While not its primary mission, the Department of Defense plays an important role in homeland security, particularly the US Northern Command, headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colo. Military capabilities and technology in logistics, training and communication—supported by private industry—are particularly important in homeland security missions.

Where’s that wrench?

Whether he said it or not, Napoleon was right: An army does travel on its stomach. Today, US military logistics are tracked by a network of radio frequency identification (RFID) centers. However, cargo is often nowhere near an RFID reader.

So the US Transportation Command is teaming up with Numerex Corp., Atlanta, Ga., in a test of a military-grade satellite tracker. According to Pierre Parent, vice president of Numerex Satellite Solutions, the tracking tags are designed to fit within the corrugations in oceangoing containers, allowing them to be attached without fear of damage when containers are stacked.

The devices have a satellite transponder for communication and a Global Positioning System for location, but Parent said they’re frugal when it comes to power. “If you’re reporting on the location of the device once or twice a day, you’ll probably get four or five years without having to change the battery.”

The tags can transmit additional data, if equipped with the right sensors. This could include motion, engine or generator run time, or the opening of the container.

One of the design criteria for the system is easy integration with the existing network. Consequently, the satellite tags are being set up as simply another RFID device as far as the automatic asset tracking system is concerned. That’s important since there’s an entire IT backend that currently tracks everything the military ships.

“The key is to take advantage of the infrastructure that is in place today,” said Parent.

At the boundary

Logistics tracking could be useful when the military is tasked with homeland security missions. Often, this will involve moving massive amounts of material into an affected area.

When that happens, another technology will be vital. Bruce Walker, vice president for strategic planning for homeland security at Northrop Grumman, Los Angeles, Calif., noted that a 3-inch military dressing isn’t cataloged in the same way as one from the Red Cross or a civilian agency. The same is true for the military’s meals-ready-to-eat and the civilian equivalent.

That can lead to problems when replacement supplies are needed, Walker told HSToday. “All the ordering systems don’t even recognize that what you’re asking for is the same or, in some cases, a valid replacement if you’re out.”

Thus, sophisticated backend databases have to bridge that gap. Doing so avoids the problem of having supplies in place that can’t be used because no one knows they’re there.

Similar interface challenges are found in many areas. Ironing out such issues will be done, Walker predicted, in future exercises.

The big screen

An innovation from Mersive Technologies, Lexington, Ky., could also prove useful in homeland security. Today, the company’s software is used as the next best thing to combat. This simulator allows a Humvee to be driven and weapons fired, with lifelike panoramic views. Even though there are 10 projectors involved, that’s not a problem, said Mersive CEO Randall Stevens. “What our technology lets them do is automatically through the software combine all 10 of those projectors so that they’ll act as one unified pixel palette.”

Without the software, he continued, multiple projector systems require painstaking setup. Putting in one for a domed view manually involves two people and three man-weeks. With Mersive’s technology, the process takes less than 30 minutes.

Creating a view that spans more than one display requires alignment to eliminate gaps and intensity adjustments at the overlap. Mersive takes care of these issues by intervening in the rendering. This begins with the software driving the projectors to display a known pattern. A camera records the actual image, and that provides the calibration needed to seamlessly knit everything together. The computational burden of doing this, according to Stevens, is minimal.

The combined displays are accurate to within a tenth of a pixel in camera space, making possible very demanding applications. The company, for example, has been considering using the technology for sniper simulations. “They can physically look through their scopes at these displays and train,” explained Stevens.

The technology could also be used when a wealth of information has to be displayed. One example could be a data wall of situational status, something useful in disaster response and other homeland security applications.

Securing traffic

Like others in homeland security, the military faces interoperability hurdles. Some data is classified and some isn’t, but all has to be routed securely and without delay. A recent product from Tresys Technology, Columbia, Md., solves part of the problem. Built using a combination of hardware and software, the company’s TurretGate securely routes Java-based messages from different networks.

The system runs on custom blade hardware. These have their communication backplane removed, which provides the physical separation needed for secure routing. The software is a Linux version with enhanced security features. The combination is hard to bog down, said Karl MacMillan, director of the Linux security technology practice for Tresys. “We’re able to transfer messages at a very high rate.”

An important aspect of the product is the company’s cross-domain solution blueprint. This set of tools, special configuration of Linux and body of certification evidence can help build cross-domain solutions very quickly. The time savings can be as great as a factor of three, according to MacMillan. HST