Officials of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in Arlington, Va., will detail the Fast Lightweight Autonomy (FAA) program in a Webcast from 1 to 4:30 p.m. eastern time on 6 Jan. 2015.
The DARPA FAS program (DARPA-BAA-15-16) focuses on non-traditional perception and autonomy methods that enable new classes of minimalistic algorithms for high-speed navigation in cluttered environments. The FAS broad agency announcement should be released around the time of the industry briefings.
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With these algorithms, the program seeks to develop and demonstrate the capability for small UAVs to fly quickly through complex, cluttered environments without assistance from human operators.
The overall goal is to build wide range of next-generation unmanned systems with reduced amounts of processing power, communications, and human intervention to fly through cluttered environments. Ultimately, DARPA researchers want to develop algorithms to enable unmanned vehicles to perform reconnaissance in denied areas like protected or damaged buildings.
The FLA program focuses on autonomy algorithms and software for unmanned vehicle sensing, perception, planning, and control. Developing specific unmanned vehicles is not part of the project.
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Industry briefings will include overview presentations by government personnel, an overview presentation by the government-furnished equipment supplier, and an information session to respond to questions from participants. The proposers day Webcast is free.
Those who wish to view the Webcast must register no later than 4 p.m. eastern time on 2 Jan. 2015 online at https://www.signup4.net/public/ap.aspx?EID=DARP402E&OID=130. The FAS Website is at https://www.signup4.net/Public/ap.aspx?EID=DARP402E.
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For questions or concerns email DARPA's Mark Micire at [email protected]. Refer to the Fast Lightweight Autonomy Proposers Day (DARPA-SN-15-15) in all correspondence.
More information is online at https://www.fbo.gov/spg/ODA/DARPA/CMO/DARPA-SN-15-15/listing.html.
