Active Noise Reduction (ANR) for Enhanced Cognitive Performance

Fatigue, cognitive workload and cognitive performance continue to be a determining factor in mission success for aviation. This is especially true with high performance aircraft and the emerging elements of manned-unmanned teaming. Fatigue manifests in many ways but can generally be grouped into pre-mission factors and on-mission factors. Pre-mission factors include quantity and quality of rest or sleep, while on-mission factors include intensity and duration of mission, as well as mission environmental condition.   Spotlight Labs proposes to identify the pre-mission physiological fatigue and cognitive state, then incorporate that state with on-mission physiology and environmental comparisons. Importantly, Spotlight Labs takes the position that identification of fatigue is important, but even more important is informing the operator of the physiological and cognitive state while also taking measures, both obvious and unobtrusive, to mitigate or manage suboptimal performance.   Multiple studies show that cognitive performance decreases in loud environments, as observed via physiological monitoring and cognitive assessments. Pilots are particularly at risk due to the high noise exposure environment. Many aircraft in the United States Air Force (USAF) do not have Active Noise Reduction (ANR) capability, including the T-6, T-38, F-16, F-15, and F-22. Likewise, many aircraft in the USAF inventory do not have in-flight physiological monitoring and warning (currently only the F-15C and F-22 have in-flight physiological monitoring). As it stands, no aircraft have both physiological monitoring and active noise reduction. In addition, no one has developed a noise reduction solution based on physiology and cognition, rather than simply trying to reduce the specific noise. Improving aviator performance in a loud environment requires that (1) starting fatigue and cognitive states are quantified, (2) physical and psychological difficulty of the mission is measured, (3) multiple audio technologies to measure and adjust cognition are utilized, and (4) end of mission fatigue and cognitive states are measured. This work proposes to develop a system that integrates physiological monitoring and dynamic ANR into most USAF aircraft. This will (i) allow for automated, individual, and responsive Operational Risk Management (ORM), (ii) measure daily performance and long-term trends, (iii) create an ability to measure cognition before, during, and after flight, (iv) measure the impact of pre-flight fatigue and in-flight fatigue on cognitive performance, and (v) develop and test algorithms to provide a real-time cognitively responsive audio system to maximize operator performance and quantify the changes.