Military Embedded Systems October 2021

@military_cots

John McHale

Special Report

Extending 5G to the battlespace

Mil Tech Trends

SOSA – taking EW to the next level

Industry Spotlight

Military spectrum management www.MilitaryEmbedded.com

7

Remembering Marty Simon

22 26 34

October 2021 | Volume 17 | Number 7

5G AND THE MILITARY: A NEW ERA OF CONNECTIVITY P 14

P 18 U.S. military must resolve widespread security threats to harden commercial 5G for the warfighter

By Dr. Robert Spalding, USAF Brig. Gen. (Ret.), SEMPRE

One Transceiver, Endless Radio Applications Our industry-leading, software-defined radio solutions—including the new ADRV9002—deliver scalability, simplicity, and flexibility across all military communication applications to get you to market faster.

End-to-End Signal Chain

Wide Signal Bandwidth

Agile

Low Power

Get to market faster at analog.com/radioverse

The Only Full EcoSystem of 3U & 6U 100GbE Products Aligned with SOSA

TM

FPGA DIGITIZING & PROCESSING

6.4 Tb/s 100GbE SWITCHING

16 TB DEPTH & 5 GB/s RATE RECORDING CHASSIS, BACKPLANE & SECURE CHASSIS MANAGER

Annapolis

Micro Systems

We GUARANTEE Seamless 100GbE System Integration Because We Design and Manufacture Every Product

www.militaryembedded.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS 14

October 2021 Volume 17 | Number 7

22

COLUMNS Editor’s Perspective 7 Remembering Marty Simon

By John McHale

Mil Tech Insider 9 Minimizing latency can enhance situational awareness in tactical ground vehicles

By Peter Green and Richard Pollard

THE LATEST

FEATURES SPECIAL REPORT: 5G technology for the warfighter 14 5G and the military: a new era of connectivity

By Emma Helfrich, Technology Editor 18 U.S. military must resolve widespread security threats to harden commercial

5G for the warfighter

Defense Tech Wire 10 By Emma Helfrich

By Dr. Robert Spalding, USAF Brig. Gen. (Ret.), SEMPRE

Editor’s Choice Products 44 By Mil Embedded Staff

22 Safely extending 5G into the battlespace

By Jim Luecke, Benchmark

Connecting with Mil Embedded 46 By Mil Embedded Staff

MIL TECH TRENDS: How SOSA impacts electronic warfare designs 26 Sensor Open Systems Architecture (SOSA) – Taking EW systems to the next level

By Denis Smetana, Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions 30 New RF FPGA solutions transform EW platforms

By Rodger Hosking, Pentek, now part of Mercury

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT: Spectrum-management challenges 34 Military spectrum management:

Spectrum sharing, quantum sensors, and AI advances

By Sally Cole, Senior Editor

9

WEB RESOURCES

38 Better connections assist soldiers to make better decisions faster

By Jack Midgley, Fischer Connectors 40 SDRs: Solving problems in spectrum management

By Victor Wolleson, Per Vices Corp.

Subscribe to the magazine or E-letter Live industry news | Submit new products http://submit.opensystemsmedia.com

34

WHITE PAPERS – Read: https://militaryembedded.com/whitepapers WHITE PAPERS – Submit: http://submit.opensystemsmedia.com All registered brands and trademarks within Military Embedded Systems magazine are the property of their respective owners. © 2021 OpenSystems Media © 2021 Military Embedded Systems ISSN: Print 1557-3222

To unsubscribe, email your name, address, and subscription number as it appears on the label to: subscriptions@opensysmedia.com Published by:

4 October 2021

ON THE COVER: Paratroopers with C Company, 1-508th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), 82nd Airborne Division (Air Assault) assess the Integrated Tactical Network (ITN) while performing an air assault exercise in early 2019 at Camp Atterbury, Indiana. Such communications technology furthers the goals of the Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) concept.

(U. S. Army photo by Justin Eimers, PEO C3T public affairs.) https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1864255/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

@military_cots

www.militaryembedded.com

3 phase. 3U.1 choice.

THE MILITARY FLIES HIGH WITH VPXtra 704™ When the mission calls for a 3-phase 3U power supply that can stand up to the most rugged environments, the military chooses VPXtra 704™ from Behlman – the only VPX solution of its kind built to operate seamlessly from MIL-STD-704F power for mission-critical airborne, shipboard, ground and mobile applications. > 3-phase AC input; high-power DC output > Available holdup card stores 700W of DC power for 50 msec > Overvoltage, short circuit, over-current and thermal protection > Provides full output performance during both normal and abnormal transients

The Power Solutions Provider : 631-435-0410

: sales@behlman.com

: www.behlman.com

ADVERTISERS PAGE 24 2 3

29

5 33 13

21 28 48 42 43 37 8

ADVERTISER/AD TITLE AirBorn – Flexible circuit assemblies Analog Devices, Inc. – One transceiver, endless radio applications Annapolis Micro Systems – The only full ecosystem of 3U & 6U 100 GbE products aligned with SOSA Association Of Old Crows – AOC International Symposium & Convention. Register now at 58crows.org!

Behlman Electronics, Inc. – 3 phase. 3U. 1 choice.

Elma Electronic – Award-winning development solutions Extreme Engineering Solutions (X-ES) – Uncompromising trusted performance for extreme environments GMS – Rugged servers.

Engineered to serve.

Interface Concept – Rugged COTS solutions Pentek – The next big thing in RFSoC is here. (And it’s only 2.5 inches wide!)

Phoenix International – Phalanx II: The ultimate NAS PICO Electronics Inc – Transformers and inductors Pixus Technologies – Ultra-high speed & powerful cooling OpenVPX Viking Technology – Powerful & compact. Built to deliver rugged reliability & durability

GROUP EDITORIAL DIRECTOR John McHale john.mchale@opensysmedia.com ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR Lisa Daigle lisa.daigle@opensysmedia.com SENIOR EDITOR Sally Cole sally.cole@opensysmedia.com TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Emma Helfrich emma.helfrich@opensysmedia.com ONLINE EVENTS MANAGER Josh Steiger josh.steiger@opensysmedia.com CREATIVE DIRECTOR Stephanie Sweet stephanie.sweet@opensysmedia.com SENIOR WEB DEVELOPER Aaron Ganschow aaron.ganschow@opensysmedia.com WEB DEVELOPER Paul Nelson paul.nelson@opensysmedia.com CONTRIBUTING DESIGNER Joann Toth joann.toth@opensysmedia.com EMAIL MARKETING SPECIALIST Drew Kaufman drew.kaufman@opensysmedia.com VITA EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Jerry Gipper jerry.gipper@opensysmedia.com

SALES/MARKETING DIRECTOR OF SALES AND MARKETING Tom Varcie tom.varcie@opensysmedia.com (734) 748-9660 MARKETING MANAGER Eric Henry eric.henry@opensysmedia.com (541) 760-5361 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Rebecca Barker rebecca.barker@opensysmedia.com (281) 724-8021 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Bill Barron bill.barron@opensysmedia.com (516) 376-9838 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Kathleen Wackowski kathleen.wackowski@opensysmedia.com (978) 888-7367 SOUTHERN CAL REGIONAL SALES MANAGER Len Pettek len.pettek@opensysmedia.com (805) 231-9582 ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF PRODUCT MARKETING/SALES Barbara Quinlan barbara.quinlan@opensysmedia.com (480) 236-8818 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Glen Sundin glen.sundin@opensysmedia.com (973) 723-9672 INSIDE SALES Amy Russell amy.russell@opensysmedia.com TAIWAN SALES ACCOUNT MANAGER Patty Wu patty.wu@opensysmedia.com CHINA SALES ACCOUNT MANAGER Judy Wang judywang2000@vip.126.com EUROPEAN MARKETING SPECIALIST Steven Jameson steven.jameson@opensysmedia.com +44 (0)7708976338 SENIOR EUROPEAN MARKETING SPECIALIST Alastair Swift alastair.swift@opensysmedia.com +44 7910 073565

WWW.OPENSYSMEDIA.COM

EVENTS Aerospace Tech Week November 3-4, 2021 Toulouse, France https://www.aerospacetechweek.com/

PRESIDENT Patrick Hopper patrick.hopper@opensysmedia.com EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT John McHale john.mchale@opensysmedia.com EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT Rich Nass rich.nass@opensysmedia.com EMBEDDED COMPUTING BRAND DIRECTOR Rich Nass rich.nass@opensysmedia.com ECD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Brandon Lewis brandon.lewis@opensysmedia.com TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Curt Schwaderer curt.schwaderer@opensysmedia.com

58th Annual Association of Old Crows (AOC) International Symposium & Convention November 30-December 2, 2021 Washington, DC https://www.crows.org/mpage/2021HOME

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Tiera Oliver tiera.oliver@opensysmedia.com ASSISTANT EDITOR Taryn Engmark taryn.engmark@opensysmedia.com ASSISTANT EDITOR Chad Cox chad.cox@opensysmedia.com CREATIVE PROJECTS Chris Rassiccia chris.rassiccia@opensysmedia.com MARKETING COORDINATOR Katelyn Albani katelyn.albani@opensysmedia.com

WEST 2022 (AFCEA West) February 16-18, 2022 San Diego, CA www.westconference.org/West22/Public/Enter.aspx embedded world March 15-17, 2022 Nuremberg, Germany https://www.embedded-world.de/en

6 October 2021

FINANCIAL ASSISTANT Emily Verhoeks emily.verhoeks@opensysmedia.com FINANCE Rosemary Kristoff rosemary.kristoff@opensysmedia.com SUBSCRIPTION MANAGER subscriptions@opensysmedia.com CORPORATE OFFICE 1505 N. Hayden Rd. #105 • Scottsdale, AZ 85257 • Tel: (480) 967-5581 REPRINTS WRIGHT’S MEDIA REPRINT COORDINATOR Wyndell Hamilton whamilton@wrightsmedia.com (281) 419-5725

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

EDITOR’S PERSPECTIVE

Remembering Marty Simon

By John McHale, Editorial Director

John.McHale@opensysmedia.com

At 40 years old this fall, the VMEbus standard’s longevity can be traced to its inventors, VME product designers, VITA Standards Organization members, military systems users, and also to the creativity and marketing acumen of a rock and roll aficionado named Marty Simon. Marty – founder of The Simon Group, member of the VITA Hall of Fame, early proponent of VME, my friend, and the most positive person I’ve ever come across – passed away in September 2021 at the age of 77 from complications from ALS.

Marty Simon

After starting his career at the Linholdt and Jones advertising agency, he launched his own firm, The Simon Group, in 1986. One of his first clients was Plessey Microsystems (Plessey later became Radstone, later bought by GE, and now called Abaco Systems), which made products based on the relatively new VMEbus standard. Perfect timing.

“Together at Plessey, later Radstone, we defined and created the rugged VMEbus market with some PR, advertising, and a groundbreaking article later in the late 1980s – cowritten by Vera Cole [later Marty’s kind, generous, and brilliant wife] – that defined a market need: rugged open systems architectures for defense and aerospace, when it had not existed before,” says Doug Patterson, president of Patterson Consulting, and then a young marketing manager at Plessey. “Marty was like a brother and Vera like a sister to me. There are really no other words to describe the effect they had on me.”

Rock songs and single-board computers don’t often mesh, but they did in Marty Simon. Never one to wear a tie and always with his curly salt-and-pepper locks covering his shirt collar, he greeted all with a big smile and a positive musician’s vibe that left you with a smile just as big as his own. His colleagues at The Simon Group weren’t employees, they were friends and “Groupies” because to Marty, life was a big, wonderful rock concert that he wanted all to enjoy. His ebullience was perfect for the nascent and not-so-sexy embedded computing market.

“If we think of the computer industry like the movie industry, Marty Simon was one of the great directors,” says his friend and former colleague from Plessey, Pete Yeatman, former publisher of COTS Journal magazine. “Marty captured the personalities of all the actors he had to work with and brought out their best. His impact on the military COTS industry is only really known by the people and companies he worked with.

Without Marty’s talent of knowing how to influence the way industry, government, and people perceived the COTS movement, it would not be where it is today. He encouraged me and provided me with views that I may never have realized, bringing out the best in me.”

Each year, Marty played director at his Simon Group party for colleagues, clients, partners, media, friends, and their families, encouraging everyone to get up and sing a song with him and his rock band.

“Marty was truly one of a kind, a gem of a person,” says Valerie Andrew of Elma Electronic, friend of Marty, and regular guest vocalist at his parties. “He had a way of making anyone he spoke with feel special, the center of the room. He was a largerthan-life, generous soul, with a quick wit and lyrical turn of phrase. Anyone fortunate enough to be in his orbit was lucky. I was one of those very lucky people and am a better person for it.” www.militaryembedded.com

Saying Marty was a positive thinker is such an understatement. On crutches – and at times using a wheelchair – his entire adult life due to a bout with polio at the age of three, Marty never let that stop him. He drove fast cars, wrote touching music, played skillful guitar, played with his three daughters and five grandkids, and passionately tried to find out what made everyone he met happy.

The latter unnerved me a little during my first press meeting with him in the 1990s. I thought we were there to talk tech, but he wanted to know what made me happy, how my love life was, what my hobbies were. The laser focus made me uncomfortably vulnerable. That hesitation didn’t last long, though, and I found myself visiting Marty every year for a blast of positivity and perspective.

I regret not making a visit in recent years after Marty retired. No excuses: My mistake and my loss. I was grateful his family and his successors at The Simon Group, Dave Lesser and Beth Smith, invited me to attend his virtual memorial service, which took place on my birthday. While I cried along with Beth during her eulogy, I left smiling and grateful for Marty’s friendship.

Marty was rare. Marty is missed.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

7

POWERFUL & COMPACT

B U I LT T O D E L I V E R R U G G E D R E L I A B I L I T Y & D U R A B I L I T Y

CUSTOMIZED DDR4 MCP, 4GB, 8GB,16GB*, 32GB*

EXTENDED TEMPERATURE Commercial, Industrial, Automotive & Military

SPACE SAVING Up to 85% Space Savings vs.

