NATO STO

The main objective of this activity is to develop a novel network architecture with methods and protocols that can adapt, manage and control existing radio technologies in a heterogeneous military networks for increased robustness and optimized planning and use of the available network resources. (Developing new radio technologies is not in scope for this activity). The mobile tactical network should be able to optimize resources and adapt to different situations that arise during or between missions, including handling wireless networks with extremely low data rate. It should also be able to react to different situations that will put sever constraints on the network, for instance like high mobility, difficult terrain including urban operations, or electronic warfare attacks, and have protocols that can be engaged for more robust behaviour in these situations. Tools and underlying mechanisms should be developed, that allow for advanced operational network planning. An example of this can be to plan differentiated treatment of dissimilar information from different sources in the network, or to plan for the use of only wireless networks with LPD characteristics in specific situations. The planning should also be able to decide how traffic should be prioritized as the mobile tactical network is challenged and does not have capacity to support all demands. The mobile tactical network should be able to leverage new state of the art wireless network types (both military and civilian) where the traffic for example can be steered with very directive beams or have other characteristics that current tactical network management and control protocols cannot easily support. As elevated platforms (both single and swarms) are being introduced to improve tactical networks, the management functionality of the network should also take into account the best use of these. Current state of the art tactical networks are not able to get the full benefit of such platforms.