STO-Activities: (no title)

Activity title: Cooperative Sensing for Military Platforms
Activity Reference: SET-ET-141
Panel: SET
Security Classification: NATO UNCLASSIFIED
Status: Planning
Activity type: ET
Start date: 2024-09-22T00:00:00Z
Actual End date: 2025-09-22T00:00:00Z
Keywords: cooperative sensing, ISR, mobile sensing, sensor noise, SET
Background: The defense scenarios encountered by NATO partner nations are increasingly sensor rich, with many manned and unmanned platforms making observations of the environment with a variety of sensor modalities. Apart from traditional iterative advancements in electronic technology, this proliferation of sensors is increasingly due to the availability of low Size, Weight, Power and Cost (SWaP-C) off-the-shelf networked electronics. Such sensor technology is readily integrated into fixed, ground mobile (UGV, dismounts, tactical vehicles) and airborne (UAS, aerostat) platforms. While these sensors may not have the same resolution or accuracy as a dedicated military sensing system, they can be deployed in much greater numbers.
While the proliferation of relatively low SWaP-C sensors presents an emerging asymmetrical threat, it also offers an opportunity for cooperative sensing for military platforms in tactical defense scenarios. Cooperative sensing uses multiple affiliated sensors on different platforms to form a more accurate observation of a given information state than a single sensor platform would alone. Individual platforms may not necessarily be designed for the cooperative problem. For example, in networked automated driving, each vehicle might share its sensor data with other nearby vehicles to improve overall performance and road safety.
Cooperative sensing is distinguished from multi-modal sensing by treating each platform as a taskable, degraded observer. Each sensor’s observations will be degraded by noise, which may come from the environment, the platform on which the sensor is mounted, or other sensor platforms. For example, repositioning a mobile platform closer to a source might improve the signal-to-noise ratio for one sensor, but the act of moving might generate noise for another platform nearby. In this way, each sensor platform both observes and degrades observations.
Prior SET Panel activity has studied related topics in sensing from mobile platforms, multi-modal sensing, and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR). From 2008 through 2011, SET-142 RTG studied distributed acoustic and autonomous sensing for ISR, including sensing from mobile and aerial platforms. Following this activity, from 2013 through 2015, SET-189 RTG examined networked sensing from mobile and aerial platforms, including acoustic, electromagnetic, and seismic sensors. SET-233 RTG focused on transient threat detection in complex environments, including multi-modal sensor fusion, from 2016 through 2018. Currently, the SET-286 RTG, started in July 2020 and ending in 2024, is studying acoustic and seismic sensing in urban environments.
Interoperability and networking, both for ISR (SET-218, SET-256) and autonomous platforms (IST-179, IST-206, SCI-288, SCI-343), has been studied by other RTGs and is not a topic of the proposed activity.
Objectives: An Exploratory Team (ET) will be formed of defense community experts in a range of terrestrial sensor technologies, including but not limited to acoustic, seismic, electromagnetic, radio frequency, and optical. This Team will collaborate through correspondence and a series of working meetings to meet the following objectives:
1. Identify common interests in unresolved multi-sensor, multi-platform defense problems for ISR, force protection, and maneuver.
The Exploratory Team will not compile an exhaustive list of problems for all participant nations, but instead select two or three tactical challenges which are both well-suited to collaborative research and poorly resolved with current doctrine. Particular attention will be given to challenges in platform-generated noise, mobile sensor platform tasking, and inter-sensor conflicts. Certain technologies and platforms may be better suited than others to a single problem, but no one modality will dominate the selected problem set.
2. Propose benchmark scenarios and candidate sensors for cooperative sensing solutions with both fixed and mobile sensor platforms.
For the identified defense problems, the Exploratory Team will develop a series of representative scenarios, which will serve as experimental benchmarks. These scenarios will consist of simplified exercises with a well-defined sensing-based objective, which will be abstracted from any specific military equipment and tactics to reduce security concerns for collaboration. Each benchmark scenario will identify a set of candidate sensor platforms and modalities that have potential to solve the scenario, based on expert opinions of the Exploratory Team. Particular attention will be given to complementary sensor technology and platform cooperation. Environmental variables that may limit both sensors and platforms will be identified.
3. Recommend follow-on Technical Activity to realize the proposed scenarios if participant nations’ willingness and available resources warrant.
At the conclusion of the technical activity, the Exploratory Team will decide whether to recommend a follow-on Research Task Group (RTG). This decision will be based on a consensus regarding the participating nations’ level of interest and available resources. If recommended, the RTG will use the scenarios developed in the technical report as a framework for collaborative experiments, ideally involving cooperation between different participating nations’ sensing systems.
Deliverables:
• A NATO Unclassified technical report on the tactical challenges selected and benchmark scenarios developed.
• A recommendation regarding follow-on technical activity, and if recommended, a Technical Activity Proposal for a Research Task Group.
Topics: • Cooperation between sensors on fixed, ground mobile (UGV, dismounts, tactical vehicles) and airborne (UAS, aerostat) platforms.
• Platform-dependent sensor noise modeling, mitigation, and filtering.
• Capabilities, limitations, and complementary use of sensing modalities and sensor platforms
• Sensor selection and deployment to optimize observational span and precision.
• Cooperative sensing for evolving scenarios and complex environments.
Contact:
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Created at 24/04/2024 13:00 by System Account
Last modified at 16/05/2024 18:00 by System Account
 
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