ATM Excellent science and outreach for connected and automated ATM

Topic description

ExpectedOutcome:

Project results are expected to contribute to the following expected outcomes:

• Environment: the proposed solutions should have no negative impact on the environment (i.e. in terms of emissions, noise and/or local air quality) or on the potential improvement of the aviation environmental footprint;
• Capacity: the proposed solutions are expected to contribute to capacity by improving runway throughput and ground operations, as well as the use of medium/high/very high density en-route/TMA airspace;
• Cost-efficiency: the proposed solutions are expected to justify the investment costs related to the adoption of automated technologies and tools;
• Safety: the proposed solutions are expected to maintain at least the same level of safety as the current ATM system, in a more connected and automated environment;
• Security: The proposed solutions are expected to identify and mitigate the potential security risks deriving from having a more interconnected and automated ATM system.

The future ATM environment foreseen by the Digital European Sky vision will be increasingly complex, integrating new airspace users’ needs, new airspace vehicles with different performances than conventional aircraft e.g., different speeds and altitudes, etc. The challenge is to propose and develop innovative or unconventional ideas to increase the level of automation (i.e., level 4 (high automation) and level 5 (full automation)) and digitalization in Europe’s ATM and design a future ATM infrastructure that would help reducing rigidities in the ATM system and making it even safer than today’s while improving its scalability and resilience. Secure data sharing between all the components of the ATM infrastructure and the relevant non-ATM stakeholders is another cornerstone of this vision. Research proposals shall aim at leveraging and exploiting emerging digital technologies that could help transforming the sector, in support of new airspace users and design a future ATM infrastructure commensurate with the performance required by each airspace user type and environment. This includes those environments in the transition areas between Europe and neighbouring ICAO regions, which may have specific regulations and challenges.

The SESAR 3 JU has identified the following innovative research elements that could be used to meet the challenge described above and achieve the expected outcomes. The list is not intended to be prescriptive; proposals for work on research elements other than those listed below are welcome, provided they include adequate background and justification to ensure clear traceability with the R&I needs set out in the SRIA for the connected and automated ATM R&I flagship:

• Moving from magnetic to geographical bearings. This research element aims at moving from magnetic to geographical bearings. The objective is to investigate the operational aspects and potential impact on different actors e.g., airspace users, pilots, ATCOs, procedure design, aerodrome operator, etc. An estimation of the potential benefits would also be required, as well as the definition of standardization needs. Research aims also at studying what would be needed from a CNS and avionics perspective (including changes on, for example, flight management system (FMS), surveillance infrastructure, etc.) for this evolution (R&I need: enabling the deployment of a performance-based CNS service offer).
• Autonomous runway inspections and surveys. Research aims at addressing technical and operational aspects related to autonomous runway inspections and surveys (e.g., laser scans, cameras, drones, etc.) for assessing runway conditions under the EU Global Reporting Format. Research shall be complementary to and avoid duplication with on-going activities under EASA (e.g., project “Runway Micro Texture” that involves laser scans). The scope covers foreign object or debris (FOD) detection, inspection of runway (RWY) aids, etc. Research shall address the impact on the aerodrome operations e.g., performance aspects (R&I need: runway use optimisation through integrated use of arrival and departure TBS tools).
• Review separation principles at and around airports (risks analysis vs. separation standards). Research aims at reviewing the principles of minimal runway separation for both independent and dependent operations and developing potential solutions to minimise separation through automation. The research element aims at building a minimum acceptable safety model based on the probability of collision and taking account of geometry, relative speed, ground and airborne systems capabilities, adherence to a planned trajectory, etc. Research shall build on time-based separation and PBN research taking advantage of airborne navigation capabilities, surveillance capabilities, etc. and may require advanced tools based on trajectory prediction and conflict detection / conflict monitoring. The objective is to increase capacity by safely placing aircraft closer together and to make a better use of available infrastructure. Results of this research aim at moving away from pre-determined separation standards (R&I need: runway use optimisation through integrated use of arrival and departure TBS tools).
• Automated ATC in airports operations. Research aims at developing and validating operational concepts for higher levels of automation in airport operations (levels 4 and 5 as per the ATM Master Plan). The proposed solutions shall be fully consistent with human capabilities. The potential use cases include e.g., automated guidance system for ground movements, automatic ground conflict resolution, enhanced functionalities for digital towers, the application of ML techniques to help in decision making building on similar situations that happened in the past, etc. Research shall address the specific challenges that hinder the application of machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) methods to increase the level of automation in airport operations (e.g., transparency, generalisation, etc.). Research shall take into account the recommendations provided by the “expert group on the human dimension of the Single European Sky” in relation to evolving roles in environments with high levels of automation. Research aims at reviewing all the roles, responsibilities and tasks of the different actors (airborne and ground, ATM and U-space, operational and technical), as well as training needs and change management. Research shall plan a close coordination with EASA to ensure complementarity and consistency with EASA activities (e.g., on AI). Research shall take into account the output of previous exploratory research projects in this area e.g., AEON, TACO (R&I: airport automation including runway and surface movement assistance for more predictable ground operations).
• Safety, ethical and liability challenges of increased automation. Research aims at investigating the safety, ethical and liability challenges associated with increased autonomy and automation level in air traffic management (ATM). Research may address the challenges imposed by artificial intelligence (AI), AI training data and AI-human partnerships, distributed systems-of-systems and decision-making, the human-machine interface and the changing role of the human – pilots and air traffic controllers – in the system, etc. Research may investigate the concept of trusted autonomy (TA), which refers to two or more interacting and self-governed autonomous intelligent systems (including humans) where one side of the interaction is willing to delegate a task that will make it vulnerable to other parties in the interaction who are willing to accept and can autonomously perform the task. This includes the study of how the interface between these systems and their end users should be designed. The integration of distributed cryptographic systems (e.g. blockchain, ZkP, smart contracts, etc.) with autonomous systems and how they could support in decision making is also under scope (R&I need: role of the human).
• Models and theories of behaviour change. An active role for the human factor in system design will be vital to support the transition from the tactical involvement of controllers to management of traffic “by exception”. Research is needed to understand and manage the impact of system changes on human performance and workload in the long term. Readiness to change, barriers to change and likelihood of relapse should be addressed in system design, monitoring and improvement over the long term. Both models of behaviours and behavioural change theories should be investigated as diagnostic tools to explain and predict specific behaviours. Furthermore, resilience in handling abnormal situations should be addressed, in order to understand how this resilience can be maintained with reduced human involvement (R&I need: role of the human).
• ATCOs up-skilling, reskilling and de-skilling in the face of new technologies. The introduction of future new technologies and higher levels of automation may increase the space for potential and new type of errors that cannot be easily foreseen. Research aims at analysing the potential of these new technologies to disrupt established patterns in coordinated activity between ATCOs’ and between ATCOs’ and flight crews. In particular, research covers the needs for up-skilling, reskilling and/or de-skilling ATCOs in the future environment. This may imply the need of developing new mental models, how the AI system works, how it fails, why it fails, and how to adapt (R&I need: role of the human).
• Innovative ways to present traffic to ATCOs. The delivery of ATM services irrespective of physical infrastructure or geographical location implies that local operational and geographical information of a sector might not be known in advanced. Research aims at exploring innovative ways to present the traffic to the ATCOs, so that the flight representation on the screen does not necessarily imply their visualisation on the zenital view of a sector. Research may develop means to help future ATCOs bridging their lack of local knowledge and reducing training time. Technologies based on extended reality (XR) may be used in the proposed research (R&I need: role of the human).