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Safety and Security of Vehicular Electronic Systems, Fall 2025

Safety and Security of Vehicular Electronic Systems

EEL 5632    

Class Periods:   Tue 3:00-4:55pm; Thu 4:05-4:55pm   

Location:   LAR 0333 (Tue); MCCA 1142 (Thu)

Academic Term:  Fall 2025

Instructor:

Name:  Sandip Ray

Email Address:  sandip@ece.ufl.edu

Office Phone Number: +1 (352) 392-1605

Office Hours:   By Appointment

 

Teaching Assistant/Peer Mentor/Supervised Teaching Student:

Please contact through the Canvas website

  • TBD

 

Course Description

In this course, we will study architectures of current and emergent automotive systems, and get a sense of the trend as we move towards increasingly connected autonomous vehicles. We are on the verge of the so-called 4th Industrial Revolution, ushering in a world where all things, humans, and processes, and data continuously communicate with one another enabling them to respond smartly to their environment. Autonomous, connected vehicles constitute one of the most crucial and most complex components of this connected ecosystem. Electronics and software play the central role in realizing the functionality and security needs for autonomous cars. We will explore the role of automotive systems in the context of connectivity and analyze some key challenges in making these systems robust, i.e., safe, secure, and reliable, in this context.

 

The course will bring together concepts from diverse areas of Computer Science and Computer Engineering, including Computer Architecture, Hardware and System Security, Real-time Systems, Machine Learning, Formal methods, Embedded system design, and Computer Networks. You will get an understanding of the cooperation, conflicts, and trade-offs among these largely disparate areas, and how to account for them the design of realistic, safety-critical applications. You will get the opportunity to have hands-on experience in design and analysis of several aspects of robust, autonomous, automotive systems. You should take the course if one of more of the following is applicable to you:

  • You want to understand what enables many of the cool features you like in a modern automobile.
  • You want to understand the challenges (and approaches) to architecting the self-driving cars of the future.
  • You want to understand the safety and security issues in current and emergent vehicles.
  • You want to learn the behind-the-scene technologies involved in hacking a car (and how to mitigate such hacks).

 

 

Course Pre-Requisites / Co-Requisites

No specific pre-requisite. However, students are expected to have a general background on Computer Architecture and Digital Systems Design. For projects, it will be beneficial for students to have some familiarity with programming in C/C++, debugging, and the Linux operating system (or understand that they will need to get familiar with these topics within the first few weeks of the course). If the topics are completely unfamiliar please talk to the instructor.

 

Course Objectives

Upon completion of the course, students should have a knowledge of the working principles of current and future automotive systems:

  •    Electronics and software responsible for various autonomous functionality of the vehicle
  •    Notions such as functional safety, security, and reliability in current and future cars
  •    Trade-offs and conflicts involved in automotive electronic design
  •    Variety of automotive standards, certifications, and regulations
  •    Current practices in automotive safety and security design
  •    Automotive software challenges

 

Materials and Supply Fees

None

 

Required Textbooks and Software

No textbook.  Relevant research papers and other notes prepared by instructor will be provided in class.

 

Required Computer

No specific requirement

 

Course Schedule

The following is a tentative schedule. 

 

Week Content Note
1 Course Overview, Introduction to Automotive Systems  
 2 Vehicular Electronics, Functional Domains Papers on Vehicular Electronics Selected
 3 Architecture of Vehicular Systems  
 4 Paper Presentations on Vehicular Electronics  
 5 Introduction to Functional Safety Paper reviews due on Vehicular Electronics
 6 IEC 61582 Standard and Its Variants Papers on Functional Safety Selected
 7 ISO26262 Functional Safety Standards Project / Term Paper topics suggested in class
 8 Paper Presentations on Functional Safety  
 9 Introduction to Vehicular Security Paper reviews due on Functional Safety
10 Key Elements of Vehicle Hacking Project / Term Paper proposals due
11 Hacking Case Studies Papers on Vehicle Security selected
12 Security of Vehicular Communications  
13 Security of Vehicular Electronic Supply Chains  
14 Paper Presentations on Vehicle Security  
15 Project and Term Paper Presentations Paper reviews due on Vehicle Security

 

 

 

Important Dates

TBA

 

Evaluation of Grades

 

Assignment Percentage of Final Grade
Paper presentation 30%
Paper Critique 30%
Term paper/project 40%
TOTAL 100%

 

 

Grading Policy

 

Percent Grade Grade Points
93.4 – 100 A 4.00
90.0 – 93.3 A- 3.67
86.7 – 89.9 B+ 3.33
83.4 – 86.6 B 3.00
80.0 – 83.3 B- 2.67
76.7 – 79.9 C+ 2.33
73.4 – 76.6 C 2.00
70.0 – 73.3 C- 1.67
66.7 – 69.9 D+ 1.33
63.4 – 66.6 D 1.00
60.0 – 63.3 D- 0.67
0 – 59.9 E 0.00

 

The class is not curved. 

 

Academic Policies & Resources

To support consistent and accessible communication of university-wide student resources, instructors must include this link to academic policies and campus resources: https://go.ufl.edu/syllabuspolicies. Instructor-specific guidelines for courses must accommodate these policies.

 

Commitment to a Positive Learning Environment

The Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering values varied perspectives and lived experiences within our community and is committed to supporting the University’s core values.

 

If you feel like your performance in class is being impacted by discrimination or harassment of any kind, please contact your instructor or any of the following: