Human-machine interaction is a critical component of complex, highly automated systems such as space shuttle ground control and flexible manufacturing systems. In such systems, typically a team of human operators acts as supervisory controllers: monitoring data, adjusting parameters, and detecting, diagnosing, and compensating for failures. In the past, most research efforts in this area have focused on a single human operator: modeling one operator's interaction with a complex system; designing single- user displays, and so forth. With the advent of knowledge-based technology, more "intelligent" tools are appearing in the context of monitoring and supervisory control. Still, such tools are designed for use by a single operator. The intent of this project is to build models and methods to support cooperation between human supervisory controllers and between humans and "intelligent associate systems" in supervisory control. Specifically, the three objectives of the proposed are to: 1) Develop a framework for modeling distributed supervisory control; 2) Develop prototype knowledge-based tools based on the modeling framework; and 3) Apply the modeling framework and collaborative knowledge-based tool design concepts to supervisory control environment: satellite ground control at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.
