seeing through the clouds themed competition 30 june 2016

Seeing through the clouds Centre for Defence Enterprise themed competition

UK OFFICIAL © Crown copyright 2016 Dstl

June 2016

Seeing through the clouds


June 2016

We want… • active and passive optical imaging to

see through clouds • technologies for any platform – aircraft,

ships, land vehicles, soldiers • low technology readiness (TRL 2-3)

concepts • development of techniques or hardware

components

Kandahar, Afghanistan

Annual sunshine hours • Kandahar: 3,380


June 2016

Basra, Iraq


• Basra: 3,066


June 2016

Edgbaston, UK


• Basra: 3,066

• Edgbaston: 1,395


June 2016

© The Lancashire County Cricket Club Ltd.

The future operating environment


June 2016

The future operating environment

“We are now in the foothills of the Information Age in which the combined power of exponential growth in processing power, data, and connectivity will fundamentally shape the way the world lives and works” General Sir Richard Barrons, Commander Joint Force Command, 03 December 2014


June 2016


June 2016

Why not use other sensors?


June 2016


June 2016

© Crown copyright 2016 Dstl

June 2016

Seeing through the clouds Centre for Defence Enterprise themed competition


June 2016

Uses of optical sensors

UK OFFICIAL

• airborne surveillance and targeting

• eg RAF Reaper, Tornado and Typhoon aircraft


June 2016


UK OFFICIAL

• battlefield surveillance, targeting and driver aids

• eg AJAX armoured vehicle


June 2016


UK OFFICIAL

• Naval gunnery and sensors for helicopters

• eg electro-optical director on the Type 45 Destroyer


June 2016


UK OFFICIAL

• landing helicopters in ‘brown-out’


June 2016

Technology scope

• optical (visible – LWIR, wavelengths 0.4-14µm) • active and passive • imaging – not other optical sensing technologies


June 2016

Cloud types

• water droplets: mist, fog, clouds in the sky, rain

• dust clouds: natural or man-made • ice: snow at ground level, ice clouds at

high altitude • man-made: smoke, smog


June 2016

Technology requirements

Our sensors can see some way, but we want to see further


June 2016

We want to be here


• estimates of current capability vary. Target not detectable at: – 2% transmission – or 5 attenuation lengths

• we want detection at 0.02% transmission

• what’s the target? Depends on the context


June 2016

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

90.005%

0.050%

0.500%

5.000%

50.000%

Atte

nuat

ion

leng

ths

Tran

smis

sion

We are here

We want to be here


UK OFFICIAL

We also want solutions for clouds that are so thick, we currently can’t penetrate them at all


June 2016



June 2016

Technology challenge 1: active techniques

• active techniques such as burst illumination LADAR and LIDAR provide some enhanced capability



June 2016

Technology challenge 1: active techniques

• we’re looking for a step change: – new sensor technologies, eg

single photon counting – novel approaches, eg ballistic

photons



June 2016

Technology challenge 2: passive techniques

• may be less effective than active, but more easily exploited



June 2016

Technology challenge 2: passive techniques • examples include:

- use of novel spectral or polarisation effects - advanced image processing techniques - new sensors to amplify low-contrast

images

What we want


June 2016

• active and passive optical imaging • TRL (2-3) concepts • disruptive capabilities, not incremental developments • development of practical techniques or hardware

components • you don’t have to provide a whole solution

What we don’t want • radio frequency sensors

• radiation transfer modelling

• demonstrations of off the

shelf products

• solutions that don’t offer significant benefit to defence

• incremental improvements


June 2016

We also don’t want • facilities for testing

technologies • PhD proposals • consultancy

• projects that can’t

demonstrate feasibility within the phase 1 timescale

• paper-based studies or literature reviews


June 2016

Important information

• this competition is for phase 1

– approximately 6-month duration, projects must complete before 31 March 2017

– total budget for phase 1 is up to £500,000 – projects typically between £50,000 to £80,000 - we won’t fund

projects over £100,000 UK OFFICIAL © Crown copyright 2016 Dstl

June 2016

Important information

• we aim to fund phase 2 projects – only available to the successful bidders from phase 1 – duration up to 12 months – up to £1 million total budget – fully-costed phase 2 proposals must be delivered with phase 1

results


June 2016

Exploitation


June 2016

• presentation day with other phase 1 winners in March

2017 • results of phase 1 and phase 2 projects may be shared

with other governments – US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and NATO

Important dates

• webinar 12:30pm 7 July 2016 • competition closes 5pm Thursday 1 September 2016 • proposals must be submitted using CDE’s online

submission service


June 2016

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/centre-for-defence-enterprise-submit-your-research-proposalhttps:/www.gov.uk/government/collections/centre-for-defence-enterprise-submit-your-research-proposal

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/centre-for-defence-enterprise-submit-your-research-proposalhttps:/www.gov.uk/government/collections/centre-for-defence-enterprise-submit-your-research-proposal

Important dates

• contract placement initiated and feedback provided mid-October 2016

• presentation event March 2017 • phase 1 projects to complete by 31 March 2017


June 2016



June 2016

Technical questions

[email protected]

General enquiries [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]



How will the competition work?

Innovation Network event 30 June 2016

Emma Howe

CDE Themed Competition Manager

Intellectual property Terms and conditions

Online bid submission

Assessors Assessors

Technical partners Technical partners

www.gov.uk/dstl/cde

Competition page from gov.uk

Challenge 1: active techniques

Challenge 2: passive techniques

Phase 1

Up to £500,000 Typically £40,000 to 80,000 Not more than £100,000

Proof of concept complete by 31 March 2017 Presentation day (March 2017) Phase 2 proposal

Phase 1

Phase 2

Up to £1 million available Longer research projects Up to 12 months duration

Competition dates

Webinar:

7 July 2016

Technical queries

[email protected]


Competition closes

September

1 1 September 2016 at 5pm

5

Questions