MODIFICATION
A -- Semantic Interoperability
- Notice Date
- 1/23/2007
- Notice Type
- Modification
- NAICS
- 541710
— Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences
- Contracting Office
- Department of the Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL - Rome Research Site, AFRL/Information Directorate 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, NY, 13441-4514, UNITED STATES
- ZIP Code
- 00000
- Solicitation Number
- Reference-Number-BAA-06-08-IFKA
- Description
- The purpose of this modification is to republish the original announcement, incorporating all previous modifications, pursuant to FAR 35.016(c). This republishing also includes the following changes: (a) update the funding opportunity description and technical focus areas for the submission of white papers in FY 08 and FY09; (b) change white papers submission instructions; (c) change the FY 08 and FY 09 recommended dates; and (d) change the agency technical point of contact information. No other changes have been made. NAICS CODE: 541710 FEDERAL AGENCY NAME: Department of the Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL - Rome Research Site, AFRL/Information Directorate 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, NY, 13441-4514 TITLE: Semantic Interoperability ANNOUNCEMENT TYPE: Initial announcement FUNDING OPPORTUNITY NUMBER: BAA 06-08- IFKA CFDA Number: 12.800 DATES: It is recommended that white papers be received by the following dates to maximize the possibility of award: FY 06 should be submitted by 26 Jan 06; FY 07 by 01 Sep 06; FY 08 by the end of 15 Aug 07; and FY 09 by the end of 15 Aug 08. White papers will be accepted until 2pm Eastern time on 30 September 2009, but it is less likely that funding will be available in each respective fiscal year after the dates cited. FORMAL PROPOSALS ARE NOT BEING REQUESTED AT THIS TIME. See Section IV of this announcement for further details. I. FUNDING OPPORTUNITY DESCRIPTION: The Information Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Rome Research Site, is soliciting white papers under this announcement for innovative solutions to address current and future Air Force net-centric interoperability requirements for maximizing the effectiveness of joint and combined military operations. Semantic interoperability is becoming an increasingly important problem as user communities seek to interoperate within and between information spaces such as those that ride on the Global Information Grid (GIG). Semantic interoperability can be defined as the state where two (or more) systems (services, people) exchange data on the basis of an agreed vocabulary (ontology) that guarantees the same interpretation (semantics or meaning) of notions (concepts and their interrelationships) for the users of the interoperating systems. An ontology can be defined as a specific vocabulary and relationships between terms (words) used to describe certain aspects of reality, and a set of explicit assumptions regarding the intended meaning of the terms and relationships of the vocabulary. Ontologies and other knowledge representations are often viewed as allowing more complete and precise domain models, and the support and use of multiple, independently-developed knowledge representations is important to support multiple Communities of Interest (COIs), information producers, and information consumers. Semantic interoperability is considered an important foundation for increasingly effective information and knowledge management capