Architectures of Cloud-enabled Cyber Physical Systems — a Systematic Mapping Study

Cloud-enabled Cyber Physical Systems (CCPS) combine embedded systems with highly scalable cloud services. Such systems provide opportunities to offload computing or data analytics tasks which require more resources than an embedded device can offer. The development of a CCPS involves multiple stakeholders as well as engineers and developers from different disciplines, which makes the description and communication of the system architecture a challenging task. Additionally, the architecture design of CCPS has the inherent challenge to determine which functionality should be placed on the device, in the cloud, or on a possible fog/edge device within or close to the system. This systematic mapping study evaluates how CCPS architectures are discussed in the current literature and which topics are associated with cloud computing in CCPS architectures. The results show a significant increase in CCPS publications over the last years, a focus on a specific architectural viewpoint and application areas, and a potential misalignment with the common understanding of cloud computing as a paradigm.