Engineering Papers⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Husni Idris

Publications and source records attributed to Husni Idris.

34 records · Page 2
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

A Framework for Sense and Follow Convoys for Collective Autonomous Mobility

Convoys are collections of vehicles that share similar velocity profiles. In the sense-and follow convoy construct, a vehicle can follow a member of an existing convoy resulting in convoy chaining. We prove conditions under which this can occur such that the resulting convoy chain is bounded and the velocities of all members converge to the leader velocity through locally distributed control algorithms. To assess the approach, we utilize a six degree-of-freedom rigid body vehicle dynamics model for each agent. A dynamic inversion based control law is used to track the desired trajectory generated by the convoy algorithms. To simulate the system, we utilize Unity, a cross-platform game engine, where 3-dimensional terrain, building, and vehicle data can be visualized. Numerous simulations are presented to illustrate the concept.

convoys↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

A Framework for Sense and Follow Convoys for Collective Autonomous Mobility

Convoys are collections of vehicles that share similar velocity profiles. In the sense-and follow convoy construct, a vehicle can follow a member of an existing convoy resulting in convoy chaining. We prove conditions under which this can occur such that the resulting convoy chain is bounded and the velocities of all members converge to the leader velocity through locally distributed control algorithms. To assess the approach, we utilize a six degree-of-freedom rigid body vehicle dynamics model for each agent. A dynamic inversion based control law is used to track the desired trajectory generated by the convoy algorithms. To simulate the system, we utilize Unity, a cross-platform game engine, where 3-dimensional terrain, building, and vehicle data can be visualized. Numerous simulations are presented to illustrate the concept. Link to video file below:

convoys↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Pathfinding for Airspace with Autonomous Vehicles (PAAV) + m:N Tabletop

The Pathfinding for Airspace with Autonomous Vehicles (PAAV) project is investigating how to integrate increasingly autonomous aircraft into the current air traffic management system. The project aims to help develop airspace procedures and technologies that are scalable to future autonomous operations. The purpose of this brief is to inform a working group on past and future PAAV efforts. The working group specializes in "m:N" operations, which refers to remote operations where one or more ground-based pilots cooperatively control multiple unmanned aircraft. The PAAV team will detail an upcoming tabletop exercise that is designed to elicit feedback from subject matter experts on current barriers to m:N operations for unmanned cargo operations and potential solutions to those obstacles. The working group will be given an opportunity to provide feedback on the objectives and methodology to be used in the PAAV tabletop exercise.

autonomous↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Impact of Latency and Reliability on Separation Assurance with Remotely Piloted Aircraft in Terminal Operations

Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) for cargo operations in the national airspace system will impact safety due to, among other factors, the latency and reliability of command & control, and of communication. This paper investigates the safety impact with increasing mix of RPA amidst manned traffic in a generic arrival pattern with three merging flows. Latency was modelled as the response time between air traffic control's determination of a resolution and the RPAs' initiation of the maneuver. Reliability was modelled as a message drop probability. The experiment was repeated with two different aircraft types having different performance characteristics as representatives of RPA for conducting automated cargo operations. Overall response time above thirty seconds and message drop probability over twenty percent caused losses of separation. Specific results depended on the RPA aircraft type. The detailed impacts of latency and reliability with increasing mix of RPA traffic are provided. Applications of the approach for further studies at increasing levels of automation are also discussed.

Vishwanath Bulusu↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Overview of Challenges to Integrating Remotely-Piloted Operations into the National Airspace System

An oral presentation summarizing key challenges to integrating remotely-piloted operations into the National Airspace System. The presentation provides an overview of NASA's Pathfinding for an Airspace with Autonomous Vehicles sub-project, recent research activities focused on enabling autonomous cargo delivery, and some of the challenges that have been learned so far from these activities.

