Jerry Petersen 
- BBN Technologies conducted a demonstration showcasing the ability of a system to ensure uninterrupted communications via automatic link switching
- The delivery of a self-healing communication capability was enabled by the Primary, Alternate, Contingency and Emergency for Agile Combat Employment architecture
- The automatic switching system is designed to work with various military or commercial communication links
RTX subsidiary BBN Technologies, with Air Force Research Laboratory funding, recently demonstrated a system that works to ensure uninterrupted communications for combat air support even in environments where networks are fragmented, jammed or altogether unavailable. The company said that during the demonstration, the system sustained connectivity between four geographically dispersed sites by switching to the next viable waveform when one link was jammed. The system is designed to work with a variety of military or commercial communication links.
How Does the BBN Technologies Auto-Switching System Work?
During operation, the system automatically selects and reroutes to the best available communication pathway, a capability enabled by the Primary, Alternate, Contingency and Emergency for Agile Combat Employment, or PACE4ACE, architecture.
In addition to enabling self-healing communication, PACE4ACE offers a number of capabilities like multiband support and dynamic, real-time routing. It also features a low size, weight and power architecture, and allows for plug-and-play integration.
Touting the benefits of PACE4ACE, BBN Technologies Principal Investigator Sam Nelson said, “For warfighters on the ground and in the cockpit, PACE4ACE helps ensure critical data never disappears, even under jamming.”
“The network self-heals, so crews can focus on the mission instead of troubleshooting communications,” Nelson added.
What Other Capabilities Has BBN Technologies Worked On?
The auto switching system is one of the latest capabilities unveiled by BBN Technologies. In April the company launched Maude-HCS, an open-source tool designed to help cyber defense teams model, test and validate covert communication networks. Funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the platform is designed to accelerate validation, enable open-source collaboration and help predict key performance metrics, including latency and data rate. It also helps estimate how long a covert channel can operate without detection.
The company is also working on a prototype spectrum manager meant to protect defense radars as the 3.1 to 3.45 GHz band is opened for commercial 5G use. The work, announced in February, is being carried out to support the Advanced Spectrum Coexistence Demonstration program via a contract awarded by the Department of War. The program aims to ensure military radar systems can continue operating effectively while sharing spectrum with commercial 5G networks.
