Our Contribution
AFWERX, a technology directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory and the innovation arm of the Department of the Air Force, seeks to innovate at a pace that matches the rapid growth of autonomy technologies through its Autonomy Prime Program. In support of the program, which provides robust, low-cost ability to rapidly evaluate, iterate, and mature emerging mission and applied autonomy technologies, the APL-developed Testing of Autonomy in Complex, Interactive Environments (TACE) system will provide a safety runtime assurance “watchdog” and Live-Virtual-Constructive (LVC) environments for Autonomy Prime testbeds. TACE intervenes to maintain safety if predefined constraints are violated and provides a ground station capability to allow an operator to monitor and manage the systems under test and the test environment. As Autonomy Prime advances, APL will continue to develop technology and capabilities to expand the runtime assurance capabilities and LVC environments into new mission sets for new vehicles.
