Charles River Analytics Bringing AI Closer to the Battlefield

• Charles River to deploy EXTRA to create tools that make deep reinforcement learning (DRL) agents understandable and trustable
• EXTRA will also integrate reasoning capabilities for mission context and terrain into the DRL agents

Led by Druce and Co-Principal Investigator James Niehaus, Charles River Analytics scientists and engineers will use EXTRA (Explainability and Terrain Reasoning for Autonomy) to identify simulation environments that reflect the complexity of U.S. Navy and Marine Corps operations. By applying research in artificial intelligence (AI) and best practices in human-machine interface design, Charles River scientists and engineers will create tools that make deep reinforcement learning (DRL) agents understandable and trustable. The U.S. Navy contract is valued at $3 million.

AI systems can make decisions and take action at superhuman speeds, but two obstacles limit their use in high-stakes military operations. First, many high-performing AIs are “black boxes”—the reasons for their responses to different scenarios aren’t clear. Second, high-performing AIs may act in surprising ways or make incorrect conclusions. These characteristics are common features of AIs created using DRL. That’s where Charles River comes in, with EXTRA.

The project team will train robust DRL agents in these environments and create tools that map DRL agent decisions to human-understandable explanations. EXTRA will also integrate reasoning capabilities for mission context and terrain into the DRL agents. Finally, EXTRA’s intuitive user interface will combine all this information to deliver human-understandable explanations of the DRL agent’s behavior.

“The future of AI is human-machine teaming,” said Jeff Druce, Senior Scientist at Charles River Analytics and Co-Principal Investigator of the EXTRA effort. “For human-machine teams to be able to engage in novel military tactics together, people need explanations from the AI that they can understand and trust.”

EXTRA has the potential to greatly benefit Navy and Marine Corps mission planning and execution. In addition, the technologies developed for EXTRA will enhance Charles River’s custom XAI (explainable artificial intelligence) software solution. This solution increases the adoption and value of DRL systems by augmenting them with explainability technologies developed through our advanced R&D programs.