Standard SODIMM Modules

SWaP OPTIMIZED Shock & Vibration, Military-Grade

RUGGEDIZED Optimized for Extreme Conditions

COMPLIANCES ITAR compliant & AS9001 Certified Facility

SWaP OPTIMIZED SOLUTIONS

Viking Technology ParallelCell Multi-Chip Package (MCP) is part of the extreme density line of DDR4 memory products optimized for the military/aerospace, embedded, and industrial markets. ParallelCell products achieve significantly

higher memory performance and density per cubic inch than conventional memory DIMMs. These performance and density milestones will critically change the way future system hardware is designed and deployed. * 16GB/32GB capacities available late CY 2022

Scan this code for in-depth product features and specifications or visit: www.vikingtechnology.com/ddr4-military-mcp/parallelcell-ddr4-mcp

A Product Division of Sanmina Corporation Copyright © 2021 Viking Technology. All Rights Reserved

For sales information, please email us at sales@vikingtechnology.com, or visit our website at www.vikingtechnology.com Need support? Call us at (714) 913-2200

MIL TECH INSIDER

Minimizing latency can enhance situational awareness in tactical ground vehicles

By Peter Green and Richard Pollard An industry perspective from Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions Through-armor video systems provide in-vehicle crews of manned and remote crews of unmanned ground vehicles with critical visibility and situational awareness. This vital visual information needs to be accessible as close to real-time as possible. Delayed video images can make warfighters unaware of an approaching enemy, an impending man-made or natural obstacle, or the unsafe proximity of a warfighter or civilian outside the vehicle, until it’s too late to appropriately or adequately respond. These risks increase when vehicles are moving quickly and when they include large and dangerous moving parts. It doesn’t take much imagination to consider the kinds of negative incidents that could occur when video images are delayed.

Video latency can also cause motion sickness for those inside the vehicle. When the images on the display don’t match the motion felt in the vehicle, the discrepancy can create inner-ear disturbances that lead to nausea, dizziness, and vomiting.

Figure 1 | Shown is the screen of the 360SA Video Management System, aimed at use in closed-hatch operation of tactical vehicles. Curtiss-Wright image.

While the risks to human safety are significantly less when unmanned ground vehicles are used, the remote location of the vehicle driver means the video stream must travel further before it can be acted upon. This distance naturally increases the latency, compounding the dangers associated with delayed video streams. Video latency makes it extremely difficult for operators to have complete confidence that what they are seeing is the reality at the time. The combination of uncertainty and delayed images can cause hesitancy when responding to threats, collisions with obstructions or humans, or unknowingly driving the vehicle into a dangerous situation or landscape.

a 360-degree through armor videomanagement system that delivers <30ms latency performance. Compared to alternative video situational-awareness and drivers visual enhancer (DVE) solutions that deliver >60ms latency, this level of system performance achieves the “sweet spot” of glass-to-glass latency to support driver aid and situationalawareness video at full HD resolutions.

Three levels of ground-vehicle video systems Ground-vehicle video systems vary widely in technical sophistication and capabilities, but can be categorized into three levels of sophistication: › The most basic video systems enable operators who are in the vehicle, or operating it remotely, to view the images from one vehicle-mounted camera at a time. These systems provide a rudimentary level of visibility but severely restrict situational awareness. › Multi-display and picture-in-picture solutions enable operators to see images from multiple vehicle-mounted cameras at once. This flexibility considerably increases situational awareness compared to single-view systems, as operators can consider their surroundings on all sides of the vehicle at all times. Operators can choose the optimal combination of camera views for the task or maneuver they are executing. › 360-degree video systems give operators the ultimate level of situational awareness – blending accurate, fully stitched images from all vehicle-mounted cameras into a seamless, panoramic image that most closely resembles what the human eye sees. These images can further be enhanced with sensor fusion, data overlays, augmented reality, and so on to offer enhanced situational awareness, which leads to increased mission effectiveness.

Overcoming technical challenges The key to reducing end-to-end latency in a video system is to reduce latency in each video system component, from cameras to video distribution and management units to displays. A British defense ministry study found that military-vehicle drivers could safely drive a vehicle through a visual display when the overall video system latency is 40 ms or less. A recent breakthrough in rugged deployed video situational awareness for manned and unmanned ground vehicles now makes it possible to provide www.militaryembedded.com

An example of a video-management solution for through armor is CurtissWright’s 360SA Video Management System (Figure 1).

The 360A combines a low-latency video management system with a full-HD video ground mobile command control system and integrates projected capacitive (PCAP) rugged touch screen displays with a scalable, rugged video gateway and a video format converter.

The MOSA [modular open systems approach] design is “camera-agnostic” and supports 20 x DS/HG/3G-SDI, 4 x composite/YC, and 1 x HDMI. Peter Green serves as an engineering and business development director for Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions.

Richard Pollard serves as a senior product manager for Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions.

Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions https://www.curtisswrightds.com/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

9

DEFENSE TECH WIRE NEWS | TRENDS | DOD SPENDS | CONTRACTS | TECHNOLOGY UPDATES

By Emma Helfrich, Technology Editor Quadome software-defined naval surveillance radar introduced by HENSOLDT At the Defence and Security Equipment International (DSEI) trade exhibition, HENSOLDT introduced its new Quadome radar system for naval surveillance and target acquisition.

Quadome is designed to provide rapid response and high precision. The dual-mode, multimission surveillance radar is intended to enhance situational awareness and reaction times for naval forces and maritime security authorities. Fast detection and tracking of small, slow, and fast targets are aimed at enabling a reliable air picture with fast-track initiation to support longer effector keep-out range.

The radar, the company says, features up-to-date gallium nitride (GaN)-based active electronically steered antenna (AESA) technology; moreover, it is software-defined, which gives the system an extended operational lifetime. Quadome features two main operational modes intended to simplify operator interaction and to reduce operator workload: Surveillance mode is used for general surface and air surveillance, while the self-defense mode is employed for high-threat situations and target engagement, with helicopter support continuously available in either mode.

Figure 1 | A digital rendering of HENSOLDT’s Quadome radar system designed for naval surveillance. Image: HENSOLDT.

Data-driven AI capabilities goal of KBR and Adarga partnership

Defense engineering firm KBR has announced a strategic partnership with Adarga, a U.K. developer of artificial intelligence (AI) analytics software for defense and national security. According to the company, KBR’s Government Solutions business will integrate Adarga’s AI software platform into the delivery of several of its large-scale programs across the defense and national security sectors to put data-driven decision-making at the center of operations.

The partnership will aim to further extend KBR’s capability offering and accelerate the speed and scale at which organizations can adopt AI analytics to resolve complex data challenges. Company officials say that the accord will enable clients to unlock understanding of information buried across data sets; they also say that the insight gained will enable users to improve retention of institutional knowledge, identify hidden connections to drive intelligence-led investigation, support strategic planning, and quantify future threats and opportunities.

Manned-unmanned teaming demoed in airborne test using MQ-20 Avenger General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) has completed an airborne manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) demonstration pairing a MQ-20 Avenger with a modified King Air 200 as a surrogate for 4th- and 5th-generation tactical fighters. According to officials, the flight demonstrated autonomous collaboration using command and control (C2) of the Avenger from a ruggedized tactical control tablet, integrated with Autonodyne’s RCU-1000 Advanced Human Machine Interface software.

During the nearly two-hour test, the airborne node used a GA-ASI-modified King Air 200, which enabled rapid integration and test of the C2 hardware. The Avenger flight originated from GA-ASI’s Desert Horizon facility in the Mojave Desert, while the King Air took off from Montgomery Airport in San Diego.

10 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Figure 2 | Photo of the ruggedized control tablet used to operate commandand-control of the Avenger. GA-ASI image.

www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 3 | Soldiers operate the ARCAS AI system using a joystick button placed on the rifle’s forward grip and a graphical user interface inspired by the gaming world. Elbit Systems image.

AI-powered electro-optical sight interfaces to provide intuitive combat info Elbit Systems announced ARCAS, a built-in computerized artificial intelligence (AI)-powered system that interfaces with combat troops’ electro-optical (EO) rifle sight, a helmetmounted eyepiece, and the rifle’s assemblies. As tested, ARCAS enables passive range measurement, automatic ballistic correction, detection of fire sources, video motion detection, and the ability to shoot around the corner and from the hip.

Additionally, the AI can interface with tactical command and control (C2), assist with navigation, perform friend-or-foe identification, track ammunition, and adjust/zero the weapon without the need for live fire.

An AI-powered computer is integrated into the assault rifle’s forward grip, running software and applications. The miniaturized computer unit receives and processes data collected from the soldier’s EO sight, tactical information from C2 systems, data from other ARCAS users in the team, and the rifle’s mechanical information, according to the company.

5G and edge computing maritime solutions to be researched

by AT&T and NPS AT&T and the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) have entered into an agreement to explore and develop 5G and edge computing-based maritime solutions aimed at benefitting national defense and homeland security, among others. The parties entered into a three-year Collaborative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) under which AT&T 5G networking and edge-computing capabilities will support an array of 5G-focused experiments on NPS facilities incorporating AI, robotics, Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, and data analytics.

The NPS and AT&T experiments with 5G and edge computing are expected to result in the identification of advanced technology solutions such as a connected system of unmanned and autonomous vehicles that can improve critical elements of national defense, such as multidomain situational awareness, predictive maintenance, and data analytics. As part of the CRADA, one initiative is the Naval Postgraduate School’s Sea Land Air Military Research (SLAMR) program, which is the only site in the U.S. where researchers can experiment with robotics in multidomain environments – sea, land, air, space, and cyberspace.

Virtual reality used by Embry-Riddle for cybersecurity defense training Researchers at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (Daytona Beach, Florida) are designing a simulator to train Navy ROTC students or midshipmen in how to identify cybersecurity threats.

To do so, officials at the university are leveraging virtual reality (VR) expertise assembled at Embry-Riddle.

By cross-referencing inside and external sensors, participants learn how to identify cyberthreats. Funded by the Office of Naval Research, the eight-week training program, featuring the Cyber Security Virtual Reality Trainer (CyVR-T), will include as many as 20 midshipmen in its first class, as well as three undergraduate students who have played important roles in the development of the software and two graduate research assistants, officials state.

Mobile counter-sUAS capability delivered to the U.S. DoD and DHS ELTA North America has announced the final contractual delivery of its advanced counter-small unmanned aerial system (C-sUAS) solution, the On-The-Move V4 (OTM V4) with C-sUAS capability.

The OTM V4 was designed to address the Assistant Secretary of Defense Special Operations/Low-Intensity Conflict (ASD SO/LIC) Irregular Warfare Technical Support Directorate (IWTSD) Mobile C-sUAS Defense-in-Depth Capability.

Since December 2020, the company has delivered five OTM V4 vehicle system integrations under the contract with IWTSD for use by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The OTM V4 is a multisensor, multilayered solution for early warning, detection, disruption, and defeat of various types of rotary and fixed-wing UASs that is designed to operate while the vehicle is in motion. www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 4 | ELTA North America’s OTM counter-small-UAS solution, OTM V4.

ELTA North America image.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

11

DEFENSE TECH WIRE NEWS | TRENDS | DOD SPENDS | CONTRACTS | TECHNOLOGY UPDATES

Teleoperated robotic system from Sarcos Defense wins additional testing nod from U.S. Navy

Sarcos Defense (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sarcos Technology and Robotics) announced that the U.S. Navy has exercised a contractual option to expand testing, evaluation, and demonstrations of the Sarcos Guardian DX teleoperated dexterous robotic system, a defense-specific variation on the Sarcos Guardian XT mobile robotic system, to handle Navy-specific tasks. The modular Guardian DX robot is a teleoperated, dual-armed dexterous robot that was designed to perform tasks with human-like dexterity while keeping the operator at a safe distance when working in challenging or hazardous conditions, including at height.

Figure 5 | The Sarcos Guardian DX robot is the defense-specific variant of the Guardian XT highly dexterous mobile robotic system. Sarcos image.

The Guardian DX robotic system can attach to various mobile bases, including wheeled or tracked vehicles, and is capable of using portable sensors for nondestructive structural testing and inspections; power tools for grinding, cutting, and welding at height; and lifting/ manipulating objects weighing as much as 200 pounds.

Study: Military EO/IR systems market to reach $12.9 billion by 2031

MOSA design to be incorporated into Gray Eagle UAS

Demand for military EO/IR systems is anticipated to be driven in part by forces’ mounting need for battlespace awareness.

Additionally, the integration of technologically advanced EO/IR systems into modern warfare platforms is expected to improve effectiveness of EO/IR systems and hence drive demand.

The study authors assert that increased research in the field of 3rd-generation infrared, laser radars, advanced 3D visualization, persistent surveillance systems, and multispectral/hyperspectral sensors will all drive the development of more capable EO/IR systems.

The GA-ASI/Army team says that MOSA will enable rapid integration of advanced payloads and communication equipment, along with artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) capabilities. The software components are also intended for use on future Army manned and unmanned aircraft.

The global military market for electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) systems, valued at $9.2 billion in 2021, is expected to increase at a combined annual growth rate (CAGR) of 3.43% to reach a value of $12.9 billion by 2031, according to a study by GlobalData, “Global Military Electro-Optical/Infrared (EO/IR) Systems Market to 2031.”

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems is working with the U.S. Army to develop a Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA) for the multidomain operations (MDO)-capable Gray Eagle Extended Range (GE-ER) unmanned aircraft system (UAS). According to the company, incorporating MOSA on GE-ER Increment 2 will aim to provide new standards for the command and control (C2) software suite and will conform to the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE), Open Mission Systems (OMS), and Universal Armament Interface (UAI).

U.S. Air Force orders open standards-based SIGINT sensor from Northrop Grumman

The U.S. Air Force has awarded Northrop Grumman a contract to complete the design of a next-generation, open standards-based signals intelligence (SIGINT) sensor for high-altitude intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms.

Under the Air Force’s Global High-altitude Open-system Sensor Technology (GHOST) program, Northrop Grumman is tasked with delivering a prototype sensor – including airborne and ground components – with an open standardsbased hardware and software architecture intended to be scaled and configured to fly on multiple types of manned and unmanned aircraft. Northrop Grumman’s GHOST sensor is intended to provide the Air Force with an agile architecture to meet the Air Force’s ISR needs while enabling rapid system enhancement, testing, accreditation, and integration as battlespace situations evolve.

12 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Figure 6 | Northrop Grumman will design an innovative, open standards-based signals intelligence (SIGINT) sensor prototype for the U.S. Air Force.

Northrop Grumman image.

www.militaryembedded.com

SPECIAL REPORT

5G and the military: a new era of connectivity

By Emma Helfrich Fifth-generation wireless technology, or 5G, is poised to emerge in a big way into the defense market. While the buzz surrounding the 5G technology standard has been growing in the general public in recent years, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has been trailing behind commercial entities on adopting 5G due in part to both the slower pace of the DoD’s acquisition process and the hardto-keep-up-with pace of consumertechnology refresh. However, officials at several defense communications companies agree that it’s just a matter of time before 5G-enabled military solutions are deployed and forever change the way in which the armed forces communicate.

