Immersive Training for the Warfighter
Written by Kelly Fodel
MT2 2011 Volume: 16 Issue: 8 (December)
Many of today’s warfighters have been fighting battles since their early years; not on an actual battlefield, but on their Xbox or Playstation gaming systems. With games like “Halo” and “World of Warcraft,” the virtual battlefield is just a click away. In recent years, the military has been utilizing cutting-edge technology to provide ever-improving methods of training, placing soldiers in immersive environments meant to simulate the conditions they will face in the real world. Military Training Technology is examining some of the ways in which companies are working with the military to better prepare the warfighter and make sure soldiers are ready to execute their missions with confidence.
“Many applications of virtual training can be offered anytime, anywhere in the world and potentially ‘just-in-time,’” said Kevin J. Kunkler, M.D, senior subject matter expert, medical modeling, simulation and training technologies at the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command. “Virtual training allows for the ability to change environments or scenarios relatively quickly and in most instances allows for objective measurement of those being trained during the exercises. The costs of ‘live-fire’ exercises can be prohibitive to conduct the extensive training that leaders and educators desire, and although virtual training is not perfect, it provides a forum through which learners can fail and learn from their mistakes prior to real life scenarios. With simulation game-based training programs for individuals and teams now available for use on personal computers and multi-player games available for team training through the World Wide Web, the flexibility has increased and should increase the impact on training.”
Havok
“Our products are designed for the development of realistic, immersive simulation training applications and are used by the leading integrators within the military, defense and simulation industries,” said Cory Kumm, director of military and simulation at Havok. “These same technologies are also in use by well-known developers in commercial games industry, helping us keep our technology on the cutting edge of innovation. In fact, Havok currently powers over 500 premier titles, with 150 more under development. Havok provides a complete end-to-end portfolio of fully integrated and modular cutting-edge technology that ranges from 3-D visualization to highly scalable physics, destruction, procedural character animation, scripting and navigational AI.”
Said Kumm: “Virtual training is an extremely cost-effective way to train a soldier for battle—both in terms of costs and risks that are often associated with live training. Warfighters can train without fear of physical injury, or additional costs associated with live training such as munitions, platform maintenance and complex logistics. Another benefit of virtual training is of course, the potential for soldiers to maximize their home time between deployments or practice, more often than would be possible with live training. A third benefit to virtual training is that warfighters are able to effectively sharpen skills by training more often, and at a much lower cost than live training.”
Havok technologies are complete 3-D visualization and simulation development toolkits that are used by integrators to develop training and simulation applications. Leading integrators have adopted the company’s technology to enhance the level of realism and interactivity to their training audiences. Havok’s technologies are used in a variety of ways to develop training applications for the simulation and defense industries.
“For example, our physics and 3-D visualization technologies are used for operator training for cranes, as well as counter-IED robots and complex vehicles with articulated parts,” said Kumm. “A combination of our physics and destruction technologies are used for Virtual Fires training or visualization of weapon effects. With a combination of our AI and character animation tools, our customers are also developing complete MOUT [military operations in urban terrain] or tactical training environments that are highly dynamic with complex physically simulated vehicles with visual effects, dynamic and destructible terrain development in addition to incredible virtual actor performances. Driver trainers, 3-D mission rehearsal, homeland security emergency planning, and analysis or 3-D prototyping are common for our customers as well.”
Innovation in Learning
Innovation in Learning is a Silicon Valley-based, woman-owned company whose co-founders have previously developed, studied and published three other virtual learning environments focused on health care training. Chief Executive Officer Parvati Dev said they developed CliniSpace and DynaPatients in 2010, for training military medics and nurses to provide emergency clinical care of acute trauma victims who have been transferred to homeland or civilian hospital facilities.
“Standard protocols are used for advanced diagnostic procedures, fluid therapy and vascular management,” said Dev. “If resuscitation measures are not implemented in a timely manner or in an inappropriate order, the InSilico medical model leads the vital signs to signal clinical deterioration, leading to death of DynaPatients. Should that occur, learners can practice cardiopulmonary resuscitation and cardiac defibrillation protocols. These simulations operate on the browsers of laptop computers, which also aggregate the performance data of users for subsequent debriefing discussions. The learning objective supported by this initial, award-winning product is practicing the sequence of observation, critical thinking, taking action(s), and reflection.”
