NASA SBIR 2006 Solicitation

SMALL BUSINESS CONCERN (Firm Name, Mail Address, City/State/Zip, Phone)
Intelligent Automation, Inc.
15400 Calhoun Drive, Suite 400
Rockville, MD 20855-2785
(301) 294-5221

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR/PROJECT MANAGER (Name, E-mail, Mail Address, City/State/Zip, Phone)
Vikram   Manikonda
vikram@i-a-i.com
15400 Calhoun Drive, Suite 400
Rockville, MD  20855-2785
(301) 294-5245

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT ( Limit 2000 characters, approximately 200 words)
The key innovation in this effort is the development of a decision support tool and simulation testbed for Airborne Spacing and Merging (ASM). We focus on concepts related to airports with Super Dense Operations (SDO) where new airport runway configurations, simultaneous operations on runways, simultaneous sequencing, merging de-confliction and spacing are some of the proposed concepts currently being considered. We focus on modeling and simulating a complementary airborne and ground system for ASM. From a ground systems perspective a scheduler will generate arrival sequences and spacing requirements that will be fed to the ASM system operating on the flight deck. We propose to use and enhance NASAs ACES software to model and simulate our concept. Our Phase I simulation will include a prototype model of an airport emulating SDO and an implementation of airborne spacing and merging algorithms implemented in the ACES flight agents. Integral to our proposed effort will be the understanding future demand in terminal areas as NAS transitions to NGATS type concepts and operations in 2025 including the impacts of possible VLJ induced traffic. Using the simulations we will evaluate the performance of our approach as air traffic densities increase, evaluate controller workload and investigate extensions needed for totally airborne autonomous operations.

POTENTIAL NASA COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS ( Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words)
Our initial target for the product developed in this effort is the NGATS modeling and simulation community within NASA and FAA. The proposed approach and testbed will provide a unique capability to model and simulate NGATS Airportal operations.

POTENTIAL NON-NASA COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS ( Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words)
The potential target market for this technology are aerospace companies developing ADS-B based automation tools for air traffic management. For this effort IAI has already identified ACSS as out initial customer and has teamed with them in this effort.

NASA's technology taxonomy has been developed by the SBIR-STTR program to disseminate awareness of proposed and awarded R/R&D in the agency. It is a listing of over 100 technologies, sorted into broad categories, of interest to NASA.

TECHNOLOGY TAXONOMY MAPPING

Airport Infrastructure and Safety Human-Computer Interfaces On-Board Computing and Data Management Pilot Support Systems Simulation Modeling Environment