NATO STO

The first objective of the SET-286 RTG on ”Acoustic and Seismic Sensing of Threats in Urban Environments” is the collection of acoustic/seismic signatures in urban areas. The organization of a field experiment is a complex effort, especially since urban areas are to be considered, with sniper shots and explosions. Previous SETs show that a field trial, with participants bringing their sensors on a shared-data basis, is immensely valuable to all. Representative threats with known near-field signatures should be used. The propagation channel (urban environment) should be taken as representative as possible (height and density of buildings, 3D shallow seismic structure), and documented as best as possible (e.g., environmental remote sensing of the atmosphere, surface and subsurface geology, and topography). Acoustic and seismic sensors and arrays should be placed both in and outside the line-of-sight. For security reasons, real urban activities may not be able to take place during the field experiment; therefore, methods to characterize and include realistic background noise environments, e.g., via post-processing or broadcast of pre-recorded street-scapes, should be considered. A second objective of the SET-286 RTG is testing of innovative sensing systems in urban scenarios. Distributed sensing (e.g., embedded processing at the sensor level, with information relay) and fusion with other sensing modalities (imaging, laser displacement monitoring, lidar, etc.) may be investigated. Artificial intelligence and machine learning methods may be used to improve the Detection, Localization, and Classification (DLC) of threats. Methods to ingest knowledge on the propagation channel may also be used to improve the DLC, or to optimize the sensors’ placement (e.g., tactical decision aid).