SBIR-STTR Award

As Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Traffic Management (UTM) ecosystems move from technology demonstrations to operationalization, aggregate-level system robustness needs to be addressed. System robustness and resiliency to failure are essential elements of any safety-critical system, which to date, have not been adequately explored or fleshed out within the context of UTM. While it is anticipated that airworthiness standards will be developed for UAs themselves, it does not appear that enough research is being performed regarding the impact of individual component and service faults or failures on the reliability of the UTM ecosystem. CAL Analytics has teamed with Assured Information Security to accomplish the following Phase 1 research: -Analyze current UTM system design for brittle areas -Identify the impact to UTM system safety created by identified brittle areas to aid in prioritization of research areas for enabling In-Time System-wide Safety Assurance (ISSA) -Develop techniques for testing UTM system robustness -Propose new Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for relaying State, Status, Mode, Version, and Fault information -Develop scalable health and integrity monitoring techniques for UTM ecosystems -Develop cybersecurity monitoring techniques for distributed cyber-physical UTM systems -Develop scalable fault tolerance techniques for UTM architectures and components -Develop graceful degradation techniques for UTM ecosystems The results of this research will form the basis for a UTM health and integrity monitoring system that will: -Monitor and detect UTM ecosystem faults -Automate contingency management to tolerate or recover from faults for higher system uptime -Automate a root cause analysis to pinpoint fault sources for faster mean time between repair These capabilities will ultimately be integral to address safety and advance the UTM industry. A robust UTM system will form the building blocks for future Urban Air Mobility (UAM) research. Potential NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words) Health and integrity monitoring of a UTM ecosystem will help NASA research as UTM is transitioned from a research project to productization and commercialization. As NASA shifts gears to UAM, a safe, reliable and robust UTM framework must exist. Hooking our technology into the LVC-DE system will allow NASA to simulate and test the reaction to many more edge-case and off-nominal scenarios. This research will also assist with standards development through RTCA and ASTM, by standardizing interfaces and reactions to common off-nominal scenarios. Potential Non-NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words) Applications include commercialized UTM ecosystems where maintenance and operations may be controlled by a public or private entity, such as a DOT or large company (e.g. Amazon). Our initial customers will include the NY UAS Test Site and the Ohio DOT. Additional applications include any system of systems where safety, uptime, autonomy and scalability are a factor, including onboard UAs.

The Phase I portion of this SBIR initiative researched ways in which the resiliency and robustness of UAS Traffic Management (UTM) ecosystems can and should be improved. The primary result of those activities was the formulation of a flexible, service-based architecture for Health & Integrity (H&I) monitoring, assessment, and mitigation of complex, federated System of Systems (SoS). This aptly named Health & Integrity Management System (HIMS) adds another dimension of capability to the UTM architecture wherein it is intended to holistically monitor and respond to the ecosystem, providing continuity between independent UTM services from a system reliability perspective. The proposed HIMS is in direct alignment with NASA’s Strategic Thrust 5 relating to In-time System-wide Safety Assurance (ISSA) capabilities development and integration. Specifically, the HIMS supports progress towards achievement of the first major ISSA milestone, namely the development of domain-specific safety monitoring and alerting tools. Phase 2 of this SBIR effort proposes to build on our HIMS concept. We will take the research and innovative conceptual design produced under Phase I and conduct the detailed development, test, and demonstration of capability that is necessary to provide a commercialized product of valuable to both NASA and industry. The CAL Team is well positioned to commercialize our innovation. We have a proven track record of integrating UAS into the National Airspace System and are working with the leading UTM/UAM firms around the world. Our team also has multiple complementary efforts which not only enhance this research but show that the commercial market for the resulting product is already forming. With the additions of AIS and ResilienX to the team as commercialization partners, we have developed a strong commercialization approach. Potential NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words) Our Phase 2 SBIR has applications throughout the NASA portfolio, where a HIMS product would further NASA efforts and research. This includes the following areas: UAM Grand Challenge - ResilienX on a participating team Strategic Thrust 5 – ISSA research and validation platform NextGen - ISSA research and validation platform FAA UTM RTT – Operationalization enabling technology Our architecture is loosely coupled, making it an ideal platform to perform research around many additional safety critical applications such as NASA’s space-based endeavors. Potential Non-NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words) The HIMS concept has already gained traction with DOTs and ANSPs looking to operationalize UTM ecosystems. We are solving critical pain points for complex system of systems with safety, availability or uptime requirements. Our market research has shown that this same technology is applicable to additional markets such as Counter UAS, Smart Cities, Industrial Internet of Things, and Vertiports.