Husni Idris↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Initial Study of Tailored Trajectory Management for Multi-Vehicle Uncrewed Regional Air Cargo Operations

The primary contribution of this paper is an evaluation of the potential value of a tailored trajectory management (TTM) capability for uncrewed aircraft (UA) operators that is proactive in detecting conflicts and developing trajectory-based solutions for UA prior to air traffic control (ATC) performing conflict resolution. The experiment matrix is composed of one baseline simulation that models current air traffic operations without such a capability and four test simulations with different configurations of such a capability. In each simulation, five UA operations into Fort Worth Alliance airport were modeled in the presence of recorded tracks for about 4700 flights on January 18, 2022. The analysis focused on the extent to which such a capability was able to preclude an event that could spike UA operator workload. More specifically, in this study, the emulated UA operator TTM capability for multi-vehicle regional air cargo operations was able to reduce the number of instances of concurrent UA conflicts in the modeled ATC conflict resolution timeframe of 8 minutes or less from three to as low as one.

uncrewed aircraft, regional air cargo, tailored tr↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Comparative Analysis of Airspace System Accessibility for Uncrewed Aircraft Systems for Regional Operations

As part of newly developing aviation markets, fixed-wing Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) are projected to impact airspace systems and conventional air traffic in the future. The initial introduction of fixed-wing cargo UAS for regional operations is anticipated to occur at smaller under-utilized airports. Therefore, this paper assesses the integration potential of regional fixed-wing cargo UAS into the airspace system. A baseline is established to identify potential airports for UAS operations in different areas. Additionally, using 2022 data, regional aircraft eligible for future cargo UAS operations are investigated. Finally, the accessibility of these regional aircraft at the identified airports was analyzed. Based on the availability of current certified landing systems needed for initial UAS operations, the potential airports for UAS operations are compared in the areas of Germany, Texas, and California. Despite 173 identified airports for potential UAS operations in Germany, 376 in Texas, and 227 in California, only eleven of these airports provide current certified landing systems needed for initial UAS operations. However, other landing system technologies that are currently under development, such as vision-based landing systems, might support UAS accessibility at the identified airports for potential UAS operations in the future.

Uncrewed aircraft systems↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Assessment of Remote Pilot Maneuver Taskload under Multi-Vehicle Control

Multi-vehicle control schemes where a number of remote pilots (m) supervise a number of uncrewed vehicles (m:N) are desired to enable scalability of operations, such as air cargo delivery, in the face of pilot shortage and other constraints. We use queuing models derived from historical track data to assess the increased task load on a remote pilot due to maneuvering demands as the number of supervised vehicles increase. We quantify metrics such as the probability that the inter-maneuver time and inter-communication time.

Multi-Vehicle Control↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

PAX Mobility

Pax Mobility is a Wicked Wild Discovery activity under the Convergent Aeronautics Solutions (CAS) project. It is intended to cut down the end-to-end travel time and friction for people and goods (referred to as passengers) through: (1) A passenger-oriented paradigm to enable faster mobility that is accessible by all people, end to end (rather than port to port), and that is also safer, more efficient, and sustainable. (2) A total mobility paradigm that integrates modes of mobility to achieve end-to-end passenger objectives. (3) Digital transformation that establishes an agile research and development process to reduce the time to reach end-to-end mobility solutions.

Passenger-oriented total mobility↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Initial Assessment of Lost Command and Control Link Procedures

This paper presents an initial assessment of lost command and control (LC2L) procedures for large Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) in a simulated representative airspace environment using real airspace procedures. The experiment matrix consists of nine different flight routes: four nominal, four following current LC2L procedures, and one that routes the UAS more conservatively through less-busy airspace. For each route, eleven simulated UAS flights – in ten-minute increments – were flown into Fort Worth Alliance Airport following a real Instrument Approach Procedure. The simulated UAS flew amongst real recorded tracks of approximately 4,700 flights on January 18, 2022. The analysis focused primarily on the number of aircraft with which each UAS lost separation and where the losses occurred. This work presents a significant increase in testing capability and provides the foundation for further verification and validation of LC2L procedures using additional analysis metrics.

