DARPA’s Collaborative Operations in Denied Environment (CODE) program recently demonstrated the ability of CODE-equipped UAS to adapt and respond to unexpected threats in an anti-access area denial (A2AD) environment.

During the test series at Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona, the UAS successfully completed a number of tasks, including efficiently sharing information, cooperatively planning and allocating mission objectives, making coordinated tactical decisions, and collaboratively reacting to a dynamic, high-threat environment with minimal communication.

Initially, the UAS operated with supervisory mission commander interaction, but when communications were degraded or denied, CODE vehicles retained mission plan intent so that they could achieve mission objectives without live human direction.

According to DARPA, the ability for CODE-enabled vehicles to interact when communications are degraded is a crucial step towards the goal of the program, which is to conduct “dynamic, long-distance engagements” of highly mobile ground and maritime targets in contested or denied battlespace.

“The test series expanded on previously demonstrated approaches to low bandwidth collaborative sensing and on-board planning,” says Scott Wierzbanowski, DARPA program manager for CODE. “It demonstrated the ability to operate in more challenging scenarios, where both communications and GPS navigation were denied for extended periods.”

The three-week ground and flight test series was conducted in a live/virtual/constructive (LVC) environment. During the test series, up to six live and 24 virtual UAS served as surrogate strike assets, and received mission objectives from a human mission commander. After receiving these mission objectives, the UAS autonomously worked together to navigate, search, localize, and engage both pre-planned and pop-up targets protected by a simulated Integrated Air Defense System (IADS) in communications- and GPS-denied scenarios.

“The demonstrated behaviors are the building blocks for an autonomous team that can collaborate and adjust to mission requirements and a changing environment,” Wierzbanowski says.

DARPA notes that its team has also advanced the infrastructure needed to support further development, integration, and testing of CODE as it transitions to future autonomous systems. Among the achievements were the successful demonstration of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory White Force Network capability to provide constructive threats and effects in an LVC test environment.

DARPA says that CODE’s scalable capabilities could “greatly enhance” the survivability, flexibility, and effectiveness of existing air platforms, while also cutting down on the development times and costs of future systems.

CODE and associated infrastructure will continue to undergo further development under DARPA until the end of the program, scheduled for next spring. This will be followed by the full transition of the CODE software repository to Naval Air Systems Command.