14 October 2021

5G technology for the warfighter

Paratroopers with C Company, 1-508th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), 82nd Airborne Division (Air Assault) assess the Integrated Tactical Network (ITN) while performing an air assault exercise in early 2019 at Camp Atterbury, Indiana. Such communications technology furthers the goals of the Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) concept, which the U.S. DoD defines as “the art and science of decision making and the ability to rapidly translate those decisions into action, leveraging capabilities across all domains and with mission partners to achieve operational advantage in both competition and conflict.” (U. S. Army photo by Justin Eimers, PEO C3T public affairs.)

That fact that 5G is a largely commercially developed solution that is now on track for adaptation to military use has enabled defense electronics manufacturers to operate in collaborative environments. This reality will prove to be valuable, as one of the driving factors behind widespread 5G adoption in the military is not the advent of the waveform itself, but the set of network-management standards that will follow.

Multidomain operations, as seen in military programs such as Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2), could greatly benefit from the interoperability enabled through 5G use. One way is through 5G technology’s ability to bring disparate solutions together under a unified network management system.

With 5G adoption occurring all around the world, electronic warfare (EW) and spectrum-management applications could also see an evolution following the implementation of 5G architectures. The use of 5G and its incorporation into intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) systems could indelibly alter how the military gathers actionable intelligence, ranging from how the DoD detects/is detected to further opening vast avenues of data collection.

The transition from Long Term Evolution 4G (4G LTE) to standalone 5G deployment will be gradual, just as it was from the early days of 1G (launched in Japan in 1979, adopted in 1983 in the U.S.) all the way to December 1, 2018, when South Korea became the first country to offer 5G. The process will take even longer to reach the military, with networking standards, current DoD networking architectures, and measured acquisition timelines among the current hurdles bogging down immediate fielding.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

The difference between 4G and 5G Following the introduction and implementation of 4G LTE in consumer and military markets, the unprecedented streaming ability that it offered was regarded as revolutionary. While patchiness in the 4G LTE network did leave users in certain regions unsatisfied, it’s a fact that 5G was already in the planning stages.

“5G, as it actually came to be, was thought of as more than just a generational change in how we communicate through a cellular environment with cell phones.

It was actually pretty far-reaching in its genesis,” says John Cowles, director of engineering and technology at Analog Devices (Norwood, Massachusetts). “It’s more than a comms system, as it enables a system of different systems. What I mean by that is there’s a traditional cellphone system, but 5G also envisions how that might affect IoT [Internet of Things], or even satellite communications. There’s terrestrial communication, there’s people, there’s data, there’s IoT, and then there’s the satellite piece of it.”

Often referred to by industry professionals as the IoT era, 5G dawned amid the understanding that data was being created far more quickly and in volumes greater than what current networks could handle. The vast quantities of unstructured sensor data and the military’s need to make sense of it also produces processing challenges that 5G could likely handle.

“5G offers faster download speeds, lower latency, and more capacity and connectivity for millions of devices and the possibilities for massive innovation,” says Lance Spencer, client executive vice president for defense, AT&T Public Sector and FirstNet (Reston, Virginia). “5G’s ultra-low atency means faster response times when moving data like video and AR/VR [augmented reality/virtual reality] for immersive experiences. Its high reliability makes it ideal for supporting mission-critical applications and services. Its massive connectivity capabilities enable faster aggregation of network-connected endpoints, sensors, devices, and data to power IoT connectivity.” www.militaryembedded.com

The all-encompassing nature of 5G is precisely what makes it such an attractive solution for the military. In areas where past network generations have had to go it alone, 5G and its proponents claim that few systems, waveforms, and data links would go unsupported under a 5G architecture.

“When people talk about 5G, a lot of times they think about the waveform that the cell carriers are bringing to market,” says Craig Miller, president of Viasat Government Systems (Carlsbad, California). “And yes, that is part of a 5G. It is a specific waveform in a way that radios communicate with each other, but the 5G standard and the set of 5G standards are much more than that. And I think that’s one of the things that sets 5G apart from 4G – the extensibility to create a 5G network-management infrastructure that can use additional waveforms.”

It’s notable that a network designed to be as impartial as 5G could actually be pivotal in multidomain operations and the act of bringing disparate systems together for the military. The added benefit of doing so under a simplified network-management system is something that 5G could excel at in comparison to 4G LTE. This would mean true interoperability under 5G for the DoD. 5G and how the military interoperates “There’s sort of a historical precedent for this,” Miller says. “If you look at how successful interoperability has been achieved in the past, it’s usually by doing it at the network level or sometimes the application level. But the internet is an example of doing it at the network level where you have a TCP/IP (internet protocol suite) network and a bunch of different networks that aren’t even always compatible. But you do have the networking standards that allow them to interoperate through either the management or the gateway functions, and 5G can do this. It’s really a way that you can [capture] these disparate networks – those that would have been stovepiped in the past – and then use a 5G network-management architecture to bring them together.”

An important DoD program powered by the modern-day need for cross-domain solutions in the military is JADC2: The robust sensor connectivity that JADC2 was introduced to achieve could be successful under the implementation of a widely compatible 5G-powered network.

“Joint All-Domain Command and Control is key to enabling multi-domain operations,” AT&T/FirstNet’s Spencer says. “JADC2 and global operations, including space-based 5G terrestrial networks, will require the elimination of silos to ensure seamless communications between nodes. For the military, 5G technologies allow for the operation of several potential applications to include C2 [command and control], logistics, maintenance, training, AI [artificial intelligence], augmented and virtual reality, and ISR systems – all of which can benefit from improved data speeds and lower latency.”

Fielding a network as extensible, indiscriminate, and interoperable as 5G, however, will present security concerns, especially in multidomain defense arenas. Officials claim that the security question will influence how 5G networks and 5G network management systems are architected.

“As you bring more users together, there are more paths to give to any individual user. Being able to understand the data and metadata on your network and create a cyberdefense around that is one thing we’ve put a lot of time and energy into in the past decade,” Miller says. “This will be really important on 5G networks, especially in the JADC2 construct as you bring these networks together because you’re going to have to move beyond cyber hygiene and checklist-based and boundarybased cyberdefense and instead move to behavioral analysis and watching how users interact.”

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

15

SPECIAL REPORT

5G technology for the warfighter

Designing these security and signals-intelligence capabilities into 5G-powered architectures will also be an important part of the role 5G will play in EW theaters. The reason: While the 5G waveform isn’t specifically designed to work in contested environments, its scalability makes it ideal for congested spots.

quantities of data brought in by both military and commercial sensors, 5G-powered computing could better enable processing capabilities.

Electronic warfare and 5G Officials are excited about the possibility of 5G network-management systems designed to support various protected waveforms and thought to be ideal for EW environments. Pairing a native 5G network with supported waveforms that are built for low probability of detection could enable warfighters to roam between available networks, depending on the mission (Figure 1).

“5G allows for multiaccess edge computing (MEC), where data is processed locally near a device to speed the completion of computing tasks,” Spencer says.

“MEC allows users to aggregate missioncritical data on site and offers the flexibility of delivering cloud services closer to the edge with localized compute functionality and optimized 5G cloud services. 5G networks are designed with robust, integrated cybersecurity protections to help secure user data.”

“The part of the 5G spec and waveform that’s operating in the millimeter band – those very high frequencies that tend to not propagate as far – create some capabilities that are a little more interesting in terms of the EW environment,” Miller says. “This is because it’s harder for the adversary to see them, simply because they don’t propagate as far. So, these little bubbles of operation are more difficult for adversaries to reach into. And a hybrid networking case where you have a 5G network with different physical layer waveforms, that also gives you room to play in an EW environment.”

Moreover, 5G could also fare well in EW arenas because it’s designed with the inherent ability to listen only to what it needs to, avoiding disruption from both accidental and purposeful signals that may get in the way. Even so, in the instance that disruption on the electromagnetic spectrum did occur, corresponding 5G-powered technologies could aid in identifying it.

“If an adversary is using 5G technology in the area, then EW systems will need to be able to understand if there’s 5G communication because this technology is not just owned by the U.S.,” Cowles says. “It’s worldwide, so adversaries could very well use 5G to communicate as well. EW systems will need to start being engineered to identify 5G signals and understand what adversaries could potentially be trying to communicate. That’s one side of it, and the other would be the fact that we use 5G technology and we don’t want unwelcome users to be able to disrupt or see what we’re doing. That’s where EW and 5G technology environments will have to coexist.”

Data collection and interpretation are so important to EW and are major pieces of the advantage 5G could provide on the battlefield. With the seemingly insurmountable

While edge computing is undoubtedly a start when it comes to military data analysis, there is still far too much of it for humans alone to process. Whether it’s anomalous network behavior, signals on the spectrum, or information from the cloud, automated 5G networkmanagement systems powered by AI could be pivotal in rendering out actionable details.

Pairing 5G with AI “5G technologies could also be incorporated into ISR systems,” Spencer says. “These require increasingly high bandwidth to process, exploit, and disseminate intelligence data from a network of terrestrial and airborne sensors.

This could enhance C2 by providing commanders with timely access to key intelligence and actionable information that can improve decision making in split seconds and allow commanders a better understanding of an adversary’s decision cycle.” (Figure 2.)

The faster and more efficient transmission of data that 5G could enable would thereby allow AI-powered analysis engines to run more effectively. Because AI and machine learning (ML) algorithms must be trained, enhanced low-latency access to data could result in smarter AI/ML systems.

Figure 1 | Viasat photo showcasing comms-on-the-move (COTM) vehicle integration at U.S. Army Cyber Quest in 2020.

16 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

“What 5G does bring is this somewhat open architecture where you can plug all kinds of different things in that could allow you to plug in different networks www.militaryembedded.com

at the right level and offer the ability to command and control using the 5G network,” Cowles says. “Historically, with all of the different sensors and systems out there, it’s been very difficult to get actionable, multisensor data from all of the different

deployed technologies to give you a cohesive, one-point location for that information. 5G makes that more likely because it can plug into different systems, assuming the necessary security is there.”

The evidence is stacking up: 5G is a network that is not only supportive of high data-throughput systems like that of AI/ ML, but it also enables the maximization of such capabilities all the same.

Apparent in the excitement surrounding 5G’s implementation is the evidence that players in the network-communications realm appear to be that much closer to tackling the big data problem faced by the military.

Figure 2 | The AT&T 5G network enhances unmanned aerial system (UAS) capabilities by increasing UAS command-and-control (C2) and data-transfer speeds, reducing C2 and data latency, and increasing the reliability of the UAS C2 and data link. Depicted: the AT&T Flying COW, a drone that enhances 5G connectivity to users by extending 5G coverage areas through onboard 5G radios and other integrated systems.

“We’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg in terms of what 5G can do,” Cowles says.

“5G has such enormous potential and there are so many layers to it we haven’t even seen unlocked yet, and we’ll continue to see that AI will have a bigger role as 5G reaches its full potential.” MES

Overcoming the Challenges of Meeting CAST-32A Objectives for Avionics Software Sponsored by DDC-I & LDRA Certification authorities and industry suppliers have worked to identify the additional objectives (or requirements) to be addressed when employing multicore processors in safety-critical systems. The crux of these formalized positions regarding software – the FAA CAST-32A Positioning Paper and EASA’s multicore Certification Review Item (CRI) – focus on bounding the interference patterns that exist when processor cores share resources. In this webcast, experts from DDC-I and LDRA will present solutions that address the CAST-32A concerns utilizing features such as cache partitioning, memory pooling, and safe scheduling.

Watch the webcast: https://bit.ly/3p4tbFs

WATCH MORE WEBCASTS:

https://militaryembedded.com/webcasts/ www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

17

SPECIAL REPORT

5G technology for the warfighter

U.S. military must resolve widespread security threats to harden commercial 5G for the warfighter

By Dr. Robert Spalding, USAF Brig. Gen. (Ret.) The deployment of 5G networks by the U.S. military will be an historic moment for today’s warfighter. From improved C5ISR [command, control, computers, communications, cyber, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] readiness and geolocation accuracy to more effective enemy engagement and perimeter defense, 5G gear will enable scalable, extremely low-latency, mobile radio platforms and an Internet of Things edge-sensor network that puts the power of real-time AI and machine learning into the hands of the combat soldier. This future state is achievable, but not without confronting a blunt reality: 5G is an open architecture designed for commercial applications and as such suffers from a great many security vulnerabilities. To build a resilient, secure, survivable 5G military communications network, we must first harden and futureproof the COTS [commercial off-the-shelf]-based hardware, software, and firmware that are the foundation of today’s civilian 5G infrastructure.

18 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

As commercial 5G service rolls out across the U.S. with the promise of 100 times greater speeds than its 4G predecessor, it’s time to examine how the U.S. military can equip the modern warfighter with an upgrade to today’s outmoded battlefield communications infrastructure. bespoke, incompatible radio hardware and move toward a shared, hardened communications framework.

Communications alignment is a national security imperative The good news? The overhaul and unification of the military’s communications network is already underway in key areas.

The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is committed to its Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) mission, which according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), aims to “connect sensors from all military services – Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Space Force – into a single network.” This alone will accelerate the speed of decision-making for the soldier and command-and-control (C2) center, which is an urgently needed component of the U.S.’s National Defense Strategy as it prepares for the emergence of Mach 5+ hypersonic weapons.

The U.S. Air Force is contributing to the JADC2 mission by developing the Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS), a C2 framework that the CRS describes as “using secure cloud environments and new communications methods to allow Air Force and Space Force systems to share data seamlessly using artificial intelligence.” In effect, this is an attempt at integrating a sensor-based Internet of Things (IoT) network that reinvents the conventional, airborne C2 structure by extending the eyes and ears of our warfighters to an intelligent edge.

Just as importantly, a unified communications topology must support the nation’s Nuclear Command and Control System (NCCS), which guides the chain of command in providing the President with information required to authorize (and prevent unauthorized) use of nuclear weapons.

As commercial 5G service rolls out across the U.S. with the promise of 100 times greater speeds than its 4G predecessor, it’s time to examine how the U.S. military can equip the modern warfighter with an upgrade to today’s outmoded battlefield communications infrastructure.

This is no small feat. 5G was designed by an international coalition of technology companies, with heavy input from stateowned Chinese firms. As an open-source, commercial standard, 5G is riddled with potential security threats, nearly 800 of which have yet to be resolved by the governing 3GPP standards body. Moreover, the uptake of 5G by the warfighter will require the U.S. military to forego a decades-long practice of developing www.militaryembedded.com

Allure of 5G processing speeds tempered by inherent security risks The military has long been eager to build a common telecommunications and computing platform that enables new software applications to be adopted at the same speed as the commercial sector – or better yet, harden Android and Apple iOS smartphones for use in the field. At best, however, today’s warfighter is relegated to using the phone’s GPS map function for geolocation, which is often more reliable than their military-issued gear.

