UNIFIED SYMBOLIC AND NUMERICAL PROCESSING FOR AIRBORNE SURVEILLANCE

THE OBJECTIVE OF THIS RESEARCH IS TO PROVE THE FEASIBILITY OF USING A NOVEL APPROACH OF COMBINED SYMBOLIC AND NUMERICAL INFORMATION PROCESSING TO AID E-2C OPERATORS TO CARRY OUT THEIR SURVEILLANCE MISSION. DUE TO THE VAST AMOUT OF SURVEILLANCE DATA THAT NEEDS TO BE PROCESSED, E-C2 OPERATORS FACE A DIFFICULT TASK IN CARRYING OUT THEIR MISSIONS. COMPLEX NUMERICAL ALGORITHMS FOR PROCESSING TARGET TRACKS ALREADY EXIST. HOWEVER, THE SUBSEQUENT PROBLEM OF EVALUATING THE THREAT WILL REQUIRE ALGORITHMS WHICH USE BOTH NUMERICAL AND SYMBOLIC PROCESSING. ALPHATECH PROPOSES TO FIRST DECOMPOSE THE THREAT EVALUATION PROBLEM INTO INDEPENDENT STEPS AND IDENTIFY INPUTS, OUTPUTS AND FUNCTION OF EACH STEP. ALPHATECH WILL THEN DESIGN AND IMPLEMENT A COMBINED NUMERICAL AND SYMBOLIC ALGORITHM IN DETAIL FOR ONE STEP AND DEMONSTRATE A PROTOTYPE SYSTEM FOR THREAT EVAUATION. NUMERICAL PROCESSING WILL BE BASED ON THE MATHEMATICS OF ESTIMATION, STATISTICAL DECISION AND OPTIMIZATION THEORY. SYMBOLIC PROCESSING WILL BE BASED ON KNOWLEDGE ACQUIRED FROM E-2C OPERATORS AND IMPLEMENTED AS A SIMPLE EXPERT SYSTEM. THE NUMERICAL AND SYMBOLIC PROCESSING WILL BE COMBINED BY MEANS OF A COMMON DATA BASE. BASED ON THIS ALGORITHMS, A PROTOTYPE COMPUTER PROGRAM WILL BE DEVELOPED TO DEMONSTRATE THE FEASIBILITY OF CONSTRUCTING AN OPERATIONAL DECISION AID FOR E-2C OPERATORS.