For 2011, the company is presenting an appropriately focused demonstration of a SBAR dialogue between medics and a gravely injured warfighter requiring lifesaving resuscitation after a gunshot wound in his chest. The clinical scenario, presented on an iPad, enables users to interact with the virtual soldier using standard resuscitation protocols at the field hospital. The scenario ends with the successful introduction of a chest tube connected to a suction system.
Soldiers learning or practicing resuscitation interact using their fingers on the iPad to select, squeeze and apply pressure as required to the virtual patient’s body structures. Diagnostic instruments, such as a stethoscope, enable users to hear diagnostic sounds of the lungs, and therapeutic measures, such as a sterile sponge held in place by their finger, allow them to stop external hemorrhage by compression. A chest tube available in the supplies bag at the simulated field hospital can be introduced and sealed into the chest cavity to facilitate lung expansion with breathing.
The hosted CliniSpace product is available by subscription, at $10,000 a year for 10 concurrent logins. The new iPad product will be launched this winter, with its price announced at that time. CliniSpace is under consideration by the Air Force’s Virtual Medical Center, PEO STRI and SPAWAR.
Applied Research Associates
Applied Research Associates created HumanSim, a simulation and training technology related to individual medical skills proficiency for the reduction of medical errors. The HumanSim COTS platform includes an embedded physiologic- pharmacologic model, comprehensive after action review and a large number of digital assets. The platform includes over 100 agents and the core physiology model enables real-time dynamic body responses for virtual patients under many variable conditions.
The Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) has awarded Applied Research Associates a $1.85 million contract award with funding provided by JPC1. “The training application serves the U.S. military primary care physician population and is primarily intended as a pre-deployment training application. We feel that this learning application will enable U.S. Army medical personnel to arrive at their designated pre-deployment training centers better prepared, more focused and much closer to being mission ready,” said Jerry Heneghan, director of product development for HumanSim. “The core of this product is the HumanSim physiology engine, which powers the instrumented avatars in our applications and includes cardiovascular, respiratory and pharmacology components. We are also running on a web-based version of the Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 3, so we are using cutting-edge tech from the interactive entertainment industry.”
Heneghan offered this example training application: TATRC U.S. Army Pre-Deployment Anesthesia and Anaphylaxis Training Simulator (PDAATS). PDAATS is a robust, self-paced, single-player, web-based, interactive 3-D, serious game medical application that will be used as a cognitive trainer to addresses critical skill proficiency related to rapid sequence induction and moderate sedation. The content pertains to the care of a patient requiring near-simultaneous administration of neuromuscular blocking agents and sedative-hypnotic drugs in order to facilitate oral intubation with the least likelihood of trauma, aspiration, hypoxia and other physiologic complications.
MotionWerx
“As a custom solution and tools provider, we integrate bestof- breed technologies that are used to preserve and represent the fidelity and nuance of our warfighters in immersive training environments,” said Roger Nelson, founder of MotionWerx. “Our full body motion capture systems, from our partner company Animazoo, support both real-time and game scenario training systems. Our extensive SDK [software development kit] allows the integration of our technology into the wide range of the custom applications constantly being created and extended for training our forces. We also supply systems that are used to model exoskeleton robotics as well as remotely operate robots. In some cases, the operator looks out the robot’s eyes and his fingers operate the robot’s fingers, allowing the manipulations of tools and other objects. We are available for consultation and the creation of custom applications, as well as provide off-the-shelf solutions that can be used stand alone or as part of a holistic solution.”
Nelson’s company integrates a range of technologies suited to both the application as well as the environment. The Animazoo motion capture suits use hybrid inertial measurement units and recent advancements allow for the utilization of this motion capture technology inside of vehicles.
Dependent on the application, MotionWerx has a range of full body solutions from $20,000 to $62,000. Industrial ruggedized versions are currently in the design phase. The full body motion capture suits can work in conjunction with CyberGloves, facial capture systems and a wide range of existing applications.
