SBIR-STTR Award

The use of GPS has become ubiquitous for position identification and navigation. However, in areas such as within buildings, dense urban areas, complex terrain, or hostile areas access to satellite-transmitted positioning signals may be limited, unavailable, or intentionally denied limiting the spatial awareness and navigation capabilities of personnel in transit. To ensure continuity in navigation capabilities, alternative localization techniques are required to avoid personnel and assets from becoming lost or disoriented while traversing unknown areas.In this proposal we investigate the feasibility of adapting the Namatad FIREFLY localization platform, which was originally designed for firefighters, to enable warfighter localization in GPS-denied areas. We will detail the adaptations necessary, including potential networking protocol accommodations and multiple channel usage, for dynamically deployable, cost effective devices that could be leveraged in warfighter scenarios. Given FIREFLY was purpose-built for localizing first responders within a single structure, we will also analyze the feasibility of the FIREFLY system for two additional environments, including mixed multi-building, indoor and outdoor environments found within urban areas as well as longer-range outdoor environments. The feasibility results will be highlighted with proposed adaptations to be incorporated into defense-specific designs in the subsequent Phase II.

The use of GPS has become ubiquitous for position identification and navigation. However, in many areas, such as within buildings, dense urban areas, complex terrain, or hostile environments, access to satellite-transmitted positioning signals may be limited, unavailable, or intentionally denied. This limits the spatial awareness and navigation capabilities of personnel in transit impeding situational awareness. To ensure continuity in navigation capabilities, alternative localization techniques are required to avoid personnel and assets from becoming lost or disoriented while traversing unknown areas. During Phase I we focused on identifying changes to adapt the commercially-available FIREFLY system originally designed for firefighters, for use by warfighters in GPS-denied areas. To identify necessary adaptations, we developed and conducted experiments with our current hardware and software designs, modified firmware for additional evaluations, constructed additional hardware prototypes, built analytical models using collected data, and used those models to develop design extensions to the existing FIREFLY system to improve and enable use in mixed urban environments. In addition, we identified scalability extensions for larger scale deployments in mixed-use indoor and outdoor conditions. Moreover, we prototyped and evaluated the feasibility of integrating radio-frequency (RF) interference resilience. As a result we have identified hardware, firmware, and software architectural changes that would make FIREFLY easier-to-use and deploy for military operations while preserving the core localization and tracking functionality currently available to first responders within buildings. In this proposal we describe the key modifications and our plan to implement and integrate the adaptations identified during Phase I into the Namatad FIREFLY system. These adaptations include design changes in the following five key areas: 1) L2 layer network adaptations for scalability and channel utilization flexibility, 2) device and system-level modifications to enable localization and tracking across larger deployment areas, 3) transceiver optimizations and ranging protocol adaptations for mixed-used and urban environments, 4) the integration of jamming resilience techniques and mechanisms for continued operations in RF-hostile environments, and 5) integration of support for the Cursor on Target (CoT) protocol and visualization on Android Tactical Assault & Team Awareness Kits (ATAK) enabled devices. We outline the key design changes for each of these areas as well as a timeline for completion. At the conclusion of the Phase II period of performance, we will have a ready-to-deploy, defense-focused version of the FIREFLY system for warfighters.