Military networking experts at CSRA Inc. (formerly SRA International) in Fairfax, Va., will maintain and upgrade a U.S. Air Force reconnaissance imagery-distribution system under terms of a $35.4 million contract. Officials of the Air Force Acquisition Management Integration Center (AMIC) Detachment 2 at Joint Base San Antonio, Texas, are asking CSRA to manage and maintain the Air Force Distributed Common Ground System (AF DCGS) Processing, Exploitation, and Dissemination (PED) Operation Center. The AF DCGS PED architecture consists of an Asynchronous Transport Mode (ATM) network that transports serial sensor bit streams, non-serial imaging sensors bit streams for still images and full-motion video. The ATM network also moves still images, video, voice, avionics bit streams, and data from reconnaissance aircraft flying overseas to various AF DCGS sites for processing, Air Force officials say. ATM broadband networks are designed to transport digital voice, data, and video signals, and are in place to unify telecommunication and computer networks. These networks handle traditional high-throughput data traffic like file transfers, as well as real-time, low-latency content such as voice and video.
