NCS Heading M&S Charge
METRO ORLANDO: CONTINUING TO LEAD ADVANCEMENTS
IN DEFENSE SIMULATION TECHNOLOGIES
Orlando has long been the hub for military- based simulation technology activity, anchored by the training system procurement commands of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. What makes Orlando even more important to this industry is the leadership and synergies that come from a cluster of related companies and other sectors, a strong university with unique simulation curricula and R&D capabilities, and the shared industry voice that comes from the National Center for Simulation (NCS).
The Orlando-based NCS focuses on promoting and providing modeling and simulation technology transfer, education and business development support to the government, industry and academic communities. NCS serves as an important link between the military, other government entities, industry and academia engaged in research, development and broad applications of simulation technology. NCS also serves as a bridge between the “traditional” defense simulation organizations and other simulation-related communities of interest, such as the digital media and medical simulation and training communities.
Today, NCS enjoys a rather unique position because it has three identities or “personalities.” First, NCS is a membership organization with national and international reach. Second, NCS is, or more precisely, represents, a geographic place (Central Florida) that is a designated Center of Excellence for Modeling and Simulation. And, third, NCS is a facilitator and promoter of the great teamwork that has evolved among the Orlando simulation community organizations.
NCS began in the early 1990s as the Training & Simulation Technology Consortium (TSTC); incorporated in 1994 as a White House Technology Reinvestment Program initiative to help transfer military technology into the private sector and create, preserve, and enhance jobs in industry. The federal government supported development of this consortium to help maintain the training and simulation industry for military and government projects, while encouraging defense contractors to pursue commercial, educational, state and local government, and industrial market opportunities. Major goals were to help lower the cost to government of simulation and training and to leverage the investment of taxpayers in this technology. In 1997, the TSTC grew into a new role as the National Center for Simulation — a nonprofit, 501(c)3 corporation; carrying over its membership, establishing a new Board of Directors, and relocating its offices to the acclaimed University of Central Florida’s Institute for Simulation and Training (UCF/ IST). Today, NCS’ membership includes 150 firms, associations, academic institutions, and individuals nationwide—forming a network of simulation experience and expertise. Defense activities and federal, state, and local government; and economic/workforce development organizations serve as affiliate members of NCS—and the addition of a number of overseas members has extended NCS’ horizons as an International Center for Simulation, as well.
NCS has a fundamental objective of further extending simulation and related technologies into new applications—principally by growing the membership, leveraging the investments that have been made in defense-related programs, and bringing new and emerging commercial technologies employed in the digital media sector into training and education and other applications.
METRO ORLANDO MOVING IN NEW DIRECTIONS
The Orlando community, with more than 150 MS&T companies and more than 17,000 industry workers, continues to expand and evolve as a national and international focal point and leader in simulation and related technologies and disciplines, which include: aviation and aerospace, emergency services, entertainment, optics, homeland security and more. A great focus has also been placed on human performance, particularly in the interface between individuals and machines (something that is critical for the future military force). With military requirements becoming an economic engine, the region has been growing purposefully in new and diverse technical directions.
As an example, earlier this year, San Diego-based simulation technology company Virtual Reality Medical Center (VRMC), announced it was establishing a facility in Orlando, joining other Orlando-based simulation industry leaders Lockheed Martin, SAIC, Northup Grumman, General Dynamics, Saab, L-3 Communications, Evans & Sutherland, CAE, Silicon Graphics and many others. Quoting from a news article on this development:
In choosing Orlando, the company’s founders cited the area’s reputation as a national center for simulation technology and its potential to develop a biomedical cluster at Lake Nona around the Burnham Institute’s planned East Coast lab, the University of Central Florida’s new medical school and a planned Veterans Affairs hospital. (Note: The Nemours Foundation also has since been approved to build a $277 million children’s hospital with a strong research component at this southeast Orlando site. With these four developments, Lake Nona is fast becoming home to the nation’s new “medical city.”) “We looked at the region and decided we needed to have a presence in the Orlando community,” said co-founder and President Mark Wiederhold, a former research director and physician with the Scripps Clinic Medical Group in San Diego.” “So much is going on there [in Orlando] in medicine and technology. It is an incredibly important area for simulation. We knew we needed to be there.”
In an editorial a few days later headed “Teamwork allowed Central Florida to broaden high-tech base,” the Orlando Sentinel newspaper pointed out that the combination of the military simulation technology industry and the fast-growing “medical city ” research complex in Orlando have produced an economic engine that is attracting hightech, high wage employers. And, VRMC is supporting both military and civilian medical simulation initiatives, including, for example, working with civilians in treatment of phobias and with the military in treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Medical, or more broadly, health care simulation is certainly a hot topic in Orlando and nationally these days. The field is fastevolving, largely driven by military necessity, spending in research, and resulting spin-off and spin-on developments. But the need is great for new health care simulation and training in the civilian community, as well. In an important report published in 1999 by the Institute of Medicine, “To Err is Human—Building a Safer Health Care System,” the institute said that at least 44,000 and perhaps as many as 98,000 patients die each year as a result of medical errors.
