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NIST, University Researchers Introduce Framework for Composing IOT Capabilities

the growing need to compose and repurpose IoT capabilities

NIST researchers and collaborators recently published the paper, A Framework for the Composition of Internet of Things (IoT) and Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) Capabilities, in the proceedings of the 2021 IEEE 45th Annual Computers, Software, and Applications Conference (COMPSAC). The paper resulted from a collaborative effort on the part of researchers at NIST, Grenoble Alpes University, and Johns Hopkins University.  The paper proposes an "IoT and CPS Composition Framework (ICCF)" to help stakeholders compose, model, and verify IoT capabilities for a variety of domains. It can aid open innovation and re-purposing capabilities in a world with an expected half-trillion IoT and CPS devices by 2030. The concept framework is based on previous work, including NIST's Cyber-Physical System Framework, and consists of:

  • Semantics that describe capabilities, interactions, and compositions
  • Languages and tools that translate semantics into specifications
  • Methods of checking models and trustworthiness assessments

The paper details the methodology used to develop the IoT and CPS Composition Framework. This includes assessing the Framework's performance and using a well-being composite capability within a smart building. Researchers propose future work to address composition concerns in other domains of interest. 

Released November 1, 2021, Updated May 25, 2022