Innovative Integration Approaches

The current avionics integration approach is becoming unaffordable partly due to the schedule and cost associated with integrating an avionics system into each configuration of each platform using its native interface. The United States (U.S.) Army's Aviation and Missile Research, Development, and Engineering Center (AMRDEC) Director for Aviation Development tasked the Modular Integrated Survivability (MIS) team to work with the U.S. Army Aviation Engineering Directorate (AED), the Army's airworthiness authority, to explore innovative integration approaches to streamline the integration process while still satisfying airworthiness certification requirements. AED has been engaged since the inception of the MIS Science and Technology (S&T) program. The MIS team, along with AED, has focused on developing the concept of using capability interfaces to communicate with similar avionics systems. The capability interfaces are built by abstracting the native interfaces allowing for a single integration into the platform for an entire suite of avionics systems. To build upon the capability interface approach, the AMRDEC MIS team has aligned its approach with the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE™) Technical Standard to enable portability and reuse of the capability interfaces across platforms. The paper discusses the time and cost challenges of the current avionics integration approach. It explores the MIS integration approach of developing and utilizing capability interfaces to integrate entire avionics system suites. The paper also discusses how incorporating the FACE Reference Architecture into the approach promotes software portability and reuse to reduce integration effort. The paper concludes by discussing the synergy realized by combining the MIS capability interface approach with the software portability enabled by the FACE Technical Standard.