FAST SHORTLINE TRACING FOR SURVIVABILITY/VULNERABILITY CODES

ALL SURVIVABILITY/VULNERABILITY COMPUTER CODES, INCLUDING THOSE FOR PROJECTILES, LASERS, AND RADIATION EFFECTS, INVOLVE TRACING SAMPLE PATHS (CALLED SHOTLINES) THROUGH COMPUTERIZED GEOMETRY MODELS. FOR COMPLEX EQUIPMENT, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF SHOTLINES ARE ANALYZED TO DETERMINE ITS VULNERABILITY TO VARIOUS WEAPON EFFECTS. THUS, THE SHOTLINE-TRACING COMPUTER CODES STRONGLY INFLUENCE THE ACCURACY AND THE COST OF COMPUTERIZED S/V ANALYSES. THE OBJECTIVE OF THIS RESEARCH IS TO DEVELOP A VERY FAST SHOTLINE TRACING ALGORITHM FOR S/V CODES. THE PROPOSED ALGORITHM IS BASED ON A PARTICULAR DATA STRUCTURE AND A PREPROCESSING STEP THAT HAS BEEN SUCCESSFUL IN OTHER RELATED APPLICATIONS. THE PHASE I EFFORT WILL DEVELOP THE ALGORITHM TO A POINT WHERE IT CAN BE COMPARED TO OTHER EXISTING METHODS ON A SET OF EXAMPLE PROBLEMS.