Notice and Invitation
Oral Defense of Doctoral Dissertation
The Volgenau School of Engineering, George Mason University

Guillermo Calderon-Meza
Bachelor in Electronic Engineering, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, 1997
Master of Science, Bolton Institute of Higher Education, 2000

AN ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTS OF NET-CENTRIC OPERATIONS USING MULTIAGENT ADAPTIVE BEHAVIOR

Thursday, March 24, 2011, 2:00 – 4:00pm
Engineering Bldg., 2901

All are invited to attend.

Committee
Lance Sherry, Chair
Robert Axtell
Kenneth De Jong
Thomas Speller, Jr.

Abstract

The National Airspace System (NAS) is a resource managed in the public good. Equity in NAS access, and use for private, commercial and government purposes is coordinated by regulations and made possible by procedures, and technology. Researchers have documented scenarios in which the introduction of new concepts-of-operations and technologies has resulted in unintended consequences, including gaming. Concerns over unintended consequences are a significant issue for modernization initiatives and have historically been a roadblock for innovation and productivity improvement in the NAS. To support the development and evaluation of Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) and Single European Air Traffic Management Research Programme (SESAR), concepts-of-operations and technologies, analysis methodologies and simulation infrastructure are required to evaluate the feasibility and estimate the NAS-wide benefits. State-of-the-art NAS-wide simulations, capable of modeling 60,000 flights per day, do not include decision-making. A few recent studies have added algorithms to these simulations to perform decision-making based on static rules that yield in deterministic outcomes.

A copy of this doctoral dissertation is on reserve at the Johnson Center Library.