Lab testing of neural networks for improved aircraft onboard-diagnostics on flight-ready hardware

The use of neural networks (NNs) to enhance onboard diagnostics and provide real-time damage detection for aircraft reconfiguration has been investigated. This research focus was a result of investigating new technologies to improve mission success and reduce life cycle/support cost resulting from a high percentage of 'cannot duplicate' and 'retest O.K.' maintenance actions occurring on some aircraft systems. Laboratory testing results have shown that future onboard diagnostics systems can use NNs to detect intermittent failure and false failure indications. The test instance featured an Ada-based NN running in an advanced vehicle management system computer (VMSC).<
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