Army Research Laboratory Collaborative Technology Alliances The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) is developing preliminary plans for new alliances in the technical areas of Robotics, Cognition and Neuroergonomics, and Network Science. In order for ARL to explore these scientific opportunities and fully comprehend the state of the art in these technical areas, an open workshop will be held at the Sheraton Reston in Reston, VA, beginning at 8:00 AM on Thursday, May 8, 2008, ending late afternoon on the same day. Attendance at this workshop is not required to propose to any solicitation that may be published in the future as related to these technical areas. In addition to listening to briefings and participating in discussions, workshop participants are welcome to give a short briefing describing their ongoing research efforts in order to help define the state-of-the-art in these three technical areas, further defined below. Individuals interested in presenting at the workshop should e-mail a brief presentation (no more than five (5) slides) to the meeting organizer, Ms. Ren'e Besanson (
contact@example.gov) no later than Friday, April 25, 2008. Submissions should indicate clearly the technical area the presentation most fully addresses, as the majority of the workshop will involve presententations on the three technical areas concurrently. To insure broad coverage in a limited amount of time, no more than two (2) presentations from a single department or branch and no more than three (3) presentations from a single organization will be allowed. It is the presenter's responsibility to ensure that all material that is presented is approved for public release by the organization that funded the research. For general questions about the conference, please contact Ms. Besanson (
contact@example.gov,
+1 (555) 000-0000). Robotics Collaborative Technology Alliance (CTA) The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) is developing preliminary plans for a new CTA on Robotics, addressing some of the fundamental scientific and technological underpinnings to enable the future deployment of highly autonomous unmanned systems, including ground, air, and surface vehicles, on the battlefield. The workshop will consist of technical sessions in the areas of (1) perception, (2) intelligence, (3) human-robot interaction, (4) dexterous manipulation and unique mobility, and (5) integrated performance. Workshop participants are welcome to give a short briefing describing their ongoing research efforts in order to help define the state-of-the-art in Robotics and/or identify fundamental technical barriers that might be addressed by this initiative. The presentation should address technical barriers in this area of robotics, the capabilities enabled if these issues were resolved, and potential approaches to addressing these issues. Cognition and Neuroergonomics Collaborative Technology Alliance (CTA) The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) is developing preliminary plans for a new CTA on Cognition and Neuroergonomics, which aims to use a multi-dimensional approach (e.g., genetics, computational modeling, neuroimaging, and performance) to: optimize information transfer between the system and the Soldier, identify mental states and individual differences that impact mission-relevant decision making, and develop technologies for individualized analyses of neurally-based processing in operational environments. The workshop will consist of technical sessions in the areas of (1) leveraging the capabilities inherent to the perceptual-motor system while minimizing limitations (2) understanding and leveraging the neural processes underlying complex decisions and (3) predicting and validating individual differences in neuro-cognitive processing in scenarios reflecting operational stressors. Workshop participants are welcome to give a short briefing describing their ongoing research efforts in order to help define the state-of-the-art in cognition and neuroergonomics and/or identify fundamental technical barriers that might be addressed by this initiative, the capabilities enabled if these issues were resolved, and potential approaches to addressing these issues. Network Science Technology and Research Center of Excellence The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) is developing preliminary plans for a potential Network Science Technology and Research Center of Excellence consisting of four components: a Social Cognitive Research Center, a Sensor and Information Fusion Research Center, a Communications and Networking Research Center and an Integration Center for evaluation and analysis of research outputs and overall management of the Center of Excellence. Workshop participants are welcome to give a short briefing describing their ongoing research efforts in order to help define the state-of-the-art in the technical areas related to Network Science and Information Fusion or identify fundamental technical barriers that might be addressed by this initiative. The submissions for the presentations should address technical barriers in the areas pertaining to Network Science as described here, the capabilities enabled if these issues were resolved, and potential approaches to addressing these issues. The workshop will consist of technical sessions pertaining to the following areas: The Sensor and Information Fusion Research Center will execute a basic and applied research program to significantly advance the state-of-the-art in sensor and information fusion with the aim of providing revolutionary enhancements to the way DoD exploits intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) data for land warfare. In order to reduce information and communications network overload, fusion of disparate data sources and information sources is essential. The fusion work will exploit the full range of potential data sources including imaging and non-imaging sensors, communications, human reports, geospatial data, etc. As part of the workshop, there will be discussions to identify critical technology enablers such as modeling and performance metrics of integrated network-fusion systems, and closed-loop networked architectures to address Tasking, Collection, Processing, Exploitation, and Dissemination (TCPED) capabilities. The Social Cognitive Research Center will execute a basic and applied research program to significantly advance the state-of-the-art in how networks influence and are influenced by human behavior in the context of military decision making. The workshop will cover how people interface with the network and the fusion products generated by the TCPED process, how they process situational information, especially its representation to humans and how they make military decisions under the stresses of combat. This Center will also execute research in understanding of social networks as input to an overall fusion architecture. The Communications and Networking Research Center will execute a basic and applied research program to enhance the military communication infrastructure to enable a dynamic, wireless, mobile environment that supports a heterogeneous mixture of individual soldiers, ground vehicles, airborne platforms, unmanned aerial vehicles, robotics, and unattended ground sensor networks. The research will investigate complex wireless infrastructure operating over noisy wireless channels with high levels of interference and jamming, while on-the-move with highly mobile nodes and mobile network infrastructure. The environment for the network includes rapidly changing network topologies requiring automatic adaptation and self-configuration. There will be discussions on techniques to model (at sufficient fidelity and with sufficient scale), design, analyze, predict, and control the behavior of secure tactical communications, sensing, and command-and-control networks. The Integration Center will be jointly operated by personnel from the Center of Excellence and Government employees. The primary functions of the Integration Center will be to evaluate and leverage research from the other three Centers as well as other research entities in a laboratory for network science to be collocated with the U.S. Army Research Laboratory. Performance evaluations by the Integration Center will be end-to-end to assess the performance of the information fusion, social cognitive, and networking as a system of systems. In addition, the Integration Center will collaborate with the other three centers to engage with potential DoD and civilian agency customers to transition mature research products.