So, the efforts of NCS to help bridge the gap between military and civilian medical and health care applications of simulation technology should pay substantial benefits for both sectors—for our warfighters and for the nation. In furtherance of these efforts, of course, NCS supports a number of professional organizations with interests in health care simulation development.
UCF’S ROLE IN THE SIMULATION INDUSTRY
In its relatively brief lifetime (41 years since rising out of a forest of sand pine, scrub oak and palmetto), the University of Central Florida in Orlando has become an internationally known and much respected source for ground-breaking research. Contracts and grants for the second consecutive year grew to more than $100 million for research. A significant component of that growth has been at the university’s Institute for Simulation and Training (IST).
Largely credited as catalyst for the growth of Central Florida’s prominence in modeling and simulation R&D, the institute (under the direction of Dr. Randall Shumaker), has come to the forefront of research in robotics technology, as well.
According to Dr. Shumaker, areas under IST investigation include probing what robots look like and how best to interact with and control them.
“If we’re going to include robots and other intelligent agents on teams,” said Shumaker, “ideally we should learn optimum ways to work alongside them.” Of no little importance are issues of confidence. “Whether your teammate is human or computer controlled, if you don’t trust them, you won’t function as effectively as a team,” Shumaker said. “So a recurring theme in our research is how humans perceive and relate to other-than-human entities.”
Examples of recent robotics projects especially important to military applications include:
• Autonomous Wireless Robots. Description of a project to develop tracked robot vehicles that can investigate, map and conduct long-term surveillance over largely unknown terrain.
• Ad-hoc Robotic Testbed (ART). Development of low-cost mobile platforms for Army Tactical Engagement Simulation training exercises.
• Intuitive Means for Robotic Control (IMROC). A research simulation environment to investigate training issues relevant to introduction of robotic elements into Army operations.
• Indoor Mapping Robot (IMR). Demonstration of design and implementation of a low cost mobile robotic computing platform that can perform exploratory operations inside buildings.
• Common Robotics Architecture (CRA). Designed in response to the need for rapid robotic application development and prototyping for hardware control systems and data communications.
Additional information on IST and its research can be found at: (www.ist.ucf.edu)
ORLANDO SYNERGIES
In addition to serving as a Center of Excellence for military applications of simulation technology and related research and development, Orlando is also home to one of the nation’s major clusters of digital media-related companies, as well as a growing base of organizations focused on homeland security. The crossover opportunities among these industries has proven fruitful.
This digital media technology sector shares similarities with the more traditional military applications of simulation and the military services. The latter is increasingly looking towards the digital media and entertainment technology community for products and capabilities that can transform training into a more interactive and engaging experience. This cross-over or convergence of technologies and applications promises to pay great dividends for all participants. For example, two local interactive entertainment companies formed the creation/ design team behind BattleStations 21, the new battleship training facility at the Great Lakes Naval Station in Illinois.
Game developers, too, are fast becoming defense contractors focused on games for serious learning purposes, with the side benefit of possibly turning those products into commercial titles, as well. The potential here is unlimited. The benefits to our men and women in uniform are being realized every day.
Finally, Orlando’s growing legion of homeland security companies that are engaged in land-mine detection, digital forensics, laser-radar and thermal imaging systems further complement the simulation industry here.
TEAM ORLANDO SUPPORTING JOINT AND MULTI-SERVICE REQUIREMENTS
NCS also supports “Team Orlando,” a working partnership among the military services, industry, and academia working together to leverage resources and contribute to the overall national security. Especially important is the opportunity for collaboration and knowledge-sharing across service and work force organizational lines in order to better support warfighter training needs.
The Team Orlando leadership is focused on:
• Providing senior-level guidance and direction to the joint modeling and simulation requirements and prioritization (“vetting”) process;
• Providing a consolidated inter-service military entity in the Orlando area in support of DoD’s requirements for M&S, training systems and human performance (HP); and
• Providing senior-level guidance and interaction to facilitate cross-pollination of tools, technologies and lessons learned as they relate to training solutions and instrumentation issues in support of joint service requirements and initiatives.
A recent example of ways in which Team Orlando has come together in support of joint service requirements is its development of the Joint Training Integration and Evaluation Center (JTIEC), which officially launched its operations in April 2006. JTIEC has provided Team Orlando with an expanded joint-centric vision, including USJFCOM and the services with focus areas on the following:
• Environment. Establishment of JTIEC with leadership and infrastructure to support Joint, Multi-service and service- specific research, development, integration, interoperability, demonstration, evaluation and other aspects of training technologies and products.
• Connectivity. Connection via the Defense Research Engineering Network (DREN) and the Joint Training and Experimentation Network (JTEN) to the Joint environment; additional connectivity will include federal agencies, industry and contractor sites, academia laboratories, and other environments that may be identified.
• Collaboration. Facilitation, cooperation, and information exchange on capabilities and projects of relevance to participating organizations.
In both military and non-military applications of simulation and related technologies, the Orlando community is moving in new directions and continues to lead the nation in advancements that are better training and arming our warfighters, saving lives and much more. For more on Orlando’s simulation industry, visit www.simulationinformation.com or www.orlandoedc.com. ♦