The Future of Simulation Exercises – Distributed/Federated Real-Time Simulations in the Context of Aviation

In the aviation context, Real-Time Simulations (RTS) are often used to support validation exercises since they are widely acknowledged as a way to support the validation processes of aircraft systems and Air Traffic Management (ATM) procedures. Due to the emergence of new airspace users such as Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS), Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), Innovative Air Mobility (IAM), and other autonomous aircraft, and due to the emergence of innovative concepts such as UAS Traffic Management (UTM) and U-space, validation and verification (V&V) processes are becoming more and more complex. Additionally, there is a rise in the interoperability requirements for the validation infrastructures to support those new users and concepts, as well as ensuring connectivity between various simulators from different organizations. Moreover, new technologies and procedures must be developed, tested, and validated with particular recognition of the requirements for connection and interaction between the involved simulators, actors, and organizations. Often these are based on methods of sharing information and collaborative decision-making among various stakeholders of Air Traffic Systems (ATS). The Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) 3 VISORS project aims to address the increasing complexity of validation processes through distributed/ federated Real-Time Simulations (D/F-RTS). In addition to the investigation of new interfaces, protocols and datasets to be used for the information exchange among the actors of traditional and new users of the ATS, new methods and techniques will be developed to assess human performance and cybersecurity aspects in remotely conducted human-in-the-loop simulations. The main focus is to reveal the advantages and disadvantages of distributed/ federated simulations involving various organizations across several European countries compared to traditional simulations conducted at a single location. Therefore, this scientific publication offers a detailed examination of distributed/ federated simulations, focusing specifically on human performance, cybersecurity and economic efficiency. The paper provides a review of previous studies, analyses existing standards and protocols that form today's foundation for conducting distributed simulations, and discusses a variety of potential use cases to verify the feasibility of distributed/ federated simulations in the context of aviation.