5G is the enabling technology that will underpin the military’s digital transformation, but 5G was never designed as a native military radio waveform. This reality presents significant challenges and entails the recognition that more than 60% of what the 3GPP ratified as 4G and 5G standards were developed primarily by state-owned Chinese companies. That raises concerns relative to the influence China may have exercised over an industry standards-making body – and the number of unsecured backdoors and man-in-the-middle vulnerabilities through which classified data can be siphoned or modified.

As a point of reference, a 2019 report released by IoT cybersecurity specialist, Finite State, looked into Huawei Technologies and found that 55 percent of tested Huawei devices had at least one potential backdoor. In its summary of findings, Finite State concluded that “if you include known, remote access vulnerabilities along with possible back doors, Huawei devices appear to be at high risk of potential compromise.”

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

19

SPECIAL REPORT

5G technology for the warfighter

What a 5G future will look like for the warfighter The future 5G state we should be working to realize will enable users to harness the power of AI, machine learning, and hundreds of thousands of sensors at the IoT edge. Doing so will give troops real-time intelligence and processing while providing secure battlefield computing and communications using fixed and transportable cellular towers supplemented by vehicle-mounted data center nodes. All of this can be achieved using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware, software, and firmware, as long as it’s all sufficiently hardened to ensure a secure connection to both the network and computing platform.

So, practically speaking, what would a typical 5G application look like? Let’s consider base security: A lot of what occurs on the battlefield involves establishing and maintaining a security perimeter. We can surmise that 5G-enabled communications technology will enable easy supplementation of the perimeter with field-of-motion and pressure sensors. When activated, those sensors feed into a tower-based alert system that sends out drones to investigate. The drones leverage video streaming and facial recognition, and if a threat is detected, can trigger an automated targeting system. If deployed properly, 5G will enable users to very quickly automate their field operations.

Marry the cell tower and data center node In a commercial 5G application, a smartphone streaming data sends a signal to a nearby tower, which routes the request to a data center that may be hundreds of miles away. The data is retrieved and sent back through the tower and on to the user. That’s a large threat surface, as was seen with the May 2021 Colonial Pipeline ransomware cyberattack.

A more secure, resilient solution is to co-locate the cell tower and data center and build hundreds of them as part of a distributed, compartmentalized network. Not only does this provide better, more even coverage, but if one tower is compromised the others will continue to send and receive data. In turn, that data is wrapped in purposebuilt security layers from the inside out – not as a programming afterthought – and provides the warfighter with a “zero-trust network” that includes encryption, user authentication, sandboxing, behavioral analytics, and other protective measures.

It’s this concept that led to the development of the SEMPRE Tower, which is based on the idea that a hardened, COTS-based 5G telecommunications and computing infrastructure can be adapted by the military to improve collaboration on the battlefield while maintaining a secure, resilient C5ISR [command, control, computers, communications, LAYERED DATA SECURITY TODAY

SEMPRE Towers are currently undergoing advanced field trials with the DoD, Air Force, and Army. As the trials progress, the goal is to reimagine battlefield communications by equipping the warfighter with a data gateway – and a data sentry – that securely and seamlessly connects them across different military branches with the performance, flexibility, and ease-of-use of a commercial smartphone. MES U.S. Air Force Brigadier General (Ret.) Dr. Robert Spalding is the founder and CEO of SEMPRE, a technology company committed to securing critical U.S. infrastructure. Prior to his role at SEMPRE, Gen. Spalding served in senior positions of strategy and diplomacy within the Defense Dept. and State Dept. for more than 26 years. He was the chief architect of the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and served as the Senior Director for Strategy to the president at the National Security Council.

SEMPRE https://www.sempre.ai/

SEMPRE APPROACH TO DATA SECURITY

Contractors

Employees

Firewall Tokens

Meta Data

AAA

5G Secure Code

IDS

IPS Data In Motion

DATA & IP

Data At Rest

Customers NAC

cyber, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] framework that can withstand a nuclear electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack. (Figure 1.)

Data Protection

Suppliers NAP

Infrastructure Defense

Service Data

DATA & IP User Data

Identity Management Users

Data is inherently insecure and is surrounded by layers of security to protect it.

Data is encrypted and restructured into secure unbreachable subcomponents which in isolation provide little value to the attacker. The attacker would need multiple pieces to make the data usable. The containerized SEMPRE 5G Core provides differentiated protection versus industry standard 5G cores.

Figure 1 | A diagram shows a conventional unsecured 5G data environment (left) versus a secure, containerized 5G data core (right). Illustration: SEMPRE.

20 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

SPECIAL REPORT

5G technology for the warfighter

Safely extending 5G into the battlespace

By Jim Luecke Cost-effective, low probability of intercept and detection (LPI/D) networks can provide connectivity into the battlespace while remaining virtually undetectable and jam-resistant.

Through appropriate integration, the benefits of 5G as a communications platform can reach deeper into the battlespace, and consequently can get into the hands of more soldiers.

Leveraging 5G communications platforms for the battlefield enables higher throughput and lower latency communications for critical and emerging applications while enjoying the cost and size benefits of commercial technology.

Though the functionality promised is

22 October 2021

enticing, it does carry some operational limitations. While these limitations – primarily centered in spoofing, jamming, and unwanted signal detection – can benefit from technology such as smart antennas, the benefit is achieved only through the “militarizing” of the 5G user equipment.

If left unchanged, 5G services must be limited to the back edge of the battlespace.

One alternative, however, which can bring 5G to the center of the battlespace, is to augment or extend the core 5G network to gain operational benefits that allow extension further into the battlespace without sacrificing the benefits of a commercial platform.

The problem with 5G on the battlefield 5G technology has a number of potential military applications, ranging from new methods of command-and-control (C2) and streamlined logistical systems to enlarging the amount of sensor data handled within intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) systems and other data-intensive applications such as virtual reality (VR). All such applications benefit from improved data rates, multimedia support, and/or lower latency, all provided by 5G. This improvement in data rate is only partially dependent on the 5G waveform, however. Higher data rates demand higher network capacity, which is enabled by

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

Most cellular networks, 5G included, are broken into two functional groups: The core network, which provides gateway access to the cloud or internet; and the radio access network, comprised of cellular towers that transmit and receive radio signals from user equipment (UE).

Within the 5G network, a connection is provided and capacity allocated between the tower and UE in a single packet stream operating as a single physical channel. If the UE is engaged in multiple simultaneous media services, data from these independent services may be merged into a single, shared packet. As such, the UE and its single connection becomes the bridge to the LPI/D network.

Figure 1 | Network configuration, with a line of demarcation separating a “safe” operating zone from a “threat” zone. Benchmark Electronics illustration.

creating smaller network cells, in effect trading distance for capacity and throughput.

Nonetheless, as the smaller cell does increase capacity, it also increases the number of radios per subscriber while providing the signal-to-noise ratio necessary to support efficient data transfer, potentially putting 5G technology into the hands of more soldiers.

While 5G offers benefits, it suffers several intrinsic vulnerabilities: Although stable in a benign environment, risk is incurred if used within the harsh battlespace, primarily from intentional jamming and unwanted signal detection. As for jamming, the 5G waveform uses orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), with information mapped onto a time-frequency lattice. As such, a jammer can selectively target physical broadcast channels or downlink control channels in both time and frequency.

Though 5G synchronization signals are no longer statically located, spoofing is still feasible, albeit requiring a more sophisticated jammer.

Jamming or interference effects can be reduced through adaptive or smart antenna techniques, which would use space-time adaptive processing (STAP) combined with an antenna array to beamform to desired 5G signals while nulling interferers. In principle, it is possible to monitor for excess energy on any physical channel, with excess energy detection used to beam-steer the antenna system and null unwanted signals.

While technically feasible, this approach significantly increases system complexity, size, power, and cost.

For some applications, the 5G signal is not appropriate because it is not covert in any meaningful sense. Any radio signal that can be detected can also be located, potentially putting soldiers in danger. If 5G is intended for actual battle operations, this characteristic limits 5G to the edges of the battlespace. While it could reach command centers, it does not safely support its use deeper into the battlefield.

Solution: 5G augmentation using LPI/D wireless technology 5G networking technology may be extended into the battlespace through augmentation using existing low probability of intercept and detection (LPI/D) wirelessnetworking technology, an approach that could provide connectivity beyond forward operating bases and tactical operations centers to greatly expand the number of soldiers with access to 5G. The U.S. Army and other service branches continue to pursue research and development of new LPI/D solutions, with the goal of improving functionality while maintaining signal security. www.militaryembedded.com

Conceptually, the network configuration can be depicted as seen in Figure 1. A virtual line runs through the battle zone, indicating a battlefront edge, a line of demarcation separating a safe operating zone – safe for 5G, that is – from a threat zone. This demarcation is the line beyond which 5G should not be extended to avoid unacceptable degradation from intentional interferers and to avoid detection. Placed along this edge are a set of UE/client devices, a bridge from the 5G network into the LPI/D client network, henceforth to be referred to simply as the client network.

While the 5G network operates as a single connection to the UE/client, the client network operates as one-to-many, a single host serving a moderatelysized network of connected users. The LPI/D network operates as full mesh, ad hoc, and multi-hop, supporting soldier mobility. The small and lightweight LPI/D radio, capable of being used as a handheld device, may be combined with the UE device to produce a solution approximately the size and thickness of two 5G phones placed back-to-back. The pair may be easily interfaced together using existing interface options.

This UE/client combination serves as the host for the client network. In this manner, the UE/client device serves as a bridge between the 5G network domain and the LPI/D domain. Cross-domain management is handled on the client side through the use of an appropriate

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

23

SPECIAL REPORT adaptation layer and address mapping mechanisms. Once a packet is received on the UE side and forwarded to the client, the client network assumes full responsibility for ensuring the packet is forwarded and routed to the appropriate destination. Although the LPI/D network may be operated as multicast, communications within the network are generally unicast. Regardless, either technique can be used on the client side, depending on the services and needed connectivity. In this manner, services over the 5G network may be extended to the soldier in the form of images, video, data, internet, or even voice communications.

As all data destined for the client network can be handled within a single packet stream, this suggests that 5G’s native transport system can be used unchanged, with the application layer used to build cross-domain services. This strategy enables the use of an LPI/D client service within the 5G network without constraining this client network to 5G access standards. The 5G transport layers remain unchanged, with the communications protocol handled entirely at the application layer.

Functionally, 5G then becomes a neutral host to provide a set of resources to the client network. For the end users, this fact means that resources are provisioned and network communications handled in a purely native manner. To the end user, nothing has changed except that they may now enjoy services carried over the 5G network. Note that neutral host architectures have been deployed with existing WiFi and 4G technologies, thereby indicating that the same approach may also be leveraged for 5G. 5G: Reaching into the battlespace Existing and emerging LPI/D wireless networking technology may be used to extend 5G communications into a hostile battlespace. Through cross-domain management, 5G

5G technology for the warfighter and LPI/D networks may be bridged with minimum complexity. With the 5G network also operated as a type of neutral host, the LPI/D network may take part in 5G services while remaining largely transparent to the 5G architecture. In the end, it means that 5G services can reach further into the battlespace, enabling the services carried over 5G to be available to even more soldiers. MES Jim Luecke is the director of design engineering for the Advanced Technology group at Benchmark. He and his team work with aerospace and defense customers on design-to-specification projects leveraging bleeding-edge technologies in RF connectivity, sensor fusion, and more.

Benchmark https://www.bench.com/

Flexible Circuit Assemblies

Your “flexperts” at AirBorn offer high-reliability, flexible printed circuit board assembly solutions including single-sided, double-sided, multi-layer, rigid-flex & sculptured varieties. Let’s get to work!

a i r b o r n . c o m 24 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

TECHNOLOGY MAKING YOUR HEAD SPIN? WE CAN HELP YOU MAKE SENSE OF IT ALL

Military Embedded Systems focuses on embedded electronics – hardware and software – for military applications through technical coverage of all parts of the design process. The website, Resource Guide, e-mags, newsletters, podcasts, webcasts, and print editions provide insight on embedded tools and strategies including technology insertion, obsolescence management, standards adoption, and many other military-specific technical subjects.

Coverage areas include the latest innovative products, technology, and market trends driving military embedded applications such as radar, electronic warfare, unmanned systems, cybersecurity, AI and machine learning, avionics, and more. Each issue is full of the information readers need to stay connected to the pulse of embedded technology in the military and aerospace industries.

militaryembedded.com

MIL TECH TRENDS

Sensor Open Systems Architecture (SOSA) – Taking EW systems to the next level

By Denis Smetana The Sensor Open Systems Architecture Technical Standard (SOSA) – which will bring many benefits to designers of radar systems – will also have a beneficial effect on the design of electronic warfare (EW) systems.

One of the main differences between radar and electronic warfare (EW) system architectures is that radar systems are primarily receivers of sensor data. While some radar systems may transmit energy to excite the targets, other radars may be completely passive.

EW sense-and-response systems, on the other hand, have significantly more bidirectional activity compared to a radar system. Moreover, EW systems must respond after sensing a signal as close to instantaneous as possible. That capability means that low latency

26 October 2021

How SOSA impacts electronic warfare designs

is essential to enable signals to get in and out from the system as quickly as possible.

Another attribute of EW is that system designers must constantly respond to new threats and come up with appropriate ways to respond. EW is a continuously evolving domain for which the concept of QRC [quick response capabilities] is vital to introducing new capacities rapidly and easily. These capabilities can range from those that correctly identify new threats to new techniques that nullify a threat. Techniques may involve jamming the incoming signal or distorting/delaying the natural response to confuse whatever weapons may be zeroed in on the target platform.

The SOSA Reference Architecture facilitates these objectives by providing a definition of SOSA modules, hardware elements (for example, plug-in cards), and software environments that follow SOSA Technical and Business Architectural Principles as well as Quality Attributes. These elements have welldefined, open, and exposed interfaces, and are verified conformant to those SOSA Quality Attributes.

Within the SOSA Reference Architecture, the SOSA Modules were created as logical entities that encompass behaviors and functions. SOSA Modules are instantiated in a variety of ways, with one example being the instantiation of SOSA modules for EW in software.

The use of SOSA Modules (no matter how they are instantiated), along with their associated Quality Attributes and open and exposed interfaces, help ensure that the system is able to adapt to the changing needs of spectrum warfare by making it easier to replace or upgrade modular pieces of the system. The ability to replace software or firmware to add a new capability to the EW system

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | Annapolis Micro Systems’ WILDSTAR 3XBP 3U OpenVPX FPGA processor is 100GbE-enabled and aligned with the SOSA Technical Standard.

is critical because it means the ability to rapidly introduce new waveforms or techniques to address constantly changing threats.

