Interdependent Critical Infrastructure Systems

The efficiency and welfare of modern urbanised societies is built upon the society’s infrastructure - the ‘backbone’ that enables the exchange and transaction of goods and services across local, regional and national boundaries.

When operating seamlessly together, these systems that power the urban world, including information and communications technology (ICT), electric power supply, transportation, emergency (such as medical, rescue, fire and police), and financial services are more than the sum of its parts

However, the interconnectedness of these critical infrastructure systems also makes them vulnerable to disruptions of both internal and external nature. External factors include natural disasters, terrorism, and malicious behaviour of humans; while internal factors may include technical failures of components, systemic failures, and human errors.

Most systems are both social and technical in nature, by virtue of the fact that they tend to be operated by people or would have some form of interface with people. Therefore, the human factor has a role in the efficiency and reliability of critical infrastructure.

This research cluster aims to understand the behaviour of critical infrastructure and develop proposals to make systems more robust.

Research modules include: 

1. Understanding Interdependencies module will examine the relationship between the social and technical aspects of a system, to uncover interdependencies and analyse how the interdependency evolve with time
2. Modelling Complex Socio-Technical Infrastructure Systems module will develop both social and technical models of critical infrastructure and study how these models interact in order to explain the behaviour of these systems
3. Resilience Metrics and Outliers module will attempt to understand and anticipate the consequences caused by stressors to systems
4. Optimal Management Strategies and Tactics module will devise optimal strategies to make systems robust, taking into consideration factors, including resources and operators