The MOVES Institute – R&D for the Future of Modeling, Virtual Environments & Simulation

Michael Zyda

The MOVES Institute
Naval Postgraduate School

Date: Friday, October 15, 2004
Place: Engineering Sciences Building, Room 2001
Time: 2:00 pm — 3:00 pm (Refreshments served at 1:30 pm)

Abstract:
The mission of the MOVES Institute is research, application and education in the grand challenges of modeling, virtual environments, and simulation. Our areas of focus are:

• Web-based simulation
• Computer-generated autonomy and computational cognition
• Human-performance engineering and game-based simulation
• Combat modeling and analysis

Web-based simulation work starts with the premise that all future M&S systems will become inextricably linked with operational systems and play across a DoD-wide intranet. Our work in this area is to define and develop technologies that allow 3D web-based simulation to happen both from a visualization and networked basis.

Our work in computer-generated autonomy is on developing computational structures and tools for the rapid deployment of agent-based simulation. Applications for agent-based simulation include modeling terrorist behaviors and asymmetric warfare.

Human-performance engineering and game-based simulations are a very important area for us. Our path at the MOVES Institute has gone from visual simulation to virtual reality to game-based simulation. Today everyone in DoD wants his next-generation combat modeling and training system to have a game-like interface. We’ve become the experts here at NPS, especially from our experience producing the very successful America’s Army PC game, a game spun-off this year into an Army development organization. Human-performance engineering is how do we take the systems we build and then determine what levels of fidelity are required for effective training and what training we can actually do with the system produced. In combat modeling and analysis, a lot of our work is taking existing combat modeling systems and bringing them into the institute for understanding and revision by our students, faculty, and staff and for building simulations that allow us to analyze what may or may not happen in an area of interest.

MICHAEL ZYDA is Director of the MOVES Institute at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey. He is also a Professor in the Department of Computer Science at NPS. From 1986 until the formation of the MOVES Institute, he was the Director of the NPSNET Research Group. In addition to NPS, Professor Zyda holds the position of Visiting Research Scholar at the University of Southern California, Information Sciences Institute. Professor Zyda's research interests include computer graphics, large-scale, networked 3D virtual environments, agent-based simulation, modeling human and organizational behavior, interactive computer-generated story, computer-generated characters, video production, entertainment/defense collaboration, and modeling and simulation. He is a pioneer in the following fields - computer graphics, virtual reality, modeling and simulation, and defense/entertainment collaboration. He holds a lifetime appointment as a National Associate of the National Academies, an appointment made by the Council of the National Academy of Sciences in November 2003, awarded in recognition of “extraordinary service” to the National Academies. He is a Pioneer in the Modeling and Simulation Professional Certification Commission. He served as the principal investigator and development director of the America’s Army PC game funded by the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Manpower and Reserve Affairs. He took America's Army from conception to three million plus registered players and hence, transformed Army recruiting.

For a more detailed biography, visit http://movesinstitute.org/~zyda

Host: Professor JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, Chair of Media Arts & Technology