Figure 2 | ANSI/VITA 65.0 Payload Slot Profile SLT3-PAY-1F1U1S1S1U1U2F1H-14.6.11-n

At a plug-in card (PIC) level there are a few physical attributes that lend themselves nicely to EW systems. The key to any EW system is the front-end sensor processor, which is typically a tuner or FPGA [field-programmable gate array] card. It is important that the front end of the system is capable of supporting a large amount of sensor I/O and can distribute this data across a high-performance fabric to other downstream plugin cards in the system. (Figure 1.)

The primary “workhorse” plug-in card profile (PICP) defined by the SOSA Technical Standard for 3U-based systems is the payload PICP. This profile differs from the I/O-intensive PICP used for singleboard computing (SBC) cards in that it provides backplane apertures which can be used for optical or coax cables, as well as a wide expansion plane (EP) interface which can send data for downstream processing, and a data plane (DP) fabric interface for sending data through the network fabric.

Two variants of the payload PICP [a primary (Figure 2) and secondary (Figure 3)] are shown in the figures where there is a tradeoff within the upper half of the backplane P2 connector, between more aperture space for sensor input/output versus a wider EP for downstream data processing. For EW systems, where both input and output signals are needed, the primary payload PICP in Figure 2, with wider aperture space, provides the capability for supporting a larger number of RF or optical transmit and receive signals. www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 3 | ANSI/VITA 65.0 Payload Slot Profile SLT3-PAY-1F1U1S1S1U1U4F1J

Either of these PICPs support rear-panel fiber or coax interfaces, which are optimal for EW sensors. The rear-panel approach enables cabling to be handled in the sensorprocessing chassis itself, eliminating the complex cable management problem that results from having a proliferation of cables at the front panel. More specifically, positioning the cables within the chassis rather than on the front panel eliminates the need to disconnect cables when replacing a PIC. This setup not only saves time but also reduces wear and tear on the connectors themselves and overall makes system integration and maintenance significantly easier. With new high-density connectors, developed by the market and standardized by VITA and The Open Group’s SOSA Consortium, the number of sensors supported is also much higher than can be supported with just the standard VPX connectors on the backplane or with the types of connectors that are typically used on the front panel.

In 6U, where more backplane pins are available, all processor profiles support one or two full connectors’ worth of apertures as well as wider DPs and EPs. Over the last 10 or so years, it seems that until recently it was the norm to have most EW analog signals brought into an FPGA card or front-end processor card via an FMC mezzanine mounted on that card or directly to the card via connectors on the front panel. In either case, there are front-panel connections to cables, and from there, connections to the sensors themselves.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

27

MIL TECH TRENDS

How SOSA impacts electronic warfare designs

In the last few years, however, the VITA 66 and VITA 67 specifications started adding provisions for connectors on the backplane that could support optical or coax. For coax, the connectors take the analog signals from the board and connect to high density cables on the backplane. For optical signals, the connectors can interface to blind-mate cables on board or include a transceiver that translates signals on onboard copper traces on the board to optical signals on the backplane cables.

Today is seeing a mixture of analog sensors and smart sensors with optical backhauls being deployed; both types are critical and in many cases may be mixed in the same system.

The analog or optical interface is another area that can benefit from standardization.

With a proliferation of cable connector types, densities, and pin assignments used on different front-end cards, having a common set of configurations makes it easier to support and easier to substitute in a different PIC. The challenge remains, however: how to do this in a way that also provides the flexibility to handle the wide range of antennae and sensor front ends that exist?

Supporting the higher-density connectors as well as prioritizing the order of pin assignments and providing a few options helps that problem significantly. The SOSA Technical Standard defines connections not only at the PIC level but also at the chassis level. The SOSA Reference Architecture is intended to support EW sensors plus radar, EO/IR [electro-optical/infrared], SIGINT [signals intelligence], and communications sensors as well.

The SOSA Technical Standard also includes the definition of signals and signal characteristics as well as the means by which different information is communicated to

www.interfaceconcept.com

RUGGED COTS SOLUTIONS

Manufacturer of Ethernet switches, Intel® or NXP ARM® processor-based Single Board Computers and FPGA boards • Ethernet Switches developed in alignment with the SOSA™ Technical Standard • 3U and 6U VPX form factors • Optical VITA 66.5 standard • Switch management software stack • Expert technical support and custom-design • From standard to conduction-cooled grades For more info, contact:

Since 1987, Interface Concept has been a leading developer and manufacturer of leading-edge HPEC embedded boards and systems for military, aerospace and industrial applications.

Elma Electronic Inc. is the North American sales and support provider for Interface Concept.

28 October 2021

www.elma.com sales@elma.com • 510-656-3400

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Figure 4 | The Curtiss-Wright CMOSS Starter Kit 3U OpenVPX system integrates a VPX3-687 VICTORY network switch module, VPX3-673 A-PNT card, and VPX3-1260 SBC in a SOSA Technical Standard 1.0 aligned chassis.

different entities. A major portion of this capability has been adopted from the Modular Open RF Architecture (MORA), which itself is an extension of the VICTORY [Vehicular Integration for C4ISR/EW Interoperability] architecture, which was developed to ease the integration of RF systems in ground vehicles.

MORA is important to EW systems in that it adds low-latency transport capability and streaming functions which are critical to time-sensitive applications. (Figure 4.)

Putting all this together, the SOSA Technical Standard provides a solid framework for supporting interchangeable entities, which are key to the interoperability, modularity, portability, and upgradeability principles, all of which are what the SOSA Reference Architecture is all about. MES Denis Smetana is a senior product manager for FPGA and DSP products for Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions, based out of Ashburn, Virginia. He has more than 30 years of experience with ASIC and FPGA product development and management in both the telecom and defense industry and over 15 years of experience with COTS ISR products.

He has a BSEE in electrical engineering from Virginia Tech.

Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions https://www.curtisswrightds.com/ www.militaryembedded.com

R EG IST ER N OW AT 5 8 .C R OWS .O R G !

W H O S H O U L D AT T E N D AOC 2021, the Association of Old Crow’s Annual Symposium & Convention, brings together the full spectrum of people working in electromagnetic spectrum operations.

ACTIVE DUTY TO VETERAN No matter what your mission, you need an advantage in the spectrum. A better understanding of the invaluable role of spectrum in military operations is imperative for success.

JUNIOR ENGINEER TO PRINCIPAL ENGINEER You are the technology makers, the rapidly evolving designers. Through research and development, you are solving the problems and providing the solutions to the war fighters.

CASUAL TO PRO The spectrum is part of your world and touches everything you do.

You need to join our mission in order to gain the knowledge you need to drive decisions in your organization.

SUPPORT OUR MISSION • INFLUENCE OUR MISSION • LEARN OUR MISSION Host Sponsor

58.crows.org

MIL TECH TRENDS

New RF FPGA solutions transform EW platforms

by Rodger Hosking Maintaining a tactical advantage in EW (electronic warfare) has become one of the highest priorities for defense organizations.

Ongoing development of innovative strategies and evolution of technologies are necessary to counter new threats and to exploit new targets.

Recent advances in silicon technology aggregate many essential elements required in electronic warfare (EW) systems within a single device. These highly integrated components not only simplify traditional EW design architectures, but also add critical performance

30 October 2021

How SOSA impacts electronic warfare designs

metrics. Because they can reduce size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C), they also open new markets and application spaces that were previously impractical.

Presented with diverse and challenging requirements and tight schedules, EW system designers must take advantage of any new resources or design strategies suitable to the tasks at hand.

EW operational challenges EW exploits the entire electromagnetic spectrum to gain advantage over the enemy with an incredibly diverse range of deployed platforms for land, air, sea, underwater, and space environments. EW is divided into three application areas: electronic attack (EA) for classic offensive objectives to disrupt, deny, degrade, destroy or deceive; electronic protection (EP), which seeks to thwart the effectiveness of EA; and electronic support (ES), which harvests the extensive wealth of signal information of all types to improve decision-making and strategies.

Despite the many differences across these platforms, they share many common needs, so that a new effective technology implemented on one platform is often quickly adapted by others.

Modern EW systems for radar, communications, telemetry, and interception now increasingly rely upon phased-array antennas to steer receive and transmit

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

antenna array is mounted in a location best suited to capture signals (perhaps on an antenna mast) and connected with radio frequency (RF) cables down to an equipment bay through dozens of long RF cables for each of the elements. Maintaining beamsteering integrity requires preserving precise and stable phase matching between those cables despite temperature fluctuations, physical movement, aging, and maintenance issues. To make matters worse, analog signals flowing from remote antennas or sensors suffer signal degradation from cable losses and susceptibility to interference from powerful antenna transmit signals, interchannel crosstalk, and power-generation equipment.

Many EA and EP systems are dedicated to fire-control and countermeasures, in which a signal is received and a counter response is computed and then delivered, all as quickly as possible. This overall latency often defines the limiting factor in the effectiveness of such systems. Unfortunately, the latest data-converter devices (both analog-to-digital [ADC] and digital-to-analog [DAC]) with the highest sampling rates now favor gigabit serial JESD204 interfaces to achieve high data I/O transfer rates.

Even though they achieve high instantaneous bandwidths, the interfaces on these devices rule out use in low-latency EW applications.

Relentless increases in RF signal complexity are driven by the need to conserve precious bandwidth in the overcrowded frequency spectrum. Here, sophisticated radar pulse waveforms are developed to extract more information from targets despite noise, jamming and other countermeasures; signals are also heavily encrypted for enhanced security against interception and eavesdropping. For EA and EP systems, low-latency, real-time digital signal processing (DSP) is essential to overcome these obstacles to compute an immediate and appropriate response with minimal delay.

This function is usually accomplished with field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), although some of the higher-complexity tasks can require GPUs or AI engines.

Compounding the data converter and signal processing issues above, phased-array systems magnify these challenges because each of the numerous elements now requires its own dedicated ADC, DAC, and DSP function. This impacts size, weight, and power (SWaP) metrics as well as cost, greatly depending on the implementation.

signal beam patterns. These antennas are usually linear or two-dimensional planar arrays often containing dozens of elements, each requiring separate signal processing for precisely shifting the phase to attain the desired directionality. They can be installed on a hull surface and quickly adapt to threats and targets without the bulky mechanical structures required for a directional dish.

Although ideally suited for airborne and UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] radars where size is critical, larger phased arrays are also extremely effective for precision ground- and maritime-based radars as well, especially for fire-control systems and countermeasures.

These larger phased-array systems pose several new challenges for the traditional EW system architecture where the www.militaryembedded.com

New FPGA RF technology for EW systems Xilinx offers two families of solutions to the many challenges above by combining critical EW functions within a single device. The first family of such technology was the RFSoC (RF system-on-chip).

Introduced in 2017, RFSoC uses the Xilinx UltraScale+ FPGA Zynq architecture based on 14 nm silicon geometry (shown in Figure 1). Now offered in the Gen3 revision, it includes eight 14-bit ADCs sampling at 5 GS/sec capable of direct RF digitization of input signals up to 6 GHz, and eight 14-bit DACs sampling at 9.8 GS/sec. These data converters are connected directly to the Zynq FPGA fabric, eliminating the power, connections, complexity, and latencies of external interfaces to discrete data converters. An onboard, multicore Arm processor serves as a system controller, providing control, status, I/O, and a 1 GbE interface to an external host. Two 100 GbE interfaces connect the RFSoC to external devices supporting 24 GB/sec data transfers in both directions. (Figure 1.)

Targeting the massive-MIMO antenna requirements of 5G commercial wireless, RFSoC supports key functions for 8-elements of a phased array including direct transmit/ receive RF conversion, real-time DSP, and control. By effectively addressing so many tough requirements, this new FPGA architecture was immediately attractive to EW designers. Its small size not only reduces SWaP-C, especially critical for air vehicles and small EW countermeasure systems, but it also enables new system architectures that provide significant performance enhancements.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

31

MIL TECH TRENDS

How SOSA impacts electronic warfare designs

This technology enables compact small-form-factor (SFF) enclosures holding RF circuitry to convert antenna signal frequencies to-and-from L-band along with the RFSoC devices, to be integrated within or behind the antenna array. Inside the RFSoC, digital lines from the data converters connect directly into the FPGA fabric, drastically reducing latency compared to external discrete devices with serial JESDS204 interfaces. DSP functions within the FPGA can locally apply the required phase shifts to the elements for beam steering receive and transmit signals, and handle signal acquisition, triggering, waveform generation, time stamping, digital up/down conversion.

These real-time front-end operations can significantly off-load backend processing tasks. (Figure 2.)

Figure 1 | Xilinx’s Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC Gen3 device combines all critical components of of EW subsystem including eight RF ADCs and DACs, high-speed Ethernet and PCIe, DDR4 SDRAM interfaces, and multicore ARM processors.

Figure 2 | This RFSoC-based small-formfactor ruggedized subsystem provides eight channels of remote data acquisition and generation, local Arm processor system controller, FPGA fabric for DSP, and dual 100 GbE optical interfaces with VITA-49 data protocol.

Sensitive RF circuitry and data converters are now inside the SFF enclosure, eliminating the need for long analog RF cables and their many disadvantages.

Instead, digitized payload signals can be connected to the host system using gigabit serial links, a popular trend for embedded system interconnections.

Once again, the RFSoC steps up to the task by providing two 100 GbE interface engines, each supported with four fullduplex 25 Gbaud lanes. By equipping each subsystem with optical transceivers, multimode fiber optical cables can deliver data at 24 GB/sec across distances as far as 100 meters. These links are not only lighter, smaller, and less expensive than RF cables, but they are also impervious to electromagnetic interference so as to maintain full signal integrity.

Because RFSoC offers a complete software radio subsystem on a chip, it opens a wealth of new EW uses previously impractical with earlier technology. These include small standalone monitoring stations, smarter munitions, more agile countermeasure and fire-control systems, and better troop protection.

Figure 3 | Xilinx Versal AI ACAP (Adaptive Compute Acceleration Platform) heterogeneous processor includes blends of DSP engines, artificial intelligence (AI) engines, adaptable FPGA engines, multicore Arm processors, network-on-chip, high bandwidth and DDR memories, multirate Ethernet I/O, and RF I/O (courtesy Xilinx).

32 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Next-generation devices for EW Xilinx’s latest offering is the Versal ACAP [adaptive compute acceleration platform] family of hardware devices and supporting development tools.

Different members of the family provide different blends of three major processing resources: scalar processors (ARM CPUs), adaptable logic (FPGAs), and vector processors (GPUs and DSPs), as shown in Figure 3. These last two www.militaryembedded.com

resources support AI capabilities such as inference, image processing, pattern recognition, and signature detection, all of which are extremely appropriate for EW as well as for many other defense applications. One even offers onboard direct sampling RF ADCs and DACs, following the successful theme introduced

by RFSoC. This heterogenous mix of ACAP resources gives designers the freedom to assign compute power to the processing engine most suitable to the task at hand, and the ability to adaptively reassign resources as required. This flexibility of ACAP delivers as much as ten times the performance over dedicated processor types alone.

