Air force 14. 1 Small Business Innovation Research (sbir) Proposal Submission Instructions

PHASE I: Design prototype radiation hardened processor architecture that is low power, within a small circuit board footprint, uses a limited instruction set, and contains a relatively small gate count (such as you find in a ARM architecture), and validate through modeling and simulation.

PHASE II: Fabricate radiation hardened prototype and characterize for all relevant performance metrics including throughput, power consumption, reliability, operating temperature range, and radiation tolerance, including SEE immunity.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Military: This research could benefit all military satellite programs requiring power efficient space computing. Commercial: Commercial applications include commercial space, avionics and automobiles.

REFERENCES:

1. Yiu, Joseph, The Definitive Guide to the ARM© Cortex™ – M0, Elsevier Inc. Oxford UK, 2011.

AF141-099 TITLE: Power Aware GPS User Equipment

OBJECTIVE: Specific to a ground-based military GPS receiver, develop a power management strategy which is implemented with an intelligent embedded software monitor/control application to balance power consumption against receiver performance.

DESCRIPTION: Modernized military Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers continue to improve in capability, but the demand for increased battery life remains a constant challenge. GPS receivers are developed using application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) devices that are fabricated in advanced submicron fabrication processes. They efficiently integrate multiple microprocessor cores, crypto engines and large acquisition circuits to meet size and power requirements. However, the newer semiconductor processes are now dominated by static power dissipation due to transistor leakage. A common approach is to reduce the power by reducing the position accuracy through various power-down, duty cycle tradeoffs in tracking and acquisition, but the challenge is to find the right mix between power and accuracy to meet the requirements for a given application (e.g., munitions, personnel location and time delivery). Also, military receivers can receive both civil and encrypted codes. There may be time windows where the military codes are not needed and performance modes could be adapted to the exposed RF environments. The objective is to develop an application which implements an intelligent power management strategy and suite of algorithms which trades between power and predictable performance behavior for any receiver. The application should reduce the power required to track encrypted military signals by 50%--typical power consumption for state-of-the-art military receivers is below 1.2W during tracking using 90nm technology.
Research GPS receiver power management techniques which allow for specific optimizations based on various mission scenarios and use cases. The study should define the use cases and define metrics which could be used to measure power and performance with degradation in mission effectiveness. These metrics should relate to receiver performance tradeoffs of critical requirements such as accuracy, Time To First Fix (TTFF), Anti-Spoof, Anti-Jam, as well as military exclusivity. The study should survey and suggest different hardware/software architectures and algorithms that could be implemented to reduce power by design optimization, as well as pulling back on receiver performance, but still maintain mission effectiveness. The study should look to combine these techniques into an application which takes a holistic approach, accounting for mission-specific requirements and use cases while leveraging related software and hardware power optimizations which are common for battery operated products. In addition, the application should have awareness of and leverage on-chip power management enablers, such as power islands, back bias and clock gating.

PHASE I: Research GPS receiver power management techniques which allow for specific optimizations based on mission scenarios and use cases. Define the use cases and define metrics for power and performance with degradation in mission effectiveness. These metrics are receiver performance tradeoffs of critical requirements such as accuracy, TTFF, Anti-Spoof, Anti-Jam, as well as military exclusivity.

PHASE II: Phase II will focus on the simulation, implementation, and benchmarking of the techniques proposed during Phase I. Demonstrate techniques at the architecture and algorithmic level using simulations in high-level languages. Implement the techniques as electronic circuits and software in a suitable hardware-description language using constructs and resources independent of technology. Build prototypes.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Enable technology transfer and subsequent research by capturing the innovation techniques developed and demonstrated during Phases I and II. Deliverables should be presented as structured, reusable intellectual property packages suitable for implementation in various ASIC & FPGA technologies.

REFERENCES:

1. u-blox Power Management Application Note: Considerations with u-blox 6 GPS receivers: Document GPS.G6-X-10014-B.

