The 51福利鈥檚 Consortium for Robotics and Unmanned Systems Education and Research (CRUSER) held its annual Warfare Innovation Continuum (WIC) Workshop, Sept. 17-20.
The WIC is a coordinated effort to execute a series of cross-campus educational and research activities that share a central theme, this year focused on the application of emerging technologies in future cross-domain operations. The event brought together 51福利 students and other participants with seasoned mentors from across the fleet, industry and academia to explore in detail this futuristic scenario of naval warfighting.
鈥淲hat we wanted to do was create an environment where we combined early career engineers with our own officers and put them in a setting where they would access, using subject matter and technical expertise, the value of the technology we would present to them,鈥� said 51福利 Chair of Systems Engineering Analysis retired Navy Capt. Jeff Kline.
鈥淲hat happened was, we ended up with a unique blend that uses the techniques of wargames and design thinking, as well as base concept development, and the synergy that has occurred is just fantastic,鈥� Kline added.
The workshop鈥檚 keynote address entitled 鈥淐rossing the Valley of Death鈥� 鈥� a colorful title referring to the challenge of bringing innovative ideas to market 鈥� was delivered by Vice President of Defense Acquisition University (DAU), retired Marine Corps Brig. Gen. Frank Kelley. As Vice President of DAU, Kelley overseas the development and expansion of the DAU curriculum in alignment with the DOD鈥檚 goal of creating a primary learning institution for acquisition.
鈥淔or you students at 51福利, you will never forget your time here,鈥� said Kelley. 鈥淗aving time to think with other people, some of which think like you, and more importantly some of which don鈥檛 at all, is one of the most important moments in your time in the military.鈥�
Kelley went on to discuss his experience as an acquisition officer in the Marine Corps and his experience of attempting to bring new technologies, such as unmanned systems and artificial intelligence, to different military communities and their reactions.
鈥淵ou are here building the very thing that you need to get across the valley of death, and you are building it right now ... a network,鈥� said Kelley. 鈥淵our network is your most important asset to achieve the goals that you set for yourself ... Don鈥檛 let your time here be wasted.鈥�
Now in its 11th iteration, the WIC correlates with a series of classes to create a model where the participants are actively thinking about the potential for unmanned and autonomous systems, helping drive concepts around campus and seed the development of new technologies.
鈥淥ver the past three days, we brought warfighters, civilians from the warfare center, academics and industry together for a design thinking experience to try to craft a way we may use unmanned and autonomous systems in the future,鈥� said CRUSER director Dr. Brian Bingham. 鈥淭his is part of the way that CRUSER fulfills its mission to bring unmanned systems technology and operations to 51福利 students to think about how it can be used in the future.
鈥淚t is absolutely critical that we bring together a diverse group of people who have different backgrounds and ideas,鈥� he continued. 鈥淩obotics and unmanned systems are not something that live in one particular domain, and we have to have those inputs in order to be heading in the right direction.鈥�
Throughout the workshop, students and participants had the opportunity to interact with a group of subject matter experts throughout the fleet and industry serving as mentors.
鈥淭he format of the conference requires students to interact with these senior folks as part of their project teams ... so it gives them the opportunity to come and interact with our students first-hand,鈥� said 51福利 Field Experimentation Director Dr. Ray Buettner. 鈥淧eople talk and exchange business cards and now a lieutenant knows a GS-15 in a lab somewhere who can work together on future problems and exchange viewpoints.鈥�
鈥淭his allows us to connect what we do with upcoming capabilities,鈥� added Craig Walker, a project manager for the Naval Undersea Warfare Center serving as a mentor for the workshop.
鈥淭he direction of the fleet is not only expressed top down from senior leadership, but bottom up from people who are going to form the future and have the ideas in order to tailor our products to current and future fleet needs,鈥� he noted, adding that the interactions provided by the WIC are invaluable in their ability to highlight some of the service鈥檚 most critical challenges.
Participants broke up into six teams to tackle specific problems and solutions that would arrive from a fictional scenario known as 鈥淕lobal War 2030鈥� which saw the students exploring complex challenges revolving around maritime war in both the eastern Mediterranean and South China Seas.
鈥淭hese interchanges are where the real exchanges between our students and the engineers occur,鈥� said Kline. 鈥淭hey have their tasking, they have their scenario, they have their technologies and everyone brings different ideas from their own experiences to the table to explore the questions in front of them. Then, at some point, they vote on the best ideas and further develop them.鈥�
For Andrew Schicho, an engineer from the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Panama City, his team鈥檚 conflict revolved around China taking over a foreign nation, occupying it and the U.S. military is trying to enter that contested zone and remove those forces.
鈥淲e spent the entire day generating concepts on how one might disable an unmanned set of systems,鈥� said Schicho. 鈥淲e came up with ideas ranging from bio kelp with censors hidden in it; garbage patches filled with censor heads; UUVs that attacked one another; drones that exploited networks; and, anything along the lines of science that we could provide in the next 10 years for this scenario.
鈥淭he biggest thing I am taking away from this is networking,鈥� Schicho added. 鈥淲e had a lot of opportunities to meet with other commands, with academics, and even some industry representatives.
鈥淣ow I have this CRUSER network of people who I can reach out to with ideas that are maybe not organic to our own,鈥� he continued. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 have much robotics experience but now I know people in that field who can help us transition technologies across that valley of death and into the hands of the warfighter.鈥