Artificial Intelligence Enhances Air Mobility Planning
MIT Lincoln Laboratory is transitioning artificial intelligence (AI) tools to the 618th Air Operations Center to streamline global transport logistics for the U.S. Air Force. The 618th Air Operations Center (AOC), the Department of Defense’s largest air operations center, directs a thousand-aircraft fleet and coordinates complex missions worldwide.
The AOC handles hundreds of daily chat messages between pilots, crew, and controllers, juggling variables to determine flight routes, fueling times, and mission assignments. Colonel Joseph Monaco, director of strategy at the 618th AOC, notes that AI can enhance these workflows, particularly in mission planning where coordination previously relied on phone calls and emails.
The Conversational AI Technology for Transition (CAITT) project, sponsored by the 618th AOC, leverages natural language processing (NLP) to analyze chat conversations. “We are utilizing NLP to map major trends in chat conversations, retrieve and cite specific information, and identify and contextualize critical decision points,” explains Courtland VanDam, a researcher in Lincoln Laboratory’s AI Technology and Systems Group.
One developed tool, topic summarization, extracts trending topics from chat messages and presents them in a user-friendly format. For instance, it might highlight “Crew members missing Congo visas, potential for delay” with related chat summaries and links.
Another tool, semantic search, allows users to ask natural language questions about aircraft delays and receive intelligent results. Other tools in development aim to automatically add users to relevant chat conversations, predict cargo unloading times, and summarize regulatory documents for mission planning.
The CAITT project stems from the DAF–MIT AI Accelerator, a collaboration between MIT, Lincoln Laboratory, and the Department of the Air Force to develop and transition AI technologies. As laboratory researchers advance their prototypes, they are transitioning them to the 402nd Software Engineering Group for implementation in the 618th AOC’s operational software environment.
