Monitoring of rapid events. Computer cameras that mimic the human brain

The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the research and development arm of the Pentagon, has announced the launch of the FENCE program for cameras and electronics that simulate nerve networks, which is designed to make computer vision cameras more efficient in simulating the way the human brain processes information, according to what has been published by New Atlas. .

Three teams of scientists, led by defense and defense giants Raytheon, BAE Systems and Northrop Grumman, were tasked with developing an infrared camera system that requires less data processing, operates faster, and uses less power. energy.

Victim of his own success

Modern cameras are developing more and more, but they have also become victims of their own success. While the latest cameras can capture high-resolution images and track objects with great precision, they do so by processing large amounts of data, which takes more time and energy.

To serve for military purposes

According to DARPA, this mode is correct or acceptable when the task is, for example, to simply follow an airplane in a clear blue sky, but if the background is cluttered with detail or subject to changing situations, like this is often the case in military operations, the imaging systems to be developed may be the ideal solution.

smarter system

The FENCE program aspires to create custom camera systems that more intelligently track fast-moving or sequentially changing events based on the use of brain simulators or neural circuits, which can dramatically reduce the amount of data to be processed by ignoring parts. irrelevant of the image. Instead of processing an entire scene, the cameras will only focus on the target event.

focal plane array

Scientists seek to create an event-based, low-latency, low-power FPA, ROIC, and processing layer that helps the ROIC identify relevant spatiotemporal signals. New digital signal processing and learning algorithms will also be needed to cope with complex and changing contexts.

1.5 watts only

The result should be that the FENCE sensor uses less than 1.5 watts of power. As the new technology targets military applications that include autonomous vehicles, robotics, and infrared research and tracking, the sensors will need to be flexible and adaptive.

Related details

“The goal is to develop a ‘smart’ sensor that can reduce the amount of information transmitted by the camera, reducing the data range to only the most relevant pixels, which are essentially the smallest elements,” explains the director. of the FENCE program, Dr. Whitney Mason individually in a dot matrix from which the image is formed, that is, it is the smallest that can be represented and its properties from the components of the image on screens with their different technologies.