New windows of opportunities are enabling people to work in challenging environments thanks to the latest developments in robotics, sensors, and remote communication over the last decades. As for defense and security, significant steps are necessary to remove the need for people to be present in hazardous locations and conditions. In order to pave the way for innovative solutions in these particular fields, the UK's Ministry of Defence has launched a competition to explore opportunities and areas for employing telexistence in the UK's security and defense sectors.

Telexistence is defined as a means that allows experts to transfer their knowledge to a remote location, which increases the speed of performance. Such technologies are used to maintain people's safety and protect them from the risks of hazardous activities, such as explosive ordinance disposal (EOD), Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear (CBRN), space exploration, firefighting, etc. Telexistence technologies are the reason behind these achievements for they provide a system that allows users to operate in environments without physically being there. This is made possible through a remotely operated, real-time avatar, which relies on the following:

Telepresence: a visual and auditory solution that gives the operator the feeling of being in a remote environment. Although the use of virtual communication through sound and video effects is common in the commercial sector, it does not allow users to interact with a remote environment as if they were physically present there.

Haptic feedback: a solution based on immersive technologies that transmit sensory information from the remote environment to the user.

Robotics: controlled solutions that enable the operator to interact with the remote environment.

The competition evaluates the submitted proposals according to three challenge areas and encourages those that combine two or more fields.

The competition seeks to achieve the following four goals:

• Identifying technological opportunities and potential applications for telexistence abilities in defense and security.
• Exposing gaps in technologies to provide the information needed to make decisions about future investments for the UK's Ministry of Defence.
• Raising awareness of defense and security sector needs within the technological industries and academia.
• Informing defense and security stakeholders of the opportunities that these technologies offer.

To achieve these goals, phase 1 will support the development and display of the telexistence elements (or the entire system if complete). Phase 2 will support the integration of these elements and the development and display of the telexistence system, which is capable of addressing future use cases in the defense and security sectors. 

Defense and security stakeholders and experts evaluate proposals according to the submitted opportunities to review their capabilities and adopt a new system that serves defense and security. Subsequently, the Ministry will invite qualified applicants to present their solutions during a designated event in May 2021 to showcase these technologies.

During the prospective phase 2 of the competition, service providers will be required to integrate technologies to address the three challenge areas and design an integrated telexistence solution, while collaboration between suppliers is preferred in other challenge areas. Solutions qualified for phase 2 will require a physical demonstration against a pre-determined test scenario related to defense and security risks.

The competition is part of the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA), a cross-government team of 50 people with diverse expertise, including defense, security, private sector, and academic. DASA is located at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory in Porton Down and owns a center at Imperial College, White City, London. DASA works with eleven national innovation partners at the local level, in addition to offices in Harwell and Cranfield universities. DASA's main objective is to find and fund innovative, viable solutions to quickly and effectively support the defense and security sectors, which in turn support the prosperity of the United Kingdom. DASA's vision focuses on enabling the United Kingdom to stay ahead in the race in the fields of defense and security all over the world.

The Secretary of State for Defence launched DASA in December 2016. Through the competition organized by DASA, €500,000 will be provided to finance the proposals of phase 1, while projects must be completed by May 31, 2021, and presented in an event held in the United Kingdom.

Resources:

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/defence-and-security-accelerator/about