Master thesis assignments
Below you find a number of examples of potential assignments for a master thesis. In general there are far more assignments than can
be listed here. It is always more fruitful to do a master thesis assignment that matches your interests. Therefore, I invite you
to discuss your particular desires with me. Please note that it is wise to at least start with organizing your master thesis two
months in advance. Students in Embedded Systems that first have to do a premaster assignment should contact me well before. Doing
the premaster assignment beside other courses in part time is very well possible.
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The Maeslantkering is the biggest water defense work in the Netherlands. It is larger than the Eifeltower. It protects
the industrial and harbour area of Rotterdam. There
are two locomotives that close the two doors that protect influx of water into the river Rhine at high tide. The software
in these locomotives needs to be replaced as the PLC's inside them are end of life. Rijkswaterstaat
requested whether it is possible to formally model the new software for the locomotive, and prove it correct to
guarantee that the new locomotive works flawlessly, at any time, especially in those times of need. They are looking
for a master student that is willing to do the modelling and verification.
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Control of wafersteppers at ASML is largely programmed using formal models written
in the specification language ASD. One of the components takes care of scheduling the wafers such that they are
properly and timely measured and projected upon. Sometimes the scheduling is disturbed because of an unexpected
event, for instance because some component emits an unexpected error message. In such a case a rescheduling is
necessary. The question is how to implement such a rescheduling such that rescheduling does satisfy a number of
correctness properties. These properties have been proven for static scheduling, but it is not so clear how
to do it for dynamic rescheduling. Persons involved at the side of ASML are Erik Kouters, Sander de Putter and
Arthur Swaving. At the side of the TU/e are Thomas Neele and Jan Friso Groote.
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At Philips
in Best software is being redesigned continuously. Currently, this is done using model based design using
the languages ASD and Dezyne developed at Verum. An interesting question is whether the
newly designed software behaves exactly as the original software. It appears that model based testing is the excellent
way to go ahead, where the old software is tested for compliance with the new models. The research question is to
see whether this is viable by applying model based testing on a recently renewed piece of software.
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Modelling and analysing systems with hard real time constraints is hard. At
ASML, where large parts of the software is currently designed using model driven design,
there is a desire to be able to model and analyse systems where hard real time constraints play a role. Such requirements
vary from input signals that must be processed within a particular time interval, robot arms that must have moved out of a
critical region within a certain time, to wafers that must have been processed in time. There are various methods and tools
available to do such analyses, but the question is whether such methods will be able to provide concrete insights in
concrete real time systems. Your assignment will be to model concrete real time behaviour of concrete systems at ASML and
see which methods are most effective in proving that those systems satisfy the required real time properties.
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Probabilistic behaviour is very interesting. This is the reason that the mCRL2 toolset supports probabilities. Checking
probabilistic modal formulas is a challenging endeavour of which the basic techniques to do so are known. This master
assignment is about making the available theory concrete in a tool. The basic steps are to define the basic modal property
language and to define the translation towards PRESs, the probabilistic counterpart of PBESs. If there is sufficient time
available, an algorithm to solve the PRESs is also very desirable.
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Plain probabilistic bisimulation is provided with a very efficient algorithms to calculate whether two states are equal.
The situation is different when combined transitions are also allowed. If there are two nondeterministic transitions
a.s and a.t, then a combined transition is a.(p s+(1-p) t), or in words, after the action a, state s can be reached with probablity
p and state t can be reached with probability (1-p). Combined probabilistic bisimulation takes such combined transitions into
account. The question is whether an efficient algorithm can be found and implemented that determines whether two states are
combined probabilistically bisimilar.
If you visit me to discuss potential master thesis assignments, I appreciate if you can bring a list of attended courses.
Having completed a fair share of the courses of the Formal System Analysis group
(System Validation, Algorithms for Model Checking, Process Algebra, Automated Reasoning, Proving with
Computer Assistance) is very desirable to successfully complete your master assignment.
Return to the homepage of the Formal System Analysis group.
Return to the homepage of J.F. Groote.