Precision Targeting for the Tomahawk Cruise Missile Using Miniature Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) Sensor Data

In the near future it is envisioned that low fidelity sensor data collected by tactical UAVs will be part of the Navy’s FORCEnet distributed framework. Thus, the potential will soon exist to combine the imagery and video data collected from a wide variety of UAV systems to produce accurate targeting information of time sensitive targets. Under the Phase I effort, ISL demonstrated that the imagery alone collected from a typical UAV sensor output data stream can be exploited to provide targeting level coordinates when combined with high-fidelity geocoded imagery. During Phase I, ISL developed advanced image registration techniques based on the log polar transform to register low-fidelity UAV imagery with high-fidelity georeferenced imagery in order to estimate the target location. During the Phase II effort, ISL and Raytheon will refine the techniques initially developed during Phase I to insure that the algorithm provides the necessary robustness and accuracy required by the end user. These robust algorithms will be implemented, demonstrated, and readied for integration with a targeting system.