SBIR-STTR Award

The PGREDS Simulation Toolkit for Population Modeling
Award last edited on: 6/10/2004

Sponsored Program
SBIR
Awarding Agency
DOD : Army
Total Award Amount
$847,109
Award Phase
2
Solicitation Topic Code
A01-212
Principal Investigator
James Panagos

Company Information

Gnosys Systems Inc

198 Broadway
Providence, RI 02903
   (401) 632-0280
   jpanagos@gnosyssystems.com
   www.gnosyssystems.com
Location: Single
Congr. District: 02
County: Providence

Phase I

Contract Number: ----------
Start Date: ----    Completed: ----
Phase I year
2002
Phase I Amount
$118,500
Today's constructive simulations do not possess the ability to represent multiple Forces and Sides with the flexibility required for today's threat and coalition forces. Gnosys, with SAIC as a team partner will leverage its over 10 years of experience in constructive simulations to develop a toolkit for Multiple Forces and Sides that offers users the option of combining new characteristics which until now, only programmers could accomplish. The Gnosys team will design and build a Java/C++ Windows-based prototype simulation toolkit in support of WARSIM and embedded in OneSAF that allows novel configurations of Forces and Sides. By using a Graphical User Interface (GUI), the non-programmer user can specify combinations of tactics techniques and procedures, task organizations and weapons platforms. The anticipated results of the proposed approach are: 1)Greatly improve the ability to represent multiple Forces and Sides not only for WARSIM but also for many other simulations. 2)The creation of new Tactics, Techniques and Procedures, Task Organizations and Platforms rapidly by state of the art graphical user interfaces (GUIs) at the appropriate level of detail for the echelon by non-programmers. 3)Reduction in labor for encoding required to provide simulations with multiple Forces and Sides. 4)Reuse of legacy code in expanding Forces and Sides representations. 5)Reduce the technical risks, costs and time associated with Computer Generated Forces development The potential commercial applications of the toolkit are: 1)It could be used as a commercial off the shelf component in larger mission systems. 2)It could be used as a scenario setup tool in commercial board-style wargame programs.

Phase II

Contract Number: ----------
Start Date: ----    Completed: ----
Phase II year
2003
Phase II Amount
$728,609
Recent events have put great demands on the simulation community for accurate simulation of mission rehearsal and training scenarios based on Support and Stability Operations (SASO), Operations Other Than War (OOTW), and Operations concerning Asymmetric Threat. Current mission rehearsal systems such as OneSAF and WARSIM do not satisfactorily model civilian and non-military combatant sides crucial in the outcome of these operations. Gnosys and SAIC propose to build PGREDS, a tool that will allow a scenario designer to bring to bear multi-disciplinary models (political, geographic, religious economic and demographic) to define civilian and non-military sides in scenario generation and execution systems. The strength of tools lies in its incorporation of any number of lead-edge, interdisciplinary models, its ability to resolve multiple, potentially conflicting answers into a single, consistent resolution, and in its ability to easily interface with existing scenario generation and execution systems. PGREDS will have applicability to military simulation as well as private industry population modeling needs.The anticipated results of the proposed approach are: 1) The addition of realistic civilian and non-combatant sides in current simulation systems such as OneSAF or AEAS without rewriting them. 2) The ability to include cutting-edge models for civilian and non-military sides from several different disciplines as they are developed. 3) The definition of a framework by which newly developed models for civilian and non-military sides can be ?plugged? into leading edge, mission rehearsal systems easily. 4) Making the process of employing methodologies from traditionally ignored fields of study (such as the social sciences) into leading edge simulation systems. 5) The ability to run multiple, interdisciplinary models and vary the gravity of their results, enables a scenario designer to emphasize certain results over others (e.g. cultural over economic models) based on the specifics of a mission training scenario (such as location, history, commanders judgments, etc.) The strategy for commercialization is two-fold: 1) As an add-on component to existing/emerging military simulation systems. 2) As a stand-alone population simulation system for industrial enterprises. Current users of simulation systems would purchase PGREDS to help them conduct SASO, OOTW or Asymmetric threat scenarios. The system will be offered as an add-on at the completion of Phase II to two simulation systems: OneSAF Objective System (OOS) and the Automated Exercise and Assessment System (AEAS). The target market for commercial applications is the industrial and governmental entities that wish to understand the likes and dislikes of population segments. It will also have value to organizations involved in public policy to predict the population?s response to certain stimuli ? this response may take the form of approval, position, or demeanor on a certain subject. A firm may also use PGREDS to gage population response to a marketing campaign. A local government may use the system to predict the approval/ disapproval of the constituents on a certain legislative issue.

Keywords:
stability and support operations, operations other than war, asymmetric threat, population modeling, political, religious, rule-based