AF141-100 TITLE: Secure Time delivery Military GPS receivers in challenged RF environments using

existing wireless infrasructure
KEY TECHNOLOGY AREA(S): Electronics and Electronic Warfare
The technology within this topic is restricted under the International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), 22 CFR Parts 120-130, which controls the export and import of defense-related material and services, including export of sensitive technical data, or the Export Administration Regulation (EAR), 15 CFR Parts 730-774, which controls dual use items. Offerors must disclose any proposed use of foreign nationals (FNs), their country(ies) of origin, the type of visa or work permit possessed, and the statement of work (SOW) tasks intended for accomplishment by the FN(s) in accordance with section 5.4.c.(8) of the solicitation and within the AF Component-specific instructions. Offerors are advised foreign nationals proposed to perform on this topic may be restricted due to the technical data under US Export Control Laws. Please direct questions to the AF SBIR/STTR Contracting Officer, Ms. Kristina Croake, kristina.croake@us.af.mil.

OBJECTIVE: Develop an accurate and secure GPS time-aiding service that considers the time uncertainty from universal time (UTC) of existing commercial and tactical wireless infrastructure.

DESCRIPTION: There are several methods to obtain time through commercial and tactical communication infrastructures; however, the level of trust and accuracy of these mechanisms limit their usefulness for military missions. Investigate alternatives for delivering secured time with highest accuracy to military GPS in tactical environments which leverages existing commercial or military communication infrastructure.
Applications that require synchronization often depend on GPS receivers to provide a source of accurate time. However, there are many situations when time is needed by the GPS receiver itself to reduce the Time-to-First-Fix (TTFF), e.g., when the GPS service is denied due to RF interference. For military receivers, providing coordinated universal time (UTC) between microsecond to millisecond accuracy provides anti-jam robustness by enabling direct acquisition of the military encrypted signals. Given that time is often provided over commercial wireless and tactical wireless communication networks, it is assumed military GPS receivers could be better integrated to leverage this as a “time-aiding” service. The challenge is to identify the various impacts to time transfer accuracy due to inherent limitations of a particular communication waveform, network deployment and equipment design (e.g., latency, clock jitter, protocols, software scheduling, etc.). In addition, for a GPS time-aiding service to be robust for military or public safety applications, authentication mechanisms would be needed to assure the time transfer. Therefore, the objective of this topic is to develop an accurate and secure GPS time-aiding service that considers the time uncertainty from UTC of existing commercial and tactical wireless infrastructure.
Provide a detailed pro/con explanation for each of the wireless waveforms. Recommend an approach that requires the least amount of changes to the wireless waveform and deployment infrastructure while offering the robustness required to time-aid a GPS receiver for military and public safety applications. Explain the ability to scale the approach from a small to large network.
Enable technology transfer and subsequent research by capturing the innovation techniques developed and demonstrated during Phases I and II. Deliverables should be presented as structured, reusable intellectual property packages suitable for implementation in a variety of wireless communication devices

PHASE I: Research existing tactical and commercial wireless waveforms for applicability to support a secure and accurate time transfer. Perform a trade analysis for each communication waveform investigated using metrics to rank application suitability, accuracy, integrity, and cost.

PHASE II: Focus on the simulation, implementation, and benchmarking of the recommended approach in Phase I. Demonstrate the ability of this approach to provide a military GPS receiver with effective time-aiding in the presences of RF interference. Build prototypes.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Military: Secure time delivery systems readily implementable in future subsystems. Commercial: There are expected civilian uses.

REFERENCES:

1. 42nd Annual Precise Time and Time Interval (PTTI) Meeting, UTC Time Transfer for High Frequency Trading Using IS-95 CDMA Base Station Transmissions and IEEE-1588 Precision Time Protocol, Michael D. Korreng, EndRun Technologies.

AF141-101 TITLE: Multi-Processor Array for Multi-Parametric Sensing in Cubesat DoD (or Air Force)

Space Missions
KEY TECHNOLOGY AREA(S): Space Platforms
The technology within this topic is restricted under the International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), 22 CFR Parts 120-130, which controls the export and import of defense-related material and services, including export of sensitive technical data, or the Export Administration Regulation (EAR), 15 CFR Parts 730-774, which controls dual use items. Offerors must disclose any proposed use of foreign nationals (FNs), their country(ies) of origin, the type of visa or work permit possessed, and the statement of work (SOW) tasks intended for accomplishment by the FN(s) in accordance with section 5.4.c.(8) of the solicitation and within the AF Component-specific instructions. Offerors are advised foreign nationals proposed to perform on this topic may be restricted due to the technical data under US Export Control Laws. Please direct questions to the AF SBIR/STTR Contracting Officer, Ms. Kristina Croake, kristina.croake@us.af.mil.

OBJECTIVE: Develop a compact multi-processor system to support observation-based Cubesat payloads including single sensor and/or multi-sensor capability.

DESCRIPTION: CubeSats, small modular satellite platforms that range from 1U to 3U size, are becoming highly regarded by both commercial and military organizations that are exploring their use for various applications from surveillance to communication to research missions. Standards-based satellite buses and deployment mechanisms such as the CubeSat and Poly Pico-satellite Orbital Deployer (P-POD) have driven expansion and technology development forward. Small satellites have proven to be very adept at focused tasks and require much lower capital expenditure and development time for both payload and launch tasks in contrast to expensive legacy monolith satellites and their costly launch requirements. Though the cost and development times associated with cubesats are much lower than conventional satellites, their size, weight, and power-constraint (SWaP-C) demands are much more stringent, particularly with regard to onboard processing. This poses a challenge since many of the missions envisaged for small spacecraft involve autonomous surveillance and situational awareness that requires monitoring and fusing widely disparate sensor data streams, as well as performing health monitoring and housekeeping which can tax commonly available embedded processors. While FPGAs are effective for some applications, the development and validation time for a given design can be considerable. Instead, a technology that shows considerable promise in this arena are embedded heterogeneous processor arrays consisting of dozens of identical processors. Such designs are better suited to graceful degradation in the face of radiation damage and also recover better from defective instructions and programming. In addition, such designs have remarkably scalable power consumption given their ability to shut down individual processors selectively or reallocate processors to perform load balancing. While General Purpose Graphical Processing Unit (GPGPU) approaches are the most widespread manifestations of this technology, an increasing number of mobile and embedded systems are proliferating.
This solicitation seeks to develop processing subsystems based on COTS multiprocessor array systems which are capable of performing multi-parametric fusion, orbital propagation, and sensor housekeeping in a cubesat environment. It can be estimated that two thirds of a 3U CubeSat SWaP will be used for power management, attitude control, communications and other basic spacecraft functions. Therefore, the processor array should fit within a small percentage of a 1U design and use a small percentage of the allowed 1.33 kg mass. It should have the capability to survive the LEO space environment for at least two years with a goal of three, operate with significant power constraints with a very low duty cycle or instantaneous power, and have a deep sleep cycle which can be awakened by a significant event of interest and which does not require continuous sensor polling.

PHASE I: Develop a novel multi-processor design for CubeSats to support AF space surveillance missions using multiple sensors for space, ground or ocean observation. Tasks could include developing the technology design, predicting sensor performance w/ the processor array using a simulation or other tools, estimating the mass, volume & power requirements, & presenting methods to mitigate power consumption.

PHASE II: Build a prototype processor array and test it in a representative environment.

• Optimize the power usage design.

• Demonstrate payload operation in a space setting such as thermal vacuum.

• Evaluate operation in a space radiation environment.

• Evaluate measured performance characteristics versus expectations and make design adjustments as necessary to enable full sensor operation.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Focus on integrating the technology into potential DoD (or Air Force) CubeSat missions. The technologies developed under this topic can be applied to a variety of commercial, military and space exploration CubeSat missions.

