Scientific use of Game Engines for Flight Simulation and Human Machine Interface Development

Kurzfassung

In the project F(AI)²R (Future Air-to-Air Refuelling) the DLR is conducting research on assistance and automation systems for Air-to-Air Refuelling. Based on this research concepts for pilot assistance and automation systems for the support during Air-to-Air Refuelling have been developed and optimized with the feedback of fighter pilots. The utilization of mixed reality technology for the realization of the pilot assistance systems is planned. Furthermore, a fighter simulator is under construction to evaluate and improve the developed systems. Currently so-called game engines are the standard tool used for developing augmented, virtual and mixed reality applications with off-the-shelf Head Mounted Devices (HMD). A game engine is originally a software tool that is used for the development of computer games. It controls the games logic and generates the visualization. Recently those tools have extended their original field of application to serious scientific applications like medical usage and various types of simulations and human machine interface designs. As game engines are evolving very quickly and new functionalities are constantly released, it is hard for researches to fully identify the potential of game engines for their scientific work. For this reason, the present paper presents an overview on the state of the art of game engines and their current usage in scientific applications. An introduction on the usage like simulations and human machine interface (HMI) design, as well as an outlook of their application in scientific aviation is provided. Challenges and risks like interfaces and IT-security are considered. The currently most commonly used engines Unity and Unreal are compared. Finally, a practical example of the implementation of a pilot assistance system based on mixed reality is presented.