"Niche-Filling New Course Meets Aircraft and Spacecraft Industries' Workforce Need"
The new Purdue Aviation and Space Cybersecurity course provides engineering students with valuable cyber-domain security knowledge while also providing computer science and cybersecurity majors with aeronautical and astronautical engineering knowledge. Aeronautical and astronautical engineering graduates typically lack a solid understanding of cyber risks and vulnerabilities, according to Joel Rasmus, director of the Purdue Center for Education Research in Information Assurance and Security (CERIAS), who formed the new course in response to industry members of the CERIAS Strategic Partnership Program. Rasmus also emphasized that cyber-focused students have not been prepared to understand the technical principles of size, weight, and power, as well as other engineering specifics. The demand for this dual expertise is high and increasing. Avionic systems, which are aircraft systems that combine aviation and electronics, include communications, navigation, and more, with each system and function being a potential target for malicious adversaries. The course is designed to teach students how to solve real-world problems. Using problem scenarios provided by industry members, teams of students work with Purdue faculty and industry mentors to develop solutions. Students from cybersecurity, computer science, data science, industrial engineering, aeronautical and astronautical engineering, and mechanical engineering will collaborate to address a specific industry concern. The students are working on a project sponsored by Boeing during the course's first semester, with the mission being to develop an algorithm that uses industry-accepted aeronautical engineering principles while also addressing the need for measurable cybersecurity. This article continues to discuss the new Purdue Aviation and Space Cybersecurity course and the importance of dual expertise.