Uncrewed aircraft↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Impact of Traffic-Following on Order of Autonomous Airspace Operations

We investigate the dynamic emergence of traffic order in a distributed multi-agent system, aiming to minimize inefficiencies that stem from unnecessary structural impositions. We introduce a methodology for developing a dynamically updating traffic pattern map of the airspace by leveraging information about the consistency and frequency of flow directions used by current as well as preceding traffic. Informed by this map, an agent can discern the degree to which it is advantageous to follow traffic by trading off utilities such as time and order. We show that for the traffic levels studied, for low degrees of traffic-following behavior, there is minimal penalty in terms of aircraft travel times while improving the overall orderliness of the airspace. On the other hand, heightened traffic-following behavior may result in increased aircraft travel times, while marginally reducing the overall entropy of the airspace. Ultimately, the methods and metrics presented in this paper can be used to optimally and dynamically adjust an agent’s traffic-following behavior based on these trade-offs.

Airspace Operations↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

VFR Trajectory Forecasting using Deep Generative Model for Autonomous Airspace Operations

To enable the airspace integration of autonomous operations, such as uncrewed aircraft conducting cargo deliveries, there is a need to forecast the positions of the surrounding traffic with which they may interact. This paper focuses on forecasting Visual Flight Rules traffic, a significant source of uncertainty and risk in the airspace, especially around small regional airports, due to the unplanned and often untracked nature of such flights. A deep generative model is developed, trained on historical traffic data at example towered and non-towered airports, and used to predict flight trajectories. Experimental results are presented comparing the performance of variational autoencoder and classical machine learning forecasting when applied to both the towered and non-towered airports over varying time horizons. The results show the advantages of the variational autoencoder in producing accurate probabilistic forecasts over varying time horizons.

uncrewed aircraft↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Analysis and Prediction of VFR Vs IFR Traffic Behavior to Support Uncrewed Aircraft Flight Operations at Regional Airports

Uncrewed Aircraft flight operations at a regional airport will be affected by the uncertainty in the Visual Flight Rules traffic around. This paper analyzes Visual Flight Rules traffic behavior, compares it with Instrument Flight Rules traffic and develops traffic prediction methods to support uncrewed aircraft flight operations. The spatio-temporal distribution of traffic operating under Visual Flight Rules and Instrument Flight Rules was analyzed from one month of historical track data around Fort Worth Alliance airport as a representative regional airport. The traffic behavior was visualized as occupancy maps generated at different altitudes. The Instrument Flight Rules traffic was concentrated in fewer regions of the airspace along structured routes where the risk of interacting with one or more flights reached close to fifty percent in some areas. Visual Flight Rules traffic was spread over more regions, mostly segregated from the Instrument Flight Rules regions, and the risk of interaction was lower reaching up to twenty-five percent on average over the month in some regions. The interaction risk was predicted using predictive occupancy maps over multiple time horizons and conditioned on time and partial observation of traffic in the vicinity. The month-to-month predictability of Visual Flight Rules risk was lower than that of the Instrument Flight Rules traffic, consistently over all the conditions analyzed. However, the prediction and its accuracy were demonstrated to be sensitive to the conditions used. The predictive models generated can be used to support both strategic planning and in-flight decision-making by uncrewed aircraft during flight operations while maintaining an acceptable risk of interacting with other traffic.

VFR↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Initial Assessment of Lost Command and Control Link Procedures

This paper presents an initial assessment of lost command and control (LC2L) procedures for large Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) in a simulated representative airspace environment using real airspace procedures. The experiment matrix consists of nine different flight routes: four nominal, four following current LC2L procedures, and one that routes the UAS more conservatively through less-busy airspace. For each route, eleven simulated UAS flights – in ten-minute increments – were flown into Fort Worth Alliance Airport following a real Instrument Approach Procedure. The simulated UAS flew amongst real recorded tracks of approximately 4,700 flights on January 18, 2022. The analysis focused primarily on the number of aircraft with which each UAS lost separation and where the losses occurred. This work presents a significant increase in testing capability and provides the foundation for further verification and validation of LC2L procedures using additional analysis metrics.

uncrewed aircraft↗