A Methodology For Impact Evaluation Of Technology Infusion On The Capability Of Weapon System Of Systems

Modern high-tech war is combat between the weapon system-of-systems (SoS). The results of the combat depend on the combat capability of all weapons and equipment, and the overall combat capabilities depend on the interaction of multiple systems, rather than individual attributes of a weapon or equipment. Influenced by changes of the form of wars, the development of weapon and equipment has shifted from emphasis on single weapon system combat capability platform to emphasize the overall combat capability of the weapon SoS. Pay attention only on the development of more advanced technology and equipment in the past, rather than focus on the interoperability between the weapons, much less attention to the construction of a weapon system would be difficult to adapt the new requirements of high-tech war. One of the impetuses of the upgrade of military equipment is continuous infusion of new technologies. Therefore, quantitative evalution of technology infusion impact on weapon system-of-systems has an important practical significance.In this work, a methodology for quantitative evalution of technology infusion impact on weapon SoS is defined, which studied influences of technologies applied to the weapons and equipment systems, on the combat capabilities of weapon SoS. The methodology can make the transformation from technology to the weapon combat capability more scientific and reasonable. The research work includes:Firslty, an assessment framework for technology evaluation focusing on the combat capabilities of weapon SoS is presented. Based on Data Farming method, the proposed assessment framework solves the problem of technology evaluation of weapon SoS in two aspects: firstly, for the assessment of technology with large number of test factors which have complex interrelationships, the experimental design is used for the planning of the simulation test; secondly, a"multi-agent simulation modeling + multi-level modeling"approach is proposed for the mapping from the technology space to the technical indicators, system capabilities and the capabilities of weapon SoS.Secondly, a modified ESE-based multi-objective optimization algorithm for Latin Hypercube experimental design is proposed. Traditional Design of Experiment (DOE) methods optimize the best design by single optimization criterion. Through simulation test, the traditional DOE methods by single optimization criterion can not guarantee the optimized experiment design. So the design method of multi-objective test is proposed. The modified ESE algorithm is proposed for solving the problem of slow optimization speed of earlier proposed optimal experimental design algorithm, and algorithms reducing the computational complexity of optimization criterions are proposed. Examples illustrate that the proposed algorithm is superior to existing methods of experimental design. Thirdly, Gaussian process modeling method is studied, and hyperparameter optimization of Gaussian Process surrogate-modeling based on the Estimation Distribution Algorithms (EDAs) is proposed. Theoretically proved the Response Surface Method can not suit to surrogate modeling with large number factors which have complex interrelationships.. Many popular surrogate models are quuivalent to particular Gaussian Process. Optimization of the hyper-parameters in GP surrogate modeling based on EDAs is proposed, which can solve the problem of local search algorithms. Through function tests, the GP surrogate modeling is superior to the traditional Response Surface Model, Artificial Neural Network, Radial Basis Function and Kriging surrogate model.Fourthly, the method for analysis the impact of technology infusion on system capability is proposed. In the technology evaluation, inter-hiearchy modeling from technology space to system capability is required. Traditional evaluation based on simulation will face a huge amount of simulation computation problems. With application of DOE method, the mapping relationship for technology space to system capability is established through simulation and surrogate modeling. In analyzing the uncertainty of technology capacity, a method considering the uncertainty of the technology capacity is proposed. Finally, focused on the capability of system, technology selection based on EDAs is proposed.Fifthly, a method for evaluating the impact of technology infusion on the system of systems is proposed, which is based on multi-Agent modeling and Data Farming method. In the evaluation, infused technology will influce large number of technical indicators. To solve the problem, the DOE and GP surrogate model in inter-hiearchy modeling is applied. An air-to-ground weapon and equipment SOS example based on NetLogo multi-agent simulation platform demonstrates the applicability of the proposed method.