A Proposal to Accelerate Undersea Weapons and Energetics Technology Development Using Machine Discovery & Invention (MD&I)
Abstract
A Proposal to Accelerate Undersea Weapons and Energetics Technology Development Using Machine Discovery & Invention (MD&I) The goal of this effort is to provide the Navy and the DoD a proof of concept showing that a socalled Machine-Assisted Discovery and Innovation (MD&I) methodology can be applied to a problem of relevance in a weapon systems technology. The unique role of MD&I is to draw associations and correlations from different data streams to establish metadata-level knowledge. The effort here will demonstrate, through appropriate analyses and comparative outcomes for a particular demonstration problem, that MD&I methodologies now could provide rapid pathways to enhanced capabilities for complex warheads systems, such as undersea warhead payloads. This will demonstrate the efficacy of the MD&I methodology in providing new capabilities to help assess, maintain or newly develop technologies of interest to the Navy. The overarching vision of this work is a future naval capability for data-driven automated discovery and innovation in design of weapon systems, based on machine-learning principles that employ both quantitative informatics-based knowledge as well as experiential qualitative knowledge. Together, these have the potential of radically transforming the field of weapons research and development, by converting decades of knowledge into a neural network structure that becomes pliable and searchable. This proposal describes an effort for achieving the first and most important objective towards realizing this vision – proof-of-concept for a data-driven design MD&I methodology that can potentially identify novel and innovative high performance weapon concepts, designs, payloads, and energetic materials. The effort will also apply traditional approaches to technology advancement, such as heuristic guidance based on consultations with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), to the same demonstration problem, and where possible, compare results to those obtained from the MD&I methodology; in essence, the methodology enables the fusing of data from heterogeneous sources, including experiential sources. In this effort, the team formed by ETC will construct an appropriate MD&I framework to systematically discover and guide development of new undersea warhead payloads, thus demonstrating the potential of the MD&I approach for accelerated innovation in Navy weapons. In addition, the ETC team will capture information available in the open literature and from our consultations with appropriate SMEs, relevant to the demonstration objective of showing the feasibility of a new type of rational design approach for undersea payload systems.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Feb 03, 2017
- Source ID
- N000141712108
Entities
People
- William L. Wilson
Organizations
- Energetics Technology Center
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy