In many diverse goods, equipment, and intelligent processes, including machine learning and artificial intelligence applications, embedded systems play a key role. As embedded systems applications proliferate in today’s industries and sectors, embedded hardware and software are essential to the operation of the vehicles, household appliances, medical equipment, interactive kiosks, and other everyday items we use.
What is an Embedded System?
A general-purpose computer and an embedded system are similar. A general-purpose computer may carry out a variety of tasks, including reading and creating documents, playing games, printing, scanning, and playing music and video. However, only specialized applications can be carried out by an embedded system.
An embedded system has many alternative definitions that have been provided by many experts on the subject.
Characteristics of Embedded Systems
- All embedded systems have a designated task. Throughout their career, they consistently and regularly perform the same duty. An MP3 player will only perform MP3 player functions.
- To complete the task in a predetermined amount of time, embedded systems are designed. It must thus function quickly enough. Accidents may occur if a car’s braking system operates for too long.
- There is little to no user interface on them (UI). A completely automatic washing machine starts operating on its own once the program is established and ends when the job is complete.
- Some embedded systems are built with the ability to recognize and respond to outside inputs. a thermometer and a GPS tracker.
- The efficiency levels embedded systems are designed to reach are predetermined. They are reasonably priced, tiny in size, and use less power to operate.
- Users are unable to modify or update embedded systems. They must therefore have good dependability and stability ratings. The user shouldn’t have any problems using them for extended periods of time.
- To create embedded systems, microcontrollers or microprocessors are employed.
6 Examples of Embedded Systems
- GPS Systems
- Medical Devices
- Central Heating Systems
- Transit and Fare Collection
- Automotive Systems
- Factory Robots
GPS Systems
A navigation system called GPS synchronizes data about location, time, and velocity using satellites and receivers. A built-in embedded system helps the application of a global positioning system on the receiver or device that receives the data.
The incorporated GPS devices make it simple for people to locate both their current location and their desired destination. As a result, they are quickly gaining ground and overtaking other navigation systems for cars in terms of usage.
Medical Devices
Healthcare facilities have been using embedded systems in medical devices for a while now. Embedded systems are used in a new generation of medical gadgets that can assist treat patients who require ongoing monitoring and care at home. These systems include sensors built in to collect health-related information about patients, such as heart rate, pulse rate, or readings from implants.
This information is transferred to the cloud, where a doctor can wirelessly analyze the patient’s information on their device. For effective patient diagnosis and treatment, medical devices have been employed extensively.
Some examples include:
Ultrasound scanners and defibrillators for pacemakers
Central Heating Systems
In a furnace room, central heating systems transform chemical energy into thermal energy, which is then transferred into heat and distributed throughout a building’s various rooms. The thermostat controls for these systems, which are made possible by an embedded system, are crucial for temperature management.
A central heating system that lacks temperature controls may cause one room to get overheated while leaving another space frigid. You can set the thermostat to a comfortable setting and make significant energy savings if you have the proper controls.
Examples of embedded systems in central heating can be found in a variety of buildings that need to maintain a certain temperature for both comfort and the management of temperature-sensitive items.
Transit and Fare Collection
Through ticket vending machines or online services, travelers can pay their fare using the automated fare collection (AFC) system. Originally using coins and tokens, these systems have been upgraded to use magnetic stripe cards or smart cards. The basic station equipment known as an AFC consists of a ticket vending machine, an automatic gate machine, and a ticket checking machine. These elements are embedded systems that guarantee quicker transactions, seamless operations, and more effective payment collection.
While commuter trains and city transit buses continue to use paper tickets and passes, urban transport systems have implemented AFC with smart cards, which are affordable technology that provides further security and data collection opportunities.
Automotive Systems
Automotive embedded systems are created and installed to improve vehicle safety. In recent years, the number of traffic fatalities has drastically decreased thanks to safety features in cars. Since embedded systems are necessary for new technological systems and sensors to be added to vehicles, the automotive industry goes above and beyond.
Adaptive speed control, auto breakdown warning, pedestrian detection, merging aid, airbags, and more are a few prominent examples of active safety systems. These are only a few of the characteristics that are thought to reduce the risk of accidents and increase demand for embedded systems around the world.
Factory Robots
Robots used in factories are built to carry out precise jobs in hazardous environments. To connect various subsystems, they have an integrated embedded system. Robots use actuators, sensors, and software in normal mechanical work to detect the surroundings and safely produce the intended result.
Robots would need to rely on outside computing or control systems if they didn’t have embedded systems. The safety hazards resulting from a delay or failure in the connecting link between the manufacturing robot and its external computing system can therefore increase as a result of this. As Industry 4.0 takes shape, these systems are fusing AI and machine learning to make machinery smarter, safer, and more efficient. For instance, they allow robots to detect flaws that a human eye wouldn’t notice and eliminate them from manufacturing.
Conclusion
Nowadays, embedded systems are used everywhere. These systems are utilized in a wide range of applications, including avionic and automotive as well as standard consumer electronics products. All embedded systems share the trait of interacting with the physical world and frequently getting their inputs from it. These systems’ behavior is frequently controlled by both functional (such as the input-output relationship) and non-functional aspects because of the application areas in which they are used (such as execution time or energy consumption). This makes it difficult to test and validate these systems. In the framework of testing embedded systems, we covered a few difficulties and their solutions in this chapter.