Onboard, flexible high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and fast DDR4 SDRAM structures eliminate the need for external devices. To interconnect these resources, ACAP includes an extremely wideband, configurable network-on-chip that offers a uniform interface and protocol to simplify system integration.

resources. Expect ongoing development of these technologies to meet the evolving EW needs of warfighters. MES Rodger Hosking is vice president of Mercury Microelectronics, a wholly owned subsidiary of Mercury Systems (formerly Pentek). With more than 30 years in the electronics industry, he has authored hundreds of articles about software radio and digital signal processing. Prior to his current position, he served as engineering manager at Wavetek/Rockland; he also holds patents in frequency synthesis and spectrum-analysis techniques.

He holds a BS degree in physics from Allegheny College in Pennsylvania and BSEE and MSEE degrees from Columbia University in New York.

Pentek, now part of Mercury • https://www.pentek.com/go/ewmes

Award-Winning Development Solutions

Versal development tools target highlevel design entry from frameworks, models, C language, and RTL coding.

Users can create a custom development environment to suit their project needs and programming preferences. Other Versal hardware/software platforms will evolve to help speed EW development tasks and support high complexity and extreme performance requirements.

Looking forward Several clear trends for EW are evident: Integrating data converters and processors into a single device solves several critical problems in the areas of system architecture, performance levels, and costs. Combining data converters with a single type of signal processor is a good start, but a heterogeneous mix of specialized processing resources means that a common platform can support a wider range of deployment scenarios and applications.

Lastly, harnessing this new complex technology requires development tools supporting high-level design entry and flexible migration of tasks across the many www.militaryembedded.com

Elma’s new CompacFrames are innovative lightweight platforms for card or system development based on open standards like VPX or aligned to SOSA™.

With you at every stage!

Learn More

Elma Electronic Inc.

elma.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

33

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Military spectrum management: Spectrum sharing, quantum sensors, and AI advances

By Sally Cole, Senior Editor U.S. military spectrum management is currently undergoing many changes – from spectrum sharing to technology advances in quantum sensors and artificial intelligence (AI).

The electromagnetic spectrum (EMS) supports all kinds of civilian and military operations worldwide; it also happens to be an invisible battlespace essential to all of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) domains.

Interruption of access to spectrum can quickly become a military nightmare.

A recent report by the U.S. GAO (Government Accountability Office) found that China and Russia are taking what the GAO calls signifi-

34 October 2021

Spectrum-management challenges

cant steps to improve their electromagnetic warfare capabilities to challenge the U.S., meaning that the U.S. can no longer be assured of superiority within the spectrum (https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-21-440t).

The DoD is well-aware of the challenges and opportunities affecting military use of the spectrum, according to the GAO, and the department agreed with GAO’s recommendations that it should identify processes and procedures, reform governance structures, assign leadership for strategy implementation, issue an implementation plan, and develop oversight processes in the spectrum arena.

In the midst of the push to regain U.S. superiority within the spectrum, changes are underway as the DoD embarks on spectrum sharing, new quantum technologies, and a boost in speed from artificial intelligence (AI).

Spectrum sharing To help solve the growing problem of spectrum scarcity, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decided to open up the Citizens’ Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) band (3.5 to 3.7 GHz) of the radio-frequency (RF) spectrum, which was being underutilized, for sharing, a move that would enable multiple categories of users to safely occupy the same frequency bands.

In 2020, licenses were auctioned off to the highest bidders, which were wireless carriers, for access to this band of spectrum; even so, the U.S. Navy retained priority as the incumbent user.

“A lot of work and technology had to fall into place to even make spectrum sharing possible, and it’s finally come to fruition,” says Manuel Uhm, director of silicon marketing at Xilinx (San Jose, California), as well as chair of the board of directors of the Wireless Innovation Forum, which sets all the technical

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

it’s not fully utilized,” Uhm says. “Put the shoe on the other foot, where the DoD says ‘You bought this spectrum at auction but it’s underutilized so we’d like to be able to use it when you aren’t using it for commercial purposes.’ Will the commercial sector open it up too? They’re going to say they purchased it at auction and paid billions for it, but if they’re not fully using it, would they be open to spectrum sharing? As long as their commercial users have priority and are protected from interference from other users, then why not open it up to the DoD?” While CBRS has successfully rolled out, improvements can be made: “Now that the revolution has happened, it’s about evolutionary changes,” Uhm continues. “So people are looking at CBRS and ways to streamline or improve the model for future spectrum sharing. One example is the ESC, the environmental sensing capability – that’s the system used by CBRS to try to ensure commercial broadband users don’t interfere with naval radar when it’s in use.”

The system as it stands involves a group of RF sensors set up on the coastline and in a few select spots inland. “If [the sensors] detect naval radar in operation, they notify all CBRS devices in that vicinity and force them to move off the spectrum within a five-minute time frame,” Uhm explains. “The current model works, but it’s expensive to deploy and can have errors. A sensor can go offline or miss a naval radar ping, then you have interference. Naval radar should have priority and be protected.”

An alternative proposed method is called the Incumbent Informing Capability, which is “a more proactive approach where a spectrum-coordination system uses information provided by the incumbents about when they will be using certain frequencies to avoid interference from other lower-priority users,” Uhm adds. standards for the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS). “Spectrum sharing makes so much sense as we’re running out of exclusively licensed spectrum; it’s going to become more common going forward.”

The issue of the EMS and spectrum dominance is a huge priority for the DoD. “This is an extremely high priority for them – having warfighters not be jammed by enemy transmitters, preventing them from carrying out orders, sending and receiving data in a real-time manner,” Uhm adds.

For many years, the commercial strategy was “just open up the spectrum at auction, we’ll buy and own it, and no one else can use it.” But the DoD’s strategy was to maintain the spectrum it had dedicated for its purposes, and then share it for commercial purposes when not being fully utilized.

“If you carry the DoD strategy to full fruition, you can see scenarios where the DoD would also like to be able to use commercial broadband spectrum when www.militaryembedded.com

Quantum sensors One technology advancement poised to shake up spectrum management lies within the realm of quantum sensors/receivers. In mid-2021, the U.S. Army reported using an Army-built quantum “Rydberg” sensor – a super-wideband radio receiver – which can analyze the full spectrum of RF and real-world signals.

The Army’s Rydberg sensor uses laser beams to create highly excited Rydberg atoms directly above a microwave circuit to boost and focus directly on the portion of spectrum being measured. These atoms are sensitive to the circuit’s voltage, so the device can be used as a sensitive probe for the wide range of signals within the RF spectrum.

“Previous demonstrations of Rydberg atomic sensors were only able to sense small and specific regions of the RF spectrum, but our sensor operates continuously over a wide frequency range,” says Kevin Cox, a researcher at the U.S Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) of the Army Research Lab. “This is a really important step toward proving quantum sensors can provide a new, dominant, set of capabilities for our soldiers, who are operating within an increasingly complex electromagnetic battlespace.”

The lab’s Rydberg spectrum analyzer and other quantum sensors show potential to unlock a new frontier of Army sensors for spectrum awareness, electronic warfare (EW), sensing, and communications – all part of the Army’s modernization strategy.

(Figure 1.)

In this vein, DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] has launched what it calls its Quantum Apertures (QA) program to try to develop a fundamentally new way of receiving radio frequency waveforms to improve both sensitivity and frequency agility for defense applications. DARPA’s former Quantum-Assisted Sensing and Readout program (which ran from 2010 to 2018) recognized the potential to sense electronic fields using highly excited Rydberg quantum states.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

35

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Spectrum-management challenges

The newly launched QA program is expected to run for 56 months; research is expected to begin in late 2021, with research team members Honeywell, Northrop Grumman, ColdQuanta, and SRI International on board.

QA’s goal is to develop RF antennas or apertures via quantum techniques to alter the way RF spectrum is accessed.

To get there, portable and directional RF receivers are needed with greater sensitivity, bandwidth, and dynamic range than any classical receiver available today.

“Commercial wireless infrastructure, the construct of spectrum use, and beyond have been dictated by a hundred years of antenna theory, originally developed

by German physicist Heinrich Hertz,” says John Burke, the program manager leading the QA program. “With the introduction of quantum, we have the ability to replace the existing fundamental limits placed on antenna technology with a whole new set of rules.

Quantum Apertures seeks to create a paradigm shift in the way we process and use the spectrum.”

Rydberg sensors offer significant advantages over classic antenna-based receivers. First, these sensors aren’t plagued by sensitivity challenges because they don’t need to contend with thermal noise. Moreover, Rydberg sensors have no size or shape limitations with respect to the received RF frequency wavelength. This decoupling of the aperture shape and RF frequency enables Rydberg sensors to be programmed over a large frequency range – from MHz to THz. The target system of the QA program is to directionally receive low-intensity, modulated RF signals and operate over a large spectral range, from 10 MHz to 40 GHz or beyond. This span will enable users to see a large swath of spectrum with one antenna, particularly the portions that are relevant to military applications.

Researchers will also attempt to develop a sensor element and its associated electronics within a one-cubic-centimeter

36 October 2021

Figure 1 | Exciting rubidium atoms to high-energy Rydberg states. Atoms interact strongly with the circuit’s electric fields, enabling detection and demodulation of any signal received into the circuit. U.S. Army illustration.

package that can successfully operate across various frequencies, a feat that DARPA says will break the tradeoff between frequency range and size that exists with classic antennas. This setup also means that the QA sensor will rely on lasers instead of cable for wiring, achieving better resilience to high-power effects and higher tolerance of microwave radiation.

“Recent demonstrations of Rydberg atomic sensors show it’s possible to access large portions of the RF spectrum, but QA aims to go beyond those efforts by continuously connecting these demonstrations across the spectrum,” says Burke. “We’re going from simple demonstrations of one functionality to a device that can be programmed to do almost anything and do most of it better than a classical receiver could. This includes speeding up the time to tune the sensor – improving sensitivity to small signals, enhancing dynamic range, and expanding compatibility with modern signals.”

AI and the edge Currently used systems scan a wide swath of spectrum to identify signals of interest and check them against a database to determine if action needs to be taken.

“Advances in AI are providing far better options that can respond much faster and with greater intelligence,” Xilinx’s Uhm says. “It can help identify foreign or interfering signals within a particular band of spectrum. And it can be used to help identify signals that would otherwise be classified as unknown signals because they’re not necessarily in the database being referenced. So there are a lot of AI technologies being put forward to manage the spectrum and EMS spectrum dominance for defense parties.”

Without question, AI is changing spectrum management, but so too is the concept of the edge, which can mean many things to different people.

“From a defense perspective, ‘the edge’ refers to the tactical edge, which can range from a pointy-nosed jet to a Humvee to remote sensors, but the trend toward the edge from a commercial perspective is also helping at the tactical edge where everything needs to get smaller and has tight constraints around heat dissipation and thermal

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

“The edge” is an overused term, [Xilinx’s Manuel] Uhm points out. “There are many requirements both in terms of compute performance in size, weight, and power within the commercial

“Having the intelligence right there at the scene is so critical to being agile and nimble – as opposed to having to go back and wait for instructions from central command,” he adds. “Warfighters don’t have time for that.”

Security is an often-overlooked aspect of the spectrum. But it’s garnering more attention now within the commercial space because more hacks and malicious attacks are being made public.

“If you hack a system, you can take control of it. Security is of paramount importance – all systems need to be secure and have multiple levels of security,” Uhm notes. From the waveform “all the way down to the individual chip level every key component needs to be secure, because hacks can occur in a number of different ways, including via the spectrum.” MES

space, so when people don’t define the edge it becomes a nebulous concept like ‘the cloud,’” he says. management, basically the size, weight, and power,” Uhm explains.

“The edge” is an overused term, Uhm points out. “There are many requirements both in terms of compute performance in size, weight, and power within the commercial space, so when people don’t define the edge it becomes a nebulous concept like ‘the cloud,’” he says.

Having both semiconductor technology and systems focused on the edge generally means smaller, rugged form factors that don’t consume as much power, can survive longer in the field, and don’t overheat as quickly.

“If you need to go back to the cloud, there’s latency associated with doing that and your responsiveness is impacted,” Uhm says. “The goal of the edge is distributing intelligence so it’s not all in one place, but is actually distributed closer to the information being gathered to allow you to take action faster.”

This reality is important for commercial scenarios like autonomous vehicles or robotic surgery, Uhm notes, but from a defense and military perspective it’s actually huge, because you need to act very quickly on intelligence and shorten the kill chain when necessary. www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

37

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Spectrum-management challenges

Better connections assist soldiers to make better decisions faster

By Jack Midgley Soldier modernization programs take on new urgency as funding priorities shift and operational demands increase. There are many challenges posed by resource constraints and changing operational environments. Defense connectivity solutions offer new capabilities and innovative, economical approaches to help soldiers and commanders at every level use every bit of the spectrum available to make better decisions faster – when observing, orienting, deciding, and acting (OODA) in unforgiving operational environments.

There is no doubt that military forces worldwide are adapting their equipment and operating models to new levels of operational intensity. As the U.S. Army Vision describes, forces are refocusing on “high-intensity conflict […] in dense urban terrain, in electronically degraded environments and under constant surveillance.” ¹ Today’s modernization efforts are increasingly focused on optimizing the ability of individual soldiers and small units to share and process information using advanced digital technology. The digital “revolution in military affairs” is happening as four key technologies have matured: artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), miniaturized inexpensive sensors, and efficient wearable power supplies.

These four critical technologies create unprecedented demands for connections capable of handling massive amounts of data with minimal power and weight. The four revolutionary technologies are evident in the U.S. Army’s Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS), recently approved for production. IVAS needs all four technologies to deliver its full capability, and the rush is on for effective, modular solutions to complement the massive latent capability of this new system.

In the U.S., Army acquisition authorities are searching for soldier modernization solutions including “body-worn systems, hand-held devices, smart lightweight electronic components and information processing to increase soldier maneuverability and protection through on-soldier sensing, remote sensing and knowledge management.” ²

38 October 2021

But what advantages will these revolutionary technologies bring on the battlefield? Unlike a new warhead with easily measurable qualities like accuracy or penetration, soldier-worn systems require a different yardstick. These systems connect soldiers with many types of information, and their advantage is measured in the quality and speed of decisions – those made by individual soldiers, and by commanders at every level. To take full advantage of revolutionary technologies, soldier-worn technology must collect and distribute information – that is, this technology must gain and maintain “connectivity” at each stage of the decision-making cycle.

Our new connected world It is key to meet these new requirements with solutions that enhance connectivity at every phase in the observing, orienting, deciding, and acting (OODA) decision-making cycle. Soldier-worn technology must contribute to rapid information processing; a critical component of that is providing technology solutions to move information swiftly, reliably, and with minimal power and size.

(Figure 1.)

Observing: Soldiers operating in dense urban environments need more than their own eyes to observe and detect threats. Observations from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), sensors, advanced optics, even satellite imagery and video are now available at the lowest levels of the chain of command. How can these sources be sorted, integrated, and processed to understand the environment, without overwhelming the observer? Too many devices, connected in a web of cables, make tactical observations more difficult for soldiers in fastchanging situations.

Up-to-date connectors and cable assemblies leverage enhanced interaction design, integration capability, and plug-and-go functionality. Such technology enables soldiers to connect and route observation devices in any direction, ensuring that external cables always run straight to the device. Moreover, straight connections mean that soldiers can manage more devices with lightweight, uncomplicated connectors, as straight connections mean shorter cables, fewer tangles, and enhanced usability because equipment is lighter and faster to set up.

Orienting: Which observations require immediate attention? Which must be reported, and which can be ignored? Unless the soldier can orient rapidly and accurately, observation data – and expensive sensor equipment – can be wasted. Sophisticated connectors help soldiers orient efficiently on tactical

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

threats by providing reliable power and data connections to the new tactical hub. Using military standard connectors solutions and a lightweight, body-worn hub, a soldier can move data efficiently from multiple sensors and communication devices onto the end-user device (EUD) for processing and evaluation.

Many advanced connectors and cable assemblies deliver rock-solid power and data connections with IP68-level sealing, while eliminating key codes and delivering 360º mating freedom. Cablefree solutions can also be achieved by integrating the panel plug directly into the housing of such wearable devices as radios, bodycams, LEDs, and alert systems or biometric sensors.

These wearables can be mated quickly and easily to ready-to-use receptacles or receptacles with new quick-detach system fitted into the fabric of a smart tactical vest, for example. Keeping multiple devices in view and reliably connected through the hub enables soldiers to focus on the data instead of on the devices and connections. Better focus can lead to faster, more accurate orientation to threats, maximizing the impact of soldier-worn sensors and communication devices.

Deciding: When the soldier and unit are correctly oriented, options have to be defined and a course of action selected.

These decisions depend on fast, accurate communication within the unit and also between the unit and its headquarters, adjacent units, and supporting elements. Defense-centric connectors add reliability and speed to military decisionmaking processes by keeping soldiers reliably connected to their communications and sensor suites. Shorter cables,

a compact hub, and tight power and data connections minimize instances of “out-ofcommunication” that can slow decision-making and add risk in tactical environments.

Soldier-worn technology must contribute to rapid information processing; a critical component of that is providing technology solutions to move information swiftly, reliably, and with minimal power and size.

Acting: When a decision is made, soldiers need to be able to move, act, and communicate rapidly and accurately. Connected vests minimize external snagging hazards and allow instant connection or disconnection of wearable devices. By using a single battery to power all the soldier’s body-worn technology, the solution lightens the soldier’s load, increasing agility and speed of movement. The next generation of soldier-worn equipment will enable individual soldiers to apply the kinds of information and insight that were once available only to higher commanders and staff.

Connectivity is key Military OEM design engineers of wearable devices and tactical vests can simplify their designs and connectivity solutions with the right connectors and cable assemblies, which can optimize soldier productivity at every step of the decision cycle – observing, orienting, deciding, and acting. Plug-and-go connectors that have 360º mating capabilities have been specially engineered to optimize cable and power management.

The panel plug can be directly integrated into the housing of wearables such as sensors, bodycams, LEDs, infrared beacons, flash drives, etc. Such wearables can quickly be mated to a ready-to-use cabled receptacle with a quick-detach system. MES Notes

¹ “The Army Strategy” www.army.mil/e2/downloads/rv7/the_army_strategy_2018.pdf ² U.S. Army Devcom Broad Agency Announcement, March 2020.

Jack Midgley is Global Defense Market Leader for Fischer Connectors (www.fischerconnectors.com). Jack was Managing Director in Deloitte’s Asia-Pacific Defense Practice and served in Afghanistan as a civilian advisor to COMISAF. Jack earned a Ph.D. in political science at MIT and a bachelor’s degree from West Point. Active duty included command of Troop I, Third Armored Cavalry Regiment.

Fischer Connectors www.fischerconnectors.com

Accelerating tactical decision-making cycles ...

... presents new challenges ...

... with new solutions

OBSERVE

Integrate multisource sensors for real-time data capture

Easy connections for multiple soldier-worn devices

ORIENT

Present data in soldier-usable formats for fast analysis

Tactical hubs and connected vests integrate data and power between EUD and other body-worn devices

DECIDE

Connect soldiers, units, and leaders reliably across the chain of command

Data and power connectors and cable assemblies deliver reliable connections in harsh environments

ACT

Move and communicate with confidence

360° connectivity and direct routing of cables minimize snag hazards, reduce weight and enhance mobility

Figure 1 | The OODA [observing, orienting, deciding, acting] cycle. www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

39

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Spectrum-management challenges

SDRs: Solving problems in spectrum management

By Victor Wolleson As wireless technology has gradually become cheaper, its use among the general public has grown. As a result, the amount of signals operating in the radio band increases, causing congestion. Interference can occur due to internal, external, and malicious sources; internal interference is unintentional and caused by an organization’s own devices, while external interference – cochannel or crosstalk, spurious signals, or natural occurrences like solar flares – is out of the organization’s control. The danger from interference arises when the radio-frequency (RF) operations – especially government-regulated bands allocated for defense-related, mission-critical, life-critical, and emergency services – are too full to handle the signals.

The solution: Software-defined radios (SDRs), which are capable of enforcing spectrum policy and removing interference from the allocated frequency bands by incorporating a number of suitable strategies.

Radio-frequency (RF) bands used for national defense purposes – bands allocated for the operation of cell towers, airtraffic control/aviation surveillance radio communication towers, GPS/GNSS satellite communications, and radar – are classified as mission-critical bandwidths.

Examples of life-critical bands include emergency position-indicating radio beacons (EPIRBs) and COSPAS-SARSAT (an international satellite-aided search-andrescue initiative) operating at 406 MHz.

40 October 2021

Frequency bands allocated for NATO and civilian military aircraft, which operate at 121.5 MHz and 243.0 MHz respectively, are emergency frequencies monitored by airtraffic control. The maritime distress frequency band is another life-critical band, which operates at 2182 kHz and is monitored by coast guards. Emergency service bands include frequency bands allocated for police, emergency medical services such as ambulances, and fire services, all of which must be clear of adjacent or cross-channel interference to ensure public safety.

Governments worldwide are responsible for licensing parts of the RF spectrum, ranging from 9 kHz to 300 GHz, and are tasked with ensuring the compliance of relevant organizations and their devices operating on these government-allocated frequency bands. The demand for using government regulated bands of the radio

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | Different types of malicious/illegal RF devices.

the U.S.) and cellphones in prohibited areas are also often used in illegal operations, particularly in restricted areas such as prisons, military facilities, government buildings, and airports.

spectrum is evident from the “spectrum auction” model, where governments sell rights for operation in a certain band.

Moreover, the concept of spectrum sharing has recently been introduced to optimize the use of the overcrowded radio spectrum and to address the limitations in the wireless frequency bands.

Contested, congested radio spectrum Not only is there an increased use of legal wireless applications in the RF band, but more and more illegal technologies are popping up to jam the frequency spectrum. For example, devices such as smart cards or AVR SD cards are used with satellite dishes to unlawfully intercept digital satellite television broadcast signals. Often these devices create leakage of radio transmission signals, which may interfere with the frequency channels allocated for police or search-and-rescue operations, causing traffic issues. Other examples of illegal devices may include GPS jammers used in company vehicles or cellphone jamming devices. (Figure 1.)

Contraband wireless devices like RF jammers (against the law in countries including www.militaryembedded.com

Occurrences of malicious interference can include meaconing, which is when a system receives radio beacon signals and rebroadcasts them on the same frequency at a higher power than the original signal, often to confuse navigation intentionally. Such tactics can be used in hostile territories or enemy airspace.

On the other hand, service interruptions may occur due to internal interference when an organization updates physical infrastructure on its network. Adding an antenna to a cell tower and relocating a receiver are some examples of these types of updates that could cause problems.

Detailing all of these issues is to say: A mechanism capable of monitoring and managing the congested spectrum is essential to ensuring minimal interference, including that from unintentional, external, and malicious sources.

SDRs: Providing spectrum-management solutions Software-defined radio (SDR) replaces a conventional radio communication system that has components implemented in hardware. SDR can be defined as an embedded system comprised of mixers, filters, amplifiers, modulators, demodulators, and other digital signal processing (DSP) implemented in software. These solutions have gained momentum with their ability to operate in compliance with a diverse range of mobile communication standards.

An SDR’s radio front end (RFE) has independent channels and adjustable bandwidths to facilitate dynamic capturing and processing of the spectrum monitoring.

Having a wide bandwidth enables spectrum sweeping to find the offending carrier frequency that causes interference or jamming, even when the carrier frequency is unknown. Continuous monitoring of the RF spectrum in mission-critical areas such as airports and military facilities is essential to ensure that safety protocols are upheld.

SDRs can intercept illegal or unwanted signals – particularly those generated by contraband cellphones in prisons – and cellphone jammers, GPS jammers, and other illegal devices in airports, which can cause electromagnetic interference (EMI). Additionally,

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

41

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Spectrum-management challenges

SDRs facilitate recording, playback, and further analysis of the interfering or jamming signals and can perform tasks including recording RF signal data to test new services like upgrades in cell towers for 5G networks.

The use of multiple-input/multiple-output (MIMO) technology facilitates interoperability device testing (IODT), geolocation, and mapping with software. Due to its multiple channels, MIMO SDR enables more accurate geolocation and a higher probability of interception, and also enabling configuration of certain channels for wideband capture to identify a signal of interest, while the other channels can be optimized for SNR at a narrow band for further analysis.

SDRs are capable of enforcing spectrum policy and removing EMI signals from the allocated frequency bands by incorporating suitable strategies, which involve the SDR communicating with a distributed spectrum-monitoring or radio-location system. The techniques of Angle of Arrival (AOA) and Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) are then used to find sources of interfering signals. The SDR takes advantage of the very wide tuning range and the user-adjustable bandwidth of the RFE to detect the signals or frequency bands of interest. SDRs with high throughput supported by wideband connections and FPGAs facilitate seamless high-throughput data capturing, recording, and storage in real time. Additionally, as SDRs can be configured remotely, multiple SDRs can be monitored from a single monitoring center (for example, monitoring a cellphone network). (Figure 2.)

With the continued growth of wireless technologies, particularly in the fields of mobile data communication and Internet of Things (IoT), only a limited portion of the radio spectrum is available for future expansions. This scenario encourages shared spectrum-related

policies, where frequency bands are used for one service when the other services are not in use. Policy models specify the number of access tiers (incumbent and shared users), access guarantees (location and times), and terms (i.e., transmitter power level and coverage). SDRs can play a fundamental role in developing and monitoring what otherwise could be chaotic spectrum-sharing policies by use of cognitive radio platforms, as well as smart antenna technologies and various DSP techniques.

Why use SDRs for spectrum management?

An SDR is a low-cost and flexible solution that enables efficient use of network and spectral resources, which becomes increasingly critical as more wireless technologies and supporting infrastructure – like cell towers and satellite ground stations – come online and spectrumsharing becomes more commonplace.

Use of SDRs will ensure regulatory compliance of frequency bands allocated for

AS 9100D / ISO 9001:2015 CERTIFIED

PHALANX II: THE ULTIMATE NAS

THE

Supports AES-256 and FIPS140-2 encryption

The McHale Report, by mil-embedded.com Editorial Director John McHale, covers technology and procurement trends in the defense electronics community.

Utilizing two removable SSDs, the Phalanx II is a rugged Small Form Factor (SSF) Network Attached Storage (NAS) file server designed for manned and unmanned airborne, undersea and ground mobile applications. w w w . p h e n x i n t . c o m

ARCHIVED MCHALE REPORTS AVAILABLE AT:

https://militaryembedded.com/newsletters/the-mchale-report

42 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

PHX_OSP_3.375_4.875.indd 1

www.militaryembedded.com 1/22/18 11:36 AM

A42_MES_1-3V_2-125x10.qxp_Layout 1 8/30/21

Transformers and Inductors

CO

...think PI

small!

think... low profile from

Figure 2 | Applications of the radio spectrum and the frequency allocation.

Over 5000 Std. Ultra Miniature

.18"

ht.

Surface Mount (and Plug-In) Models

Figure 3 | Universal SDR transceiver.

mission-critical, life-critical, and emergency services. Moreover, they will ensure that the communication devices don’t interfere with these services.

SDRs have several independent RF channels (MIMO), higher bandwidths, FPGA/DSP capabilities, high lossless data throughput for storing/playback used in geolocation, rack-mounted COTS [commercial off-the-shelf] product tech, and the ability to be controlled remotely. Moreover, SDRs are updatable and upgradeable simply by software, and can be easily configured. These factors make SDRs the right tool to manage and monitor the all-important radio spectrum. (Figure 3.)

An example of such a wideband SDR is the Cyan, which enables as many as 16 independent chains with the option of up to four DSP channels per chain. Moreover, it enables adjustable RF bandwidths up to 1 GHz; benchmarking the highest instantaneous-stare bandwidth available on the market. The digital back end contains field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) with on-chip processors, enabling real-time analysis and streaming of data, where the data is sent over a qSFP+ port at a high data rate. Cyan is capable of 4 x 40 Gbps qSFP+ backhaul in the data communication between the radio platform and other equipment. MES Victor Wollesen is the CEO and cofounder of Toronto-based software-defined radio company Per Vices Corp. Victor has an honors degree in physics with a specialization in astrophysics from the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. He has coauthored several peer-reviewed papers on SDR technology, one of which was presented at IEEE’s Radar Conference in 2020. Victor is a member of the Canadian Armed Forces; in his free time he enjoys putting his recreational pilot’s license to use.

Audio / 400Hz / Pulse Multiplex Data Bus / DC-DC Converter Transformers / Power & EMI Inductors ed ia te ly al o g im m ’s fu ll C at s .c o m ic S ee P ic o n o c tr

w w w .p ic

o e le

PICO units manufactured and tested to MIL-PRF-27 requirements. QPL units are available. Delivery stock to one week for sample quantities.

VISIT OUR EXCITING NEW WEBSITE

www.picoelectronics.com Featuring our easy-to-use product Search Wizard!

PICO Electronics Inc. 143 Sparks Ave, Pelham, NY 10803

Call Toll Free: 800-431-1064 E Mail: Info@picoelectronics.com FAX: 914-738-8225

MILITARY • COTS • INDUSTRIAL TRANSFORMERS & INDUCTORS

Per Vices Corp. • www.pervices.com www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

43

EDITOR’S CHOICE PRODUCTS

VBS4 software release enables more realistic military training VBS4 from Bohemia Interactive Simulations (BIS) is a whole-earth virtual and constructive simulation that also functions as a simulation host. VBS4 21.1 introduces powerful performance improvements and extremely realistic environmental scenes for more immersive training environments anywhere in the world. These enhancements include an upgrade to NVIDIA’s PhysX 4 as VBS4’s new physics engine; new workflows offering greater flexibility in setting up network architectures; access to high-fidelity Microsoft Bing Maps global satellite imagery directly through the VBS4 launcher; better environmental visuals; and dozens of interactive 3D models of vehicles, characters, and equipment representing militaries and cultures from around the world.

The update to NVIDIA’s PhysX 4.0 in VBS4 is intended to bring a better driving experience and improved performance in larger-scale scenarios. With enhanced built-in wheel, tire, and track simulation, VBS4 using PhysX 4.0 now enables users to simulate different tire types. In addition, the VBS4 gearbox simulation has also been updated to behave more reliably and realistically. VBS4 users will also notice a new training tab alongside the battlespaces tab in 21.1, which is an option for a single-player battlespace. Users can now download the new software release, VBS4 21.1, via the BISim Customer Portal.

Bohemia Interactive Simulations | www.bisimulations.com

Atrenne Computing Solutions releases Gen-4/5 OpenVPX backplanes Atrenne Computing Solutions announced a new series of Gen-4/5 OpenVPX backplanes, part of Atrenne’s product family that is designed to enable end-to-end solutions for 64/100 Gigabit systems. The company offers a range of standard and custom highperformance backplanes, including 3U, 6U, and hybrid 3U/6U models. Atrenne’s Gen-4/5 OpenVPX backplanes are designed to the signal-integrity requirements of PCIe Gen4 and 100 GbE (100GBASE-KR4) and offer high signal integrity (SI). The tool uses full three-dimensional electron microscopy (3D EM) field modeling to develop accurate SI models, with the result that areas such as return loss, dielectric loss, skin effect loss, and crosstalk have been stabilized in the backplane design.

Atrenne officials say that the company’s internal testing and modeling research has helped achieve Gen-4/5, 16/25s Gbaud signaling in OpenVPX systems. Atrenne’s Gen-4/5 OpenVPX systems operate on high-performance VITA 46.30 MULTIGIG RT 3 connectors; multiple backplane profiles are available, including pass-through backplanes. The company also will design applicationspecific configurations to meet individual and custom requirements.

Atrenne Computing Solutions | www.atrenne.com

Sidekiq NV100 embeddable software-defined radio offers extended RF tuning Epiq Solutions has introduced Sidekiq NV100, a small software-defined radio (SDR) transceiver module that is intended to enable simultaneous, multichannel signal processing in challenging radio-frequency (RF) environments. Sidekiq NV100 is Epiq Solutions’ first SDR product to leverage the Analog Devices ADRV9004 wideband transceiver RFIC, leading to a module that delivers extended RF tuning capabilities as well as high RF fidelity and instantaneous dynamic range, the company says. Multiple RF operating modes are supported, including single-channel 1 receive (Rx) + 1 transmit (Tx) FDD/TDD, dual-channel phase coherent Rx or Tx, and dual-channel independently tunable Rx or Tx. Rx preselect filtering is configured by Epiq Solutions’ API. Sidekiq NV100 integrates onboard Rx preselect filters and a GPS disciplined oscillator (GPSDO) into its small form factor, providing enhanced performance and allowing customers to either save space and reduce the product size or free up space to accommodate other technology needs. With an M.2 2280 Key M form factor measuring just 22 mm by 80 mm, Sidekiq NV100 is designed to be used in any small compute platform such as a laptop or tablet, aiming it squarely at on-thego electronic warfare (EW); signal intelligence (SIGINT); and command, control, communication, computers, cyber, intelligence, and reconnaissance (C5ISR) applications.

Epiq Solutions | www.epiqsolutions.com 44 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

EDITOR’S CHOICE PRODUCTS

DisplayPort 2.0 software options announced for Teledyne LeCroy oscilloscopes Teledyne LeCroy DisplayPort 2.0 adds new capabilities to its traditional displays, as users look for higher resolution for military-focused virtual reality and PC displays – up to 16,000 pixels (16K) – and ever-faster refresh rates that demand faster data transfer from the computer processing unit (CPU) to the display. In response to these requirements, Teledyne LeCroy has leveraged its experience in DisplayPort testing with its new QualiPHY DisplayPort 2.0 source and sink compliance and DisplayPort AUX decode, measure, and eye diagram (DME) oscilloscope software options, building on the company’s recently announced DisplayPort 2.0 Link Layer compliance test solution The company says that QPHY-DP20-SOURCE provides DisplayPort 2.0 Source (transmitter) compliance tests for UHBR10 (10 Gb/sec), UHBR13.5 (13.5 Gb/sec), and UHBR20 (20 Gb/sec) data rates. Additionally, QPHY-DP20-SINK is used in conjunction with the Anritsu MP1900A stressed signal generator for automated sink (receiver) test calibration and testing at the quoted rates. Moreover, the DPAUX DME (decode/measure & graph/eye) aims to provide DME for DisplayPort AUX channel – a low-speed sideband signal operating at 2 Mb/sec. Teledyne LeCroy says that QPHY-DP20-SOURCE and QPHY-DP20-SINK will be available with QualiPHY version 9.7.

Teledyne LeCroy | www.teledynelecroy.com

Point of load converter added to VPT’s space product line VPT, a HEICO company, has announced the availability of its SVRPL Series of spacequalified point of load DC-DC converters. Covering an input voltage range of 3.1 to 5.5 V and available in 6A output surface-mount options, the SVRPL products are designed specifically for space applications facing harsh radiation environments while requiring low voltages and tight regulation for high-performance processors.

The SVRPL3R306SG is based on the Intersil ISL70001ASEH radiation-hardened monolithic buck regulator and is designed to operate from a nominal 3.3 V or 5 V bus. The SVRPL3R306SG supplies low voltages at 6A with high efficiency, which makes it able to supply point-of-load applications such as high-performance space processors.

VPT’s specs detail the converter’s high efficiency, tight regulation, low output ripple, fast load transient response, and singleevent transient (SET) performance. The part is also specifically designed to meet the rigorous requirements of the latest revision of MIL-PRF-38534 Class K. The series is characterized for total ionizing dose (TID) performance – including enhanced low dose rate sensitivity (ELDRS) and for single-event effects (SEE) –is operable over the full military temperature range with no power derating, and has been submitted for qualification to MIL-PRF-38534 Class H and Class K plus Radiation Hardness Assurance (RHA) Level R.

VPT | www.vptpower.com

Conduction-cooled chassis from LCR Embedded Systems designed to enhance heat-dissipation capability LCR Embedded Systems has released two new conduction-cooled chassis designed for high-speed VPX systems. The AoC3U-400 Series of chassis use leading-edge technology to manage high-heat dissipating board payloads. According to the company, this emerging family of ATR chassis is designed to maintain safe operating temperatures for high-power 3U VPX and SOSA aligned, module-based systems. Each chassis combines forced air with conduction cooling to significantly increase aggregate heat dissipation capacity by up to 100% versus straight passive-conduction solutions while leveraging readily available VITA 48.2 plug-in modules.

The 410 model features four payload slots, plus one VITA 62 PSU slot, while the 412 model adds dual removable solid-state drive (SSD) bays. Each unit includes custom backplane, front I/O board, and applicable connector sets. Backplane data flow profiles provide for VPX and [Sensor Open Systems Architecture] SOSA aligned module usage, while I/O board designs support high-speed copper, optical, or radio frequency (RF) signals with a range of MIL-STD connector options. Optional VITA 62 power supplies provide up to 700 W of power. The 400 Series chassis are both designed to meet MIL-STD-810, MIL-STD-461, and MIL-STD-901D testing methods, featuring a rugged bolt-together construction fabricated out of machined aluminum alloy 6061-T6.

LCR Embedded Systems | www.lcrembeddedsystems.com www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS October 2021

45

www.militaryembedded.com

CONNECTING WITH MIL EMBEDDED

By Editorial Staff

GIVING BACK | PODCAST | WHITE PAPER | BLOG | VIDEO | SOCIAL MEDIA | WEBCAST GIVING BACK

Military Warriors Support Foundation

Each issue, the editorial staff of Military Embedded Systems will highlight a different charitable organization that benefits the military, veterans, and their families. We are honored to cover the technology that protects those who protect us every day.

This issue we are highlighting the Military Warriors Support Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit charity that was founded in 2007 by retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Leroy Sisco. After spending 42 years in the military, Sisco saw the need to help large numbers of veterans exiting the military who needed transitional programs to help them reintegrate back into civilian life.

The programs focus mainly on housing and homeownership, recreational activities, transportation assistance, and leadership development for combat-wounded vets, Gold Star spouses, and their families in all 50 states.

One of the organization’s programs is Homes 4 Wounded Heroes/Homes 4 Gold Stars, which awards mortgage-free homes to wounded veterans and spouses whose loved one was killed in action. Recipients also are entitled to three years of family and financial mentoring. In a similar vein, the Transportation 4 Heroes program awards payment-free vehicles to wounded vets or surviving spouses who need transport. Through these programs, the foundation has given nearly 900 mortgage-free homes and more than 100 payment-free vehicles to those who need them.

A newer program for the organization is HOPE4Heroes, which enables female veterans to pursue higher education or vocational training while sharing a living environment with peers. Mentors work with the veterans to develop budgets, set up savings goals, and explore new opportunities while setting goals for the veterans’ lifelong success.

The Military Warriors Support Foundation has garnered an unusual 100% “Encompass” score from Charity Navigator, attesting to good practices for its finances and accountability. For additional information on the foundation, visit https://militarywarriors.org/.

WEBCAST

WHITE PAPER

Deploying the SOSA Technical Standard: Benefits & Challenges Sponsored by Annapolis Micro Systems, Mercury Systems, and Pixus Technologies The Open Group’s Sensor Open System Architecture (SOSA) Consortium and its Tri-Service leadership (Air Force, Army, and Navy) and industry members were all involved in developing the recently released SOSA Technical Standard that will be a requirement for future electronic warfare (EW), radar, signals intelligence, ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance], and other sensor systems.

The joint effort is intended to reduce overall development and deployment costs while enabling faster deployment of sensor technology to the warfighter. This webcast features industry experts discussing the challenges involved in deploying SOSA conformant hardware and software technology to the warfighter and will detail the benefits of using these technologies, such as faster delivery of new capabilities, shorter equipment downtimes, lower long-term life cycle costs, and more.

Register for this webcast: https://bit.ly/3mOQQ9V Register for more webcasts: https://militaryembedded.com/webcasts

46 October 2021

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Achieving Data Interoperability for Modern Military Forces

By Christian McMahon, Director of Design Engineering, Benchmark Secure Technology Data interoperability (DI), the successful exchange of data between systems, is critical for modern military systems because without it, actionable information derived from the data cannot be shared among systems and troops, or the shared data may be misinterpreted. Fortunately, standardization of electronic systems actually enables DI; moreover, the adoption of open standards makes DI possible at different network communications layers, such as physical and data layers. The use of open standards and a modular system architecture enable secure and reliable DI with many benefits for modern military systems users.

In this white paper, the expectations of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) for DI are laid out, and the ways in which defense contractors meet those requirements are detailed. Also examined: the meaning of DI in modern systems and its relationship to information interoperability.

Read this white paper: https://bit.ly/2X90kUR Read more white papers: https://militaryembedded.com/whitepapers

www.militaryembedded.com

NAVIGATE ...

THROUGH ALL PARTS OF THE DESIGN PROCESS

TECHNOLOGY, TRENDS, AND PRODUCTS DRIVING THE DESIGN PROCESS Military Embedded Systems focuses on embedded electronics – hardware and software – for military applications through technical coverage of all parts of the design process. The website, Resource Guide, e-mags, newsletters, podcasts, webcasts, and print editions provide insight on embedded tools and strategies including technology insertion, obsolescence management, standards adoption, and many other military-specific technical subjects.

Coverage areas include the latest innovative products, technology, and market trends driving military embedded applications such as radar, electronic warfare, unmanned systems, cybersecurity, AI and machine learning, avionics, and more. Each issue is full of the information readers need to stay connected to the pulse of embedded militaryembedded.com technology in the military and aerospace industries.

The Next Big Thing in

RFSoC

Now Available with

is Here.

Gen 3 RFSoC!

(And it’s only 2.5 inches wide!)

Small

Powerful Deployable

Pentek’s Model 6001 Gen 1 and 6003 Gen 3 RFSoC QuartzXM® modules let you quickly develop and deploy RFSoC technology, while optimizing your system for SWaP. Mounted on your custom carrier or Pentek’s proven 3U VPX, SOSA Aligned 3U VPX, PCIe and SFF platforms, both QuartzXM modules come pre-loaded with a full suite of IP modules, robust software, and fully integrated hardware — all geared to shorten time to market and reduce design risk.

SFF enclosure

PCIe

And at only 4"x2.5", it can be deployed in extremely compact environments, including aircraft pods, unmanned vehicles, mast-mounted radars and more.

QuartzXM

• QuartzXM eXpress Module speeds migration to custom form factors • Powerful Zynq® Ultrascale+™ RFSoC with built-in wideband A/Ds, D/As and ARM processors • Dual 100 GigE interfaces for extreme system connectivity

3U VPX RFSoC Gen 3 Product Family

• Robust Factory-Installed IP for synchronous real-time data acquisition, waveform generation and more • Board Resources include PCIe Gen.3 x8 and 16 GB DDR4 SDRAM • Navigator® Design Suite BSP and FPGA design kit for seamless integration with Xilinx Vivado®

Unleash the Power of the RFSoC. Download the FREE White Paper! www.pentek.com/go/mesrfsoc

All this plus FREE lifetime applications support!

Pentek, Inc., One Park Way, Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458 Phone: 201-818-5900 • Fax: 201-818-5904 • email: info@pentek.com • www.pentek.com Worldwide Distribution & Support, Copyright © 2021 Pentek, Inc. Pentek, Quartz, QuartzXM and Navigator are trademarks of Pentek, Inc. Other trademarks are properties of their respective owners.

™