Group 4-5 UAS integration of terminal area sensors & operations in the terminal area for Airborne Sense and Avoid

ABSTRACT:Integration of track data from Ground Based Sense and Avoid (GBSAA) and Airborne Sense and Avoid (ABSAA) systems offer the possibility of significantly improved terminal airspace tracks because they often have complementary sensing geometries and measurement error statistics.Under Phase 1, Systems & Technology Research (STR) demonstrated a multi-hypothesis tracking and fusion capability to mitigate the clutter and improve the track picture overall by integrating the ground and airborne data.The objective of Phase 2 is to extend the track fusion approach developed in Phase 1 to address system latency, to develop methods to maximize performance in the face of limited bandwidth, to assess minimum bandwidth requirements and performance degradation as bandwidth is reduced, and to evaluate the system across a range of encounter scenarios and operating environments.BENEFIT:A robust multi-sensor integration capability for detecting airspace intruders will increase the operational capability of unmanned systems. Our track integration approach that combines airborne EO, airborne radar and ground radar tracks will yield improved tracking performance over each modality on its own, especially in high clutter situations.By actively managing the communications, the system can be deployed in environments with constrained bandwidth.The resulting capability may be used in next generation sense-and-avoid systems, which has applicability for both military and commercial systems.