REFERENCES:

1. ftp://apollo.ssl.berkeley.edu/pub/cinema/02.%20Systems/1.%20Requirements/CubeSatDesignSpecification_rev12.pdf.

AF141-102 TITLE: M-code External Augmentation system

OBJECTIVE: Working within the signal definition of IS-GPS-250A, conduct a trade study on suitable EAS signal modulations that are spectrally compatible with M-Code and BFEA and have minimum impact on conventional receiver signal processing techniques.

DESCRIPTION: IS-GPS-250A (1) is an interface specification for an External Augmentation System, also known as a pseudolite (2), that provides a terrestrial source of signals for position, navigation and timing (PNT) purposes. These signals are currently defined to have the same modulation as P(Y)-code but with differing signal structure to facilitate simultaneous reception of both satellite and EAS signals.
In the presence of BFEA signals, any signal with P(Y)-code modulation will be significantly degraded, preventing reliable acquisition and tracking. Since IS- GPS-250A is developed on a P(Y)-code modulation, it is spectrally incompatible with BFEA.
The objective of this study is to investigate alternative signal modulations that would be spectrally compatible with BFEA and with existing M-Code signals. Since IS-GPS-250A is currently being implemented in MGUE (3), the purpose of this study is to examine a modulation within the signal structure defined in IS-GPS-250A that is complementary to existing M-Code signal processing techniques.
The study should examine the impact to M-Code signal reception. The study should also take into consideration any modifications that would need to be made to a typical GPS receiver signal processing chain to facilitate reception of the new EAS signal.

PHASE I: A report that quantifies the tradeoffs of various modulations and signal structures that are spectrally compatible with both BFEA and M-Code (e.g., BOC(10,5), BPSK-R10 offset from L1/L2, BOC(10,1), etc.).

PHASE II: Building from the Phase I design, Phase II will develop an engineering model simulation of the signal space and receiver processing algorithms that will show the impact of the BFEA and M-Code spectrally compatible EAS signal on M-Code EAS signal performance.

PHASE III DUAL USE APPLICATIONS: Military Application: With the inclusion of IS-GPS-250A in MGUE Increment 1, the Phase II applications should enable rapid implementation of a BFEA and M-Code compatible signal in existing receiver architectures. Commercial Application: Will not be available due to national security reasons.

REFERENCES:

1. “IS-GPS-250 Navstar GPS Y-Code External Augmentation System (EAS)/User Equipment Interface,” Global Positioning Systems Directorate, 30 January 2012.

AF141-105 TITLE: Algorithms for IR data

OBJECTIVE: Develop data-processing methods and algorithms to exploit novel target signatures for insertion into ground- based processing software and real-time spacecraft data-processing firmware.

DESCRIPTION: Short-wave infrared (SWIR) surveillance scanning and staring systems have several missions, including missile warning, missile defense, battlespace awareness, technical intelligence, and environmental specification and forecasting. Of interest to these missions are data-processing methods and algorithms that exploit novel dim phenomena (targets, events, and environmental phenomena of military relevance). Each space system has its own features, which complicate the extraction of militarily-relevant information from large-format infrared images. In particular, the raw imagery contains artifacts, e.g., noise, internal reflections, etc., which must be characterized and corrected using data-processing methods and algorithms. It is anticipated that the most enabling concepts will involve innovative clutter suppression and mitigation techniques for SWIR see-to-ground bands (e.g., static sources, slow- or fast-moving objects), as well as track-before-detect approaches. The plan would be to insert the algorithms developed into existing baseline overhead persistent infrared (OPIR) software, at facilities such as the Aerospace Fusion Center, and to test the utility of the algorithms on flight-like hardware. This topic seeks innovation in the area of improved exploitation of SWIR image data acquired by space-based sensors viewing earth scenes.