Title: A process to comprehend critical system-of-systems factors: applied to wireless technology design on a navy ship

Authors: Shawn McKay; Vishal Mahulkar; Douglas Adams

Addresses: 1500 Kepner Dr. Lafayette, IN 47905, USA. ' 1500 Kepner Dr. Lafayette, IN 47905, USA. ' 1500 Kepner Dr. Lafayette, IN 47905, USA

Abstract: The complexity of new technology and operational changes to reduce manning on the Navy warfighter require that system-of-systems methodologies be used to make engineering, workflow, and policy decisions. However, system-of-systems models contain hundreds of factors and account for many outputs, which make it difficult to utilise the model for decision making. Sensitivity analysis is applied to a system-of-systems Navy warfighter simulation model incorporating the crew, concept of operations, and various ship systems to identify the critical factors and their directional effect on all the outputs. The emergent phenomena of the system-of-systems are discovered from the higher order effects of the sensitivity analysis and are examined in the frequency domain to understand these phenomena. It is shown that the second order effect between intelligence maintenance and repair procedures influences the frequency range associated with the crew rotations, task assignments, and machine failures non-linearly.

Keywords: system of systems; agent-based modelling; sensitivity analysis; complexity; emergent phenomena; frequency domain analysis; multi-agent systems; agent-based systems; naval ships; navy warships; decision making; simulation; modelling; intelligent maintenance; intelligent repair; crew rotation; task assignment; machine failure; wireless technology.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSSE.2011.043860

International Journal of System of Systems Engineering, 2011 Vol.2 No.4, pp.257 - 278

Received: 31 Mar 2009
Accepted: 18 Aug 2009
Published online: 16 Oct 2014 *

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