Alternate routes: DARPA program could help military avoid communcation obstacles

摘要

Beneath America's multibillion-dollar push to deliver wireless Internet protocol (IP) communications to the battlefield lurks a problem that is rarely voiced outside of the military's cadre of communications experts. IP communications are vulnerable to disruption on the battlefield because they are addressed to individual recipients and require unobstructed pathways between sender and recipient. Jamming, poor weather, power outages or obstructions can cut a vital IP link. The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is looking for a way around the problem, literally. DARPA experts are testing a NASA-pioneered messaging software called Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN), which would use a more flexible addressing format to automatically route messages around disruptions using mobile relay nodes -- potentially unmanned aircraft circling overhead.