Anomaly Detection, Active Learning, Precursor Identification,and Human Knowledge for Autonomous System Safety

The project Autonomy Teaming and TRajectories for ComplexTrusted Operational Reliability (ATTRACTOR) researched and developed Artificial Intelligence with application to multi-Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) missions. Such missions, like other complex systems-of-systems, are likely to have previously-unknown, safety relevant anomalies occur due to many possible factors including system failures or degradations, emergent behavior, changes in the environment in which the systems operate, changes in the way the systems are operated. We discuss the application of anomaly detection, active learning, and precursor identification to identify such anomalies and the conditions under which they are more likely to appear. We demonstrate results on simulated multi-UAS missions that show promise to be applied to real missions.