Science in the Army - Augmented Reality

How science is entering deep into a soldier's actual work

 Science in the Army - Augmented Reality

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• The story: In all battles, the armed forces compile tactical intelligence about their enemy, and store it on computers. But making full use of it in the heat of battle is tough. Now, a new display technology called augmented reality (AR) may change that for ever.
• AR: It is the art of superimposing computer graphics on a view of the real world. Popular in applications ranging from video games to selling furniture, America’s army now wants tactical intelligence pertinent to a soldier’s mission to pop up on a transparent visor attached to his helmet. American Army handed a deal to Microsoft to build such a system, worth billions.

1. Army calls it the IVAS or "Integrated Visual Augmentation System"
2. Microsoft calls it a holographic computer

• What IVAS does: IVAS crunches and synthesises many types of data. A GPS receiver locates the wearer within centimetres. Instruments fitted with accelerometers and gyroscopes provide information on how he is moving around. Cameras track eye movements. IVAS uses LIDAR to be aware of the soldier’s environment. An array of sensors record the time it takes infrared laser pulses bounced off nearby objects to return. That allows those objects’ distances to be calculated. Machine-vision software that recognises those objects then keeps track of how they move. So a steady 3-D vision is created.
• An old problem: IVAS must calculate speedily where on a headset’s visor to display graphics. A latency of just seven milliseconds can cause vestibular ocular discomfort, a type of dizziness that has long plagued the development of realistic displays of augmented and virtual reality.

1. Microsoft has modified an AR headset called HoloLens, sold mostly to businesses and research outfits.
2. The militarised version is “ruggedised”.
3. Tactical intelligence can be uploaded before an operation, with updates transmitted wirelessly as needed.

• Cutting edge in battlefield: AR text and graphics will guide soldiers through unfamiliar terrain, highlight the whereabouts of friendly forces and mark the enemy’s known and suspected positions. The headsets will employ facial-recognition technology (FRT) to append information on possible persons of interest who come into view. IVAS is linked with Azure, Microsoft’s computing cloud, to permit features like language interpretation. Production of the headsets, which weigh about a kilogram, has begun already.
• Other countries: Britain’s Royal Navy has paid $25.5m to BAE Systems, a local defence giant, to adapt them to show pictures currently displayed on screens on the bridge to officers elsewhere on a vessel.
• Ukraine's case: The benefits of AR may be greater inside tanks, from which crew typically peer at the world through periscopes. Limpid Armor, an AR firm in Kiev, Ukraine, is making the LPMK, which superimposes graphics on video images collected by cameras and infrared sensors mounted on an armoured vehicle. A handful of armoured vehicles belonging to Ukraine’s army have already been fitted with test versions of LPMK. Before an operation, these are fed intelligence from a battle-management system. The United Arab Emirates and an undisclosed Asian country have placed orders with Limpid, too.
• Will take time: Experts say that even the European armies most advanced in the art (those of Britain, Germany, Lithuania, the Netherlands and Norway) will need another decade to fully adopt this technology. Using AR for training, and for the maintenance and design of military hardware, is easier.
• Summary: There are problems also, as AR will make it easier for distant commanders to tell soldiers in battle what to do. The risk is that officers sitting far away from the fight will “feel like they’ve got puppets on the ground”, and will rob troops of the degree of autonomy needed to fight effectively.
• EXAM QUESTIONS: (1) Explain the pitfalls of having too much science in the real working of any Army. (2) List five technologies that were developed as a result of warfare. (3) Distinguish between augmented reality and virtual reality.

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