Buettner, Jr., Raymond R.

This project will prepare and execute a maritime Multi-Thread Experiment (MTX) off San Clemente Island (SCI), CA and follow on experiment at the Camp Roberts Maneuver Training Facility. The primary objective of MTX is to advance autonomy of a collaborative unmanned vehicle (UxV) Network Control System (NCS) in an operationally realistic, multi-domain environment of land, sea and air. The NCS is a distributed network where sensing, control, navigation and communication information are exchanged though a network to achieve mission objectives. The NCS consists of a combination of COTS hardware and specialized software consisting of approximately 10 clients, 2 servers and 20 mesh network nodes.

In addition to the hardware listed above the control system will utilize platforms such as Scan Eagle, Sea Fox, Remus 100, and the Shield AI Quadrotors. MTX will initiate development of a unified framework for UxV NCS and support tactical unit route selection through an optimal trajectory ‘template’ approach for UAV road network monitoring. It will reduce the ‘tooth-to-tail-ratio’ for UxV operations while harnessing the capability of these systems to actively support the warfighter.
Consortium for Robotics & Unmanned Systems Education & Research
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Rapid Reaction Technology Office
DoD
2018