Biology-Based ISR Sensors to Be Developed
This post is also available in: 
עברית (Hebrew)
Current ISR systems are ideal for identifying and tracking entities such as aircraft and vehicles, but are less capable of identifying and tracking humans. Consequently, the US Air Force’s ISR research program is developing “technologies to enable the Air Force to identify, locate, and track humans of interest within the operational environment.”
The US Air Force Human Signatures Program is designed to “develop technologies to discover, characterize, and transition biological-based signatures (biosignatures) to enable effective human and environmental threat detection, identification and exploitation, and operator performance assessment across a variety of Air Force mission areas.”
The objective is to be able to identify, locate, and track specific individuals and groups of individuals who possess “certain characteristics of operational interest.”
“Biosignatures range from the micro-level (molecular, cellular, genomic) up to whole body physiological signatures based on anthropometric and biomechanical properties and characteristics,” the Air Force said.
For these purposes, sensors that are designed to detect and collect biosignatures will be developed, as well as analytics and information to process, analyze, fuse, and utilize biosignature data; also to be developed are end-user systems that can integrate biosignatures into a layered sensor network and provide analysis, visualization, and prediction tools in order to exploit biosignature data, according to biometricupadate.com.
The Air Force said because “the large number of sensors and sensor platforms continues to proliferate along with an exponential increase in sensor data,” human analysts are “challenged” in their ability to “turn sensor data into [useable, actionable] information.”
“Human-centered ISR research places the human component in the system at the forefront and seeks to develop technologies that enhance the performance of ISR analysts and improve the quality of their work product.”
The current scope of the Air Force’s “human-centered ISR research spans the complete range of human performance,” beginning at the individual molecular, cellular, and genomic level, and progressing to complex human-to-human and human-to-machine interactions, the Air Force said, adding, “human-centered ISR reaches across multiple domains (air, space, cyber) and has broad application to other Department of Defense organizations,” as well as the Intelligence Community.
