N242-D10 TITLE: DIRECT TO PHASE II: Radio Frequency Real-Time Modeling and Simulation

OUSD (R&E) CRITICAL TECHNOLOGY AREA(S): Advanced Computing and Software

The technology within this topic is restricted under the International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), 22 CFR Parts 120-130, which controls the export and import of defense-related material and services, including export of sensitive technical data, or the Export Administration Regulation (EAR), 15 CFR Parts 730-774, which controls dual use items. Offerors must disclose any proposed use of foreign nationals (FNs), their country(ies) of origin, the type of visa or work permit possessed, and the statement of work (SOW) tasks intended for accomplishment by the FN(s) in accordance with the Announcement. Offerors are advised foreign nationals proposed to perform on this topic may be restricted due to the technical data under US Export Control Laws.

OBJECTIVE: Design, develop, and incorporate realistic environmental responses to radar signals from VHF to X-Band, including free-space propagation, terrain and ocean scattering, multipath signals, and ship targets (physical optics with multibounce dihedral and trihedral reflections) into at least one (threshold) of these threat surrogate testbeds. This will include high-fidelity propagation effects in testing advanced Electronic Warfare (EW) blue weapon systems via the Electronic Support (ES) receiver portion or tactical Electronic Attack (EA) receiver.

DESCRIPTION: The ASIE EW Labs of Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division (NAWCWD) at Point Mugu, CA have several Radio Frequency (RF) Hardware-in-the-Loop (HWIL) surrogate threat (red) capabilities for test and evaluation (T & E) of (primarily) airborne EW systems. The surrogate threat (red) capability at NAWCWD is a virtual test suite capable of emulating engagements at RF with incorporating blue and red force radar systems. The current hardware architecture and RF environment generator currently do not produce realistic threat representations and will not meet future requirements of testing advanced radar/EW capabilities. Updated capabilities need to include a wide range of advanced radar and EW threats, densely congested environments, realistic terrain and ocean scattering, multipath, and targets. HWIL testing will greatly reduce the need for open-air or sea range testing. This is especially important in the case of advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imaging platforms, EW platforms performing spatially coherent processing [Ref 1], and cognitive EW systems [Ref 2]. The goal is to incorporate realistic environmental responses to radar signals from Very High Frequency (VHF) to X-Band, including free-space propagation, terrain and ocean scattering, multipath signals, and ship targets (i.e., physical optics with multibounce dihedral and trihedral reflections) into at least one (Threshold) of these threat surrogate testbeds. An additional goal is to include these high-fidelity propagation effects in testing advanced EW blue weapon systems via the Electronic Support (ES) receiver portion or tactical Electronic Attack (EA) receiver. The modeling and simulation (M & S) system should be capable of predicting the wideband (1 GHz) electromagnetic channel for radar pulses from multiple (5) platforms in real time for the HWIL system over a 100 GbE connection.

Computational adjuncts should be proposed. Real-time responses for radar and EW systems will enable dynamic, competitive, and/or adversarial HWIL simulations.

Work produced in Phase II may become classified. Note: The prospective contractor(s) must be U.S. owned and operated with no foreign influence as defined by 32 U.S.C. § 2004.20 et seq., National Industrial Security Program Executive Agent and Operating Manual, unless acceptable mitigating procedures can and have been implemented and approved by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) formerly Defense Security Service (DSS). The selected contractor must be able to acquire and maintain a secret level facility and Personnel Security Clearances. This will allow contractor personnel to perform on advanced phases of this project as set forth by DCSA and NAVAIR in order to gain access to classified information pertaining to the national defense of the United States and its allies; this will be an inherent requirement. The selected company will be required to safeguard classified material during the advanced phases of this contract IAW the National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual (NISPOM), which can be found at Title 32, Part 2004.20 of the Code of Federal Regulations.

PHASE I: For a Direct to Phase II topic, the Government expects that the small business would have accomplished the following in a Phase I-type effort and developed a concept for a workable prototype or design to address, at a minimum, the basic requirements of the stated objective above. The below actions would be required to satisfy the requirements of Phase I:

Both the scientific and technical merit, described in the topic have been met. Developed a physics-based, M & S software that can predict the wideband (1 GHz) (site-specific) RF channels for radars and EW systems in ocean or littoral environments. The M & S software exhibits realistic radar scattering versus aspect angle including ocean-ship dihedrals and trihedrals; and that the M & S environment accommodates an unlimited number of targets with unlimited range delay [Refs 3-4] for EW effects, which will allow for demonstration of real-time HWIL tests in the laboratory with dynamic pulse-to-pulse channel adjustments (not using a pre-calculated script), including realistic targets, ocean and terrain clutter, and EW signals.

FEASIBILITY DOCUMENTATION: Proposers interested in participating in Direct to Phase II must include in their response to this topic Phase I feasibility documentation that substantiates the scientific and technical merit and Phase I feasibility described in Phase I above has been met (i.e., the small business must have performed Phase I-type research and development related to the topic NOT solely based on work performed under prior or ongoing federally funded SBIR/STTR work) and describe the potential commercialization applications. The documentation provided must validate that the proposer has completed development of technology as stated in Phase I above.

PHASE II: Modify the M & S software so that it can operate in real time. The system should be capable of predicting the wideband (1 GHz) electromagnetic channel for radar pulses from multiple (5) platforms in real time for the HWIL system over a 100 GbE connection.

Computational adjuncts should be proposed. Real-time responses for radar and EW systems will enable dynamic, competitive, and/or adversarial HWIL simulations.

Work in Phase II may become classified. Please see note in the Description paragraph.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: The final deployment of the HWIL system scales with the T & E requirement dictated by the program of record under which the HWIL system is adapted. This indicates that the real-time signal processing system does not degrade under scaling to meet the appropriate many-v-many requirements of future EW systems.

Many commercial applications employing wireless devices in congested environments benefit directly from the ability to model the setting in which the technology deploys. This includes large-scale cellular infrastructure to support pico-cell networking for access points in 5G and Internet of Things (IoT) applications.

REFERENCES:

1. Guerci, J. R. "Cognitive radar: A knowledge-aided fully adaptive approach." Artech House, 2020. https://www.worldcat.org/title/1199585736
2. Haigh, K. and Andrusenko, J. "Cognitive electronic warfare: an artificial intelligence approach." Artech House, 2021. https://www.worldcat.org/title/1262373416
3. Bergin, J.; Kirk, D.; Studer, J.; Guerci, J. and Rangaswamy, M. "A new approach for testing autonomous and fully adaptive radars." 2017 IEEE Radar Conference (RadarConf), May 2017, pp. 1174-1178. https://doi.org/10.1109/RADAR.2017.7944382
4. Huang, H.; Pan, M. and Lu, Z. "Hardware-in-the-loop simulation technology of wide-band radar targets based on scattering center model." Chinese Journal of Aeronautics, 28(5), 2015, pp. 1476-1484. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2015.07.006
5. "National Industrial Security Program Executive Agent and Operating Manual (NISP), 32 U.S.C. § 2004.20 et seq." Code of Federal Regulations, 1993. https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-32/subtitle-B/chapter-XX/part-2004

KEYWORDS: Real-Time Signal Processing; Hardware-in-the-Loop; HIWL; Electronic Warfare; EW; Radio Frequency; RF; Clutter; Space-Time Processing

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