“Our equipment is used to capture motions to promote realism in interactive ‘game’ scenarios or to allow real-time interaction in the control of robotics or digital avatars in virtual worlds,” said Nelson. “Our equipment is also ideal for ergonomic design for air, land and watercraft for comfort, accuracy and long term health. We are working toward modeling scenarios with our equipment that will help identify the repetitive motions that over time might cause injuries.”
Cole Engineering
Cole Engineering has developed a prototype, sponsored by the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command in partnership with the U.S. Army Simulation and Training Technology Center (STTC), that combines technology from virtual worlds, Army simulations and computer gaming. It’s called EDGE (Enhanced Dynamic Geosocial Environment). The goal? To integrate online gaming technology like that used in the massively multiplayer online game “World of Warcraft” with a virtual world environment and an accurate Army simulation called OneSAF, short for One Semi Automated Forces.
“Let’s exchange the wizards and the dragons and knights and swords for environments that are relevant to the Army … we wanted to build a representation of the operational environment,” said Matt Kaufman, chief, technology and integration at U.S. Army TRADOC (G2). “The challenge is contextual. If you’re in one location at a school and I’m in a school at another location, how do we make sure there is consistency as we teach and train? We are trying to level the playing field across the organization.”
The goal is to combine the best of technologies in order to recreate the devices, people and activities in the operational environment as accurately as possible. In addition to the virtual battlefield, EDGE also explores the noncombatant battle space, allowing for simulated communication with locals in foreign lands and languages.
EDGE is a government-owned solution. While the technology is commercial in nature, it has a licensing structure to allow the government to co-develop the product and bring on multiple partners. “We are motivated by the fact that there are different organizations contributing to the online content of EDGE and we can leverage that with different initiatives we are working on as well,” said Bryan Cole, chief executive officer of Cole Engineering and principal developer of the EDGE software program. “We see its extensibility into other markets, to include the Department of Homeland Security, state and local governments, and even commercial applications. We deliver the source code to anything we write anyway, so this arrangement is not all that different for us.”
Kaufman and TRADOC have been working closely with Cole, as well as with Tami Griffith, STTC’s science and technology manager for virtual world and game-based training. “Each of us has our own expertise and vision, and it is all fitting very nicely together,” said Griffith.
Griffith said, starting in January 2012, the EDGE team will be providing the functionality to the NCO Academy’s Advanced Leaders Course at Fort Benning, purely as a means of getting feedback on the prototype. As the soldiers and trainers determine what additional functionality is needed in the environment, adjustments to EDGE will be made.
The Future of Immersive Training
What say the experts when it comes to the future of this rapidly-advancing field?
“As more and more virtual training revolves around the individual warfighters, I believe we will need to see better visuals as well as improved AI and character animation for truly immersive, plausible training,” said Kumm. “For those training environments that require dismounted infantry, vehicles and weapon effects including highly realistic, computer controlled people and physically simulated vehicles, in addition to avatars controlled by players all interacting in a highly interactive way within a simulation.”
“Saving the lives of wounded warriors will require medics and field hospital staff to be able to access just-in-time detailed visualizations of the best protocols of care,” said Dev. “This will be done through selecting virtual patients who most closely resemble the case at hand, and rapidly reviewing and practicing the protocol in a virtual environment before proceeding with a difficult or unknown medical problem. Handheld devices, intelligently accessing the best relevant information in the cloud, will become a staple of the medic’s tool bag. With virtual environments and avatars, medics will not only use just-intime knowledge but will also find teammates, community, and a game-based environment within which they will learn as they practice and play.”
While the technology continues to evolve, Kunkler reminds us that no one technology or tool provides all of the answers. “Depending on the level of complexity, for example, fully immersive training simulations, costs can be a showstopper,” he said. “The technologies to create these training environments, conduct the training and assess the results, are still in the research and development stage. You also have end-user variation as to what they expected: Some desire high fidelity and very accurate environments while others can ignore some items. As do some movie-goers in a 3-D movie, some people experience degrees of discomfort, even dysfunction, when experiencing virtual environments for longer periods. Another drawback is that it is not yet fully understood how effectively skills learned in virtual simulated environments actually transfer to the performance of those skills in real life.” ♦