Integration and Complexity

Abstract

The modern aircraft is a tightly integrated set of subsystems in which functions may be distributed throughout the system network. This not only has led to significant advantages in performance, but also has led to a complexity of systems in which it is becoming difficult to visualize the behavior of systems under both normal and failure conditions. This has ramifications for system qualification and for fault finding especially for in-flight failures. This chapter will describe how this situation has arisen, give some examples of complexity, and will pose some ideas on how best to deal with the situation. Keywords: systems integration; complexity; emergent properties