Perceptual reasoning in adaptive fusion processing

摘要

The author previously published a unified perceptual reasoning system framework for adaptive sensor fusion and situation assessment. This framework is re-examined to highlight the role of human perceptual reasoning and to establish the relationship between human perceptual reasoning and the Joint Director of Laboratories (JDL) fusion levels. Mappings between the fusion levels and the elements of perceptual reasoning are defined. Methods to populate the knowledge bases associated with each component of the perceptual reasoning system are highlighted. The concept and application of perception, the resultant system architecture and its candidate renditions using distributed interacting software agents (ISA) are discussed. The perceptual reasoning system is shown to be a natural governing mechanism for extracting, associating and fusing information from multiple sources while adaptively controlling the "fusion level" processes for optimum fusion performance. The unified modular system construct is shown to provide a formal framework to accommodate various implementation alternatives. The application of this architectural concept is illustrated for distributed fusion systems architectures and is used to illustrate the benefits of the adaptive perceptual reasoning system concept.