Plug and play autonomous sensors

Posted On: 18th December 2015

A jointly funded project by the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) and Innovate UK for an autonomous, modular sensor system could be a game-changer for the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and security industry. Government Opportunities

The Sensing for Asset Protection with Integrated Electronic Networked Technology (SAPIENT) project has demonstrated a modular hierarchical autonomous sensor system which could significantly reduce the operator burden involved in perimeter protection and security.

Currently most security systems, such as CCTV cameras, simply collect data and feed it to an operator who can assess the situation and make decisions for where the sensors should look next. Monitoring and interpreting lots of data can place a high cognitive burden on the operator.

In the SAPIENT system individual sensors can make low-level decisions autonomously, such as which direction to look or whether to zoom in, in order to fulfil a higher-level objective. These higher-level objectives are managed by a decision making module which controls the overall system and makes some of the decisions normally made by the operators. This significantly reduces the burden on the operator and lowers his or her need to concentrate on the output of the sensors all of the time.

Dstl and Innovate UK are now working with the industry partners on opportunities to exploit these technologies further for military and civilian security applications.

Paul Thomas, Principal Scientist, Dstl says:

“Combining the dual challenges of autonomy and modularity is no mean feat but these are key issues when it comes to multi-sensor systems. The technologies demonstrated through SAPIENT have shown that autonomous modular sensors can be developed. This is an important step forward in enabling sensors to ‘plug and play’ and allowing operators to focus on the task in hand rather than sifting through large amounts of data. This concept could have significant benefit both in the area of civil security such as the protection of infrastructure and in military systems such as for base protection.”

BiP Solutions Limited is a company registered in Scotland with Company Number SC086146 and VAT number 383030966 and having its registered office at Medius, 60 Pacific Quay, Glasgow, G51 1DZ.

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