Description

Future Army forces will need to conduct cross-domain maneuver (CDM) and at times, operate semi-independently, disbursed, and while communications and infrastructure such as GPS are disrupted or denied. Robotics and autonomous systems will play a key role in expanding the operational reach, situational awareness, and effectiveness of maneuver forces in CDM.

DEVCOM ARL is focused on developing fundamental understanding and informing the art-of-the-possible for warfighter concepts, through research, to greatly improve air and ground based autonomous vehicle perception, learning, reasoning, communication, navigation, and physical capabilities to augment and increase the freedom of maneuver in complex and contested environments.

The Scalable, Adaptive, and Resilient Autonomy (SARA) Collaborative Research Alliance (CRA) is focused on developing and experimentally accelerating emerging research in autonomous mobility and maneuverability, scalable heterogeneous and collaborative behaviors, and human agent teaming to realize adaptive and resilient intelligent systems that can reason about the environment, work in distributed and collaborative heterogeneous teams, and make op-tempo decisions to enable autonomous maneuver in complex and contested environments.

SARA Sprint 4 Webinar

When: Monday, April 29, 1 p.m. EDT
Where: MS Teams
Who: All interested; open to the public

Program Structure

SARA consists of a series of technology sprint topics executed in annual program cycles. Each topic will be focused on addressing a different scientific area within the scope of the broad research aims of the SARA CRA. Each topic will be carefully chosen based on both program achievements from the previous year, on scientific and technological advancements by the broader research community, and in a way to systematically converge on the specific long-term SARA goals. The SARA Cycle 1 Technology Sprint Topic is: “Off-road Autonomous Maneuver.” The SARA Cycle 2 Technology Sprint Topic is “Autonomous Complex Terrain Maneuver.” The SARA Cycle 3 Technology Sprint Topic is “Long-Duration Autonomous Maneuver.” The SARA Cycle 4 Technology Sprint Topic is “Resilient Autonomous Maneuver.”

Program Timeline

• Opportunity Released: 11 April 2024
• Opportunity Webinar: 19 April 2024
• 2nd Opportunity Webinar: 29 April 2024
• Deadline for Questions on Funding Opportunity: 3 May 2024
• Proposals Due for Cycle 4: 17 May by 5 p.m. (EDT)
• Notification to Recipients: 15 July 2024
• Cycle 4 Awards: ~ 1 November 2024

SARA Cycle 4

The SARA program will consist of a series of technology sprint topics executed in annual program cycles. Each topic will be focused on addressing a different scientific area within the scope of the broad research aims of the SARA program. Each topic will be carefully chosen based on both program achievements from the previous year, on scientific and technological advancements by the broader research community, and in a way to systematically converge on the specific long-term SARA program goals. The SARA Cycle 4 Technology Sprint Topic is “Resilient Autonomous Maneuver,” and there are two sub-topic areas of interest.

• Sub-topic #1: Collaborative behaviors in comms-denied areas. The objective is to develop techniques for enabling an autonomous platform to continuously localize, map, plan, and collaborate when communications are lost.
• Sub-topic #2: Autonomous maneuver in extreme terrain and transitions. The objective is to enable a legged platform to autonomously maneuver over multiple complex and unstructured terrain types by considering the expanded capabilities of a legged platform.