles. It will include expert talks and discussions from leading industry experts as well as academic leaders, and a special session for participants to present their research, along with networking opportunities. This event will uplift students’ skills in cyber-physical infrastructure and promote long-term training opportunities for ‘working together’. This includes assessments (via questionnaires) to understand students’ learning curve and the effectiveness of this workshop. 

To acknowledge each participant's contribution, the event will award the 'Certification of Participation'. We invite you to join us in this exciting opportunity of advanced cyber-physical security, analytics and innovation, offering a great place for learning and future collaborations.

Eligibility Criteria

Open to undergraduate, postgraduate (Master's), PhD, and postdoctoral students of all disciplines from universities across the UK as well as to industry practitioners who wish to enhance their knowledge in this area.

How to Apply

For the UK in-person participants with presentation: To apply for this workshop to present their research, interested candidates are required to send an email with their recent CV (max 2 pages) and a poster (A4, PDF) to Dr Neteesh Saxena at saxenan4@cardiff.ac.uk with the subject line "UKIERI workshop application" by the 20th of August 2024 (midnight). The workshop accepts any previously published poster, or you can create a poster version of any published work of yours or a poster on a new idea that can potentially help you focus on the route to market. Your poster can have any of the themes (but try to put it in the context of an autonomous and/or vehicle system): Cybersecurity, safety, policy, smart grid/power system, transportation system, electric vehicles, robotics, human factors, and psychology. 

For the UK in-person participants (no presentation, only attending): If you want to just attend (no presentation), simply complete the registration from the link given below on this page.

We aim to cover limited expenses for outstation participants up to £150.

For online participants (no presentation, only attending): If you want to just attend (no presentation), simply complete the registration from the link given below on this page.

Note that we have limited spaces for in-person attendance, so hurry up with your application.

Selection Process

The selection process for in-person (with presentation) participants is committed to fairness and meritocracy, aiming to recruit selective high-potential students. Here is an overview of the selection criteria:

Ø  Merit-Based Selection: Candidates will be selected based on the potential and merit demonstrated in their submitted CV and poster. This includes academic achievements, relevant experiences, and the expressed interest in the workshop.

Ø  Inclusivity and Diversity: In line with our commitment to inclusivity, preference will be given to 'meritorious' female candidates and individuals with declared disabilities.

*****Registration*****

All participants are required to register themselves on the following page:

https://forms.office.com/e/sfRRPNn1yx

Event Summary

Workshop Date: 20th September 2024

Venue: Cardiff University, Abacws Building

Important Dates

Application Submission Date: 20th of August 2024  30th of August 2024 **Extended**

Selected Participant Notification: 30th of August 2024  7th of September 2024

Contact Information

Organiser: Dr Neetesh Saxena (saxenan4@cardiff.ac.uk)

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Workshop Schedule:

Workshop Schedule:

20th Sept 2024 [In-person & Online]

Venue: 

Abacws Building 

Cardiff University

Senghennydd Rd, Cardiff CF24 4AG

All participants will be provided with breakfast, lunch and evening tea/coffee - (Abacws/0.04)

Workshop Registration (with refreshment) - 0900 - 1000 hrs

Morning Session: 1000 - 1200 hrs (Abacws/0.01)

Welcome by Neetesh Saxena 1000 - 1015 hrs

Speaker: Prof Peter Lee (University of Portsmouth) - 1015 - 1045 hrs

Title: Autonomous Vehicles: Characteristics and Opportunities, Challenges and Risks

The development and manufacture of autonomous vehicles (AV) are expanding rapidly for maritime, ground, and aerial use. This paper will address key characteristics and opportunities of existing AV, going on to consider key challenges and risks which accompany these developments. The production and use of AV, particularly at these early stages of their evolution, present various challenges to the safety and security of AV systems, including unlawful uses, hardware and performance issues, the explainability of the AI that powers autonomy, ethical concerns, and public mistrust. Key threats to the safety and security of AVs relate to their safe operation and cybersecurity, since they are based on a combination of digital technologies, sensory techniques, and AI platforms.

Bio: Peter Lee is a Professor of Applied Ethics and Associate Dean for Research in the University of Portsmouth Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences. His research has spanned the ethical, operational and other human aspects of UK Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (drone) operations, the ethics of AI and autonomous systems, and moral injury and mental harms in military and police personnel. In 2014 he contributed ethics insights to the International Committee of the Red Cross Conference: ‘Autonomous Weapon Systems: Technical, Military, Legal and Humanitarian Aspects’. From 2016-2018 he was granted unprecedented research access to the two RAF Reaper squadrons for his book, Reaper Force: The Inside Story of Britain’s Drone Wars.  In 2020 Peter led a project which explored legal, ethical, and moral perspectives on advanced technology and emerging weapon systems. In April 2023 he commenced a collaborative EPSRC-funded project to create a Trustworthy Autonomous Robotic Drone System to Support Battlefield Casualty Triage, while in 2024 he was part of an ASIS-funded collaborative project entitled, ‘Autonomous Vehicles: Opportunities, Threats and Challenges.

Speaker: Prof Andews Morris (Loughborough University) - 1055 - 1125 hrs

Title: Driving towards the Future – What can we expect?

In this presentation, I will delve into the history of traffic safety and its evolution over time. And then, as we look to the future, the discussions will shift towards the impending reality of Autonomous Vehicles exploring their potential to revolutionize transport as we know it. But I will also pose some questions about the challenges that we may encounter as we navigate this new frontier. In a nutshell, this presentation will explore the journey towards a world where Autonomous Vehicles could become an integral part of daily lives whilst highlighting that things may not be as straightforward as we might like them to be!

Bio: Andrew Morris is a Professor of Human Factors in Transport Safety and is the Director of the Transport Safety Research Centre at Loughborough University, UK. Andrew was awarded the US Government Special Award of Appreciation in recognition of outstanding leadership and special contributions in the field of motor vehicle safety (June 2009). Andrew has over 30 years of experience in research into transport safety, vehicle safety, crash investigation, crash-injury and driver behaviour research and has published over 300 refereed technical publications, reports and conference papers on the subject of transport safety, crash research, injury prevention and driver behaviour. 

Speaker: Prof Anthony (Tony) Pipe (UWE Bristol) - 1135 - 1205 hrs

Title: The critical roles for AI and simulation in autonomous vehicle development 

Autonomous vehicles, in most of their likely application domains, will need to cope with time-varying environmental interaction scenarios, including those that are “everyday” and those that are very rare, but almost always highly complex. In order for us to demonstrate to an acceptable level that full vehicle autonomy will be acceptable to us in their behaviour and, above all, safe, it seems increasingly likely that AI and high-fidelity simulation will play crucial roles. In this presentation Prof. Pipe will outline the reasons for making the statements above and then discuss the opportunities and the risks involved with these socio-technical developments, i.e., considering both the human and technology factors in play.

Bio: Prof. Pipe was a founding member of the Bristol Robotics Laboratory (BRL) and was one of its Deputy Directors until 2020. His research interests focus on the safe and correct operation of robot systems, normally in close proximity to human beings. He has co-authored over 220 international refereed publications, supervised 35 PhDs, and created a BRL income of >£15M since 2013. He has acted as BRL-UWE PI on the EPSRC grant ‘Trustworthy Robotic Assistants’, as well as the Centre for Doctoral Training in Robotics and Autonomous Systems. Prof. Pipe has been heavily involved with Connected Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) research and development since 2015 via six Innovate UK/CCAV-funded projects. These projects gradually changed emphasis from the technology itself and its acceptance by users to formal testing and assessment of the safety and correctness of that technology, with a focus on the role of simulation in this process. During 2020 and 2021, he acted as a technical author for PAS1884, a guide to safety operators in automated vehicle testing and trialling.

Speaker: Prof Omer Rana (Cardiff University) - 1215 - 1245 hrs

Title: Edge AI and Vehicular Systems

Bio: Professor of Performance Engineering and previously led the Complex Systems research group at Cardiff University. His research interests lie in the overlap between intelligent systems and high-performance distributed computing.  He is particularly interested in understanding how intelligent techniques could be used to support resource management in distributed systems, and the use of these techniques in various application areas. 

Lunch - 1250-1410 hrs

Afternoon Session: 1410 - 1535 hrs (Abacws/0.01)

Speaker: Research Presentations and Discussion - 1410-1535 hrs

Fatimah Aloraini - 1410-1420 hrs

Muzun Althunayyan - 1425-1435 hrs

Muhammad Setiadji -  1440-1450 hrs

Yazeed Alrowaili -  1455-1505 hrs

Mohammed Asiri -  1510-1520 hrs

Xihai Zhang - 1525 - 1535 hrs

Tea/Coffee Break 1540 - 1600 hrs

Evening Session: 1600 - 1720 hrs (Abacws/0.01)

Speaker: Dr Qiyuan Zhang (Cardiff University) - 1600 - 1630 hrs

Title: Blame and Trust in Self-driving Car Accidents

Bio: Dr Qiyuan Zhang is a lecturer in Human Factors Psychology and Cognitive Sciences in the School of Psychology, Cardiff University. He obtained his PhD in Cognitive Psychology at Durham University which investigated people’s intuitive judgments of probability and risk using counterfactual thinking (i.e., imaginations of what might have been). He joined Cardiff University in 2018 and switched his research focus to more applied areas of human-machine interactions (HMI) and automation. As a member of the Human Factors Excellence Research Group (HuFEx) and the Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Human-Machine Systems (IROHMS), he collaborated internationally with scholars and industrial organisations on multi-disciplinary projects concerning human performance and wellbeing when interacting with AI-powered technologies in various application domains including emergency services and aviation. One example aimed to improve human-computer interface design and the working procedure in emergency call centres in Sweden (funded by SOS Alarm). Another project (funded by Airbus) was on the topic of Explainable AI (XAI) and involved developing evaluation frameworks to enhance the interpretability of deep learning networks to human users.

Speaker: Dr Rigel Gjomemo (University of Illinois at Chicago) - 1640 - 1710 hrs

Title: Testing the electric vehicle charging infrastructure for bugs and vulnerabilities

In recent years, electric vehicles have emerged as a clean and appealing mode of transportation. To sustain the growth of this sector, the charging infrastructure is rapidly increasing in size in several regions of the world. This infrastructure is composed of several technologies with different software and firmware, which is often not accessible due to restrictions and intellectual property concerns. In this context, ensuring that such technology is secure from cyberattacks becomes challenging. This talk will describe OCPPSTORM, a tool developed at DPI to test communication protocols in electric vehicle charging infrastructure in a black-box manner. OCPPSTORM is a black-box fuzzing tool that is designed to be extensible to multiple communication protocols.

Bio:  Rigel Gjomemo is a Research Scientist at the Discovery Partners Institute, at the University of Illinois System, and a Research Associate Professor at the Computer Science Department at The University of Illinois at Chicago. His research interests span cybersecurity including intrusion detection, prevention, and response, vulnerability research, mobile applications security, and cybersecurity education. As part of his research, he has published papers in top security conferences and is a recipient of several best paper awards. Currently, he is developing tools to make electric vehicle charging infrastructure and distributed energy resources more resilient to attacks. During his career, he has mentored over 60 students ranging from middle school to PhD.