Cyber-Physical Systems

What Is a Cyber-Physical System?

Cyber-physical systems are complex engineered systems that link cyberspace with the physical world through a network of interconnected computational elements, such as sensors, actuators, and computational processing units. These systems are highly automated, intelligent, and collaborative. Applications of cyber-physical systems include energy-neutral buildings, zero-fatality highways, personalized medical devices, smart cities, and smart manufacturing.

Designing cyber-physical systems is challenging because:

  • The vast network and information technology environment connected with physical elements involves multiple domains such as controls, communication, analog and digital physics, logic, and software engineering.
  • The interaction with the physical world varies widely based on time and situation.

Using multidomain models that capture such variability is critical to successful design of cyber-physical systems.

You can model the information domain of cyber-physical systems with MATLAB®, Simulink®, Stateflow®, and related products (such as Control System Toolbox™, Communications Toolbox™, Signal Processing Toolbox™, Computer Vision Toolbox™, Deep Learning Toolbox™, Statistics and Machine Learning Toolbox™, and Reinforcement Learning Toolbox™). You can also model physical behavior with Simscape™ and event-driven and message-based behavior with SimEvents™.

These products enable system-level design that spans multiple domains and levels of fidelity.

Learn how engineers who design cyber-physical systems apply MATLAB and Simulink:

See also: Model-Based Design, design of experiments, mechatronics, real-time simulation, wireless communications, stereo vision, abstract interpretation, analytical solution, formal verification, robot programming, CAN network communication, control synthesis with model checking, Smart Emergency Response System, embedded system security