Performance-Based Sensor Resource Management for Missile Defense

Toyon Research Corporation proposes to develop a sensor resource management (SRM) algorithm that generates schedules that assign sensors to specific tasks, chosen to best protect numerous defended areas from multiple raids. We cast the problem of SRM as a combinatorial optimization problem and our algorithm assembles multi-sensor schedules from a set of candidate sensor tasks to minimize an objective function. The formation of candidate takes into account such constraints as availability, accessibility, and measurement capabilities. The objective function combines elements of information theory with measures of site survivability to quantify the mission objective. We solve the optimization problem using a branch-and-bound technique to generate good schedules quickly. This Phase I study will build on work we have performed in the area of SRM for over ten years and develop the extensions and modifications that will make it ideal for the problem of multi-raid, multi-target environments. Specific tasks we will pursue include development of sensor task creators and a suitable objective function, implementation in software, and demonstration of the effectiveness and computational tractability on an example problem. In Phase II we will integrate our software prototype with a sophisticated simulation framework and demonstrate our algorithm against more challenging problems.