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Wissenschaft
Since Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the start of its war of aggression against Ukraine in February 2022, the European security order and, as a result, the mission and direction of the Bundeswehr have changed significantly. Its core mission is once again national and alliance defense in close cooperation with NATO. Research within NATO creates the necessary standardisation and capabilities. Uninterrupted communication and cooperation in joint operations are major challenges. The NATO research group "Edge Computing at the Tactical Edge" (IST-193) is working on an important prerequisite for this: the federation of the various national clouds.
"How can clouds be operated in tactical networks? And how do you build the most efficient cloud infrastructures possible for a federation? These are questions that we are investigating in our international research group," explains Group Co-Chair Thomas Kudla. "Every nation wants to retain sovereignty over its hardware and cloud. Our goal is therefore the adaptive federation: independent clouds that interact as if they were one." The computer science graduate has been working in the "Information Technology for Command and Control Systems" research department at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE for ten years. From the very beginning, this included working in NATO research groups – according to Kudla, an extremely exciting and highly motivating task, especially in these geopolitically conflict-ridden times.
Anchoring in NATO STO
The NATO Science and Technology Organisation (STO) is the central platform for multinational cooperation in defence science research. Under its umbrella, seven technical panels and a working group create the basis for common standards and concepts. The Fraunhofer FKIE, as a leading German institute for applied and defence technology research, is one of its most committed supporters: the institute's scientists are involved in almost a quarter of the organisation's current 350 or so activities. In line with its own research priorities, the Fraunhofer FKIE is particularly strongly anchored in the Information Systems Technology (IST) Panel, of which Kudla's research group is also a member.
"NATO work is a lot of fun," reports the scientist. "Six nations are involved in our group. The team is highly motivated. Everyone has the same goal and everyone contributes a piece of knowledge relevant to the project according to their own national research status. This is how great new knowledge is created." The work also brings together different cultures and perspectives: "By travelling, which has already taken me to Finland, France, Poland and Canada as well as the Netherlands and the USA, you naturally get to know the country and its people and come closer together as nations," says Kudla.
Incorporating AI and machine learning processes into cloud architectures
As Group Co-Chair, the computer scientist and senior software architect is primarily responsible for the technical design and software implementation. On top of that, he supports Group Chair Harrie Bastiaansen from the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) with the technical management of the team. Bastiaansen: "We conduct foundational research for NATO, analyzing state-of-the-art edge computing architectures and implementations, involving both research (academia) and industry. Our goal is to identify best practices and develop a reference architecture with capabilities and building blocks for deploying adaptive cloud technology in tactical edge networks, while also exploring the integration of application, AI and machine learning into these architectures." Prototypes of a federated cloud are currently being tested. In view of the high practical relevance of the topic, Fraunhofer FKIE scientist Kudla is convinced that the project group will continue after its official end in April 2025.
Thomas Kudla
Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE
Department "Information Technology for Command & Control" (ITF)
Phone: +49 228 9435-976
E-Mail: thomas.kudla@fkie.fraunhofer.de
https://www.fkie.fraunhofer.de/en/press-releases/nato-sto-ist-193.html
How can clouds be operated in tactical networks? And how do you build the most efficient cloud infra ...
NATO Science & Technology Organization (Screenshot YouTube Video)
Six nations are working in the NATO research group “Edge Computing at the Tactical Edge” (IST-193). ...
NATO Science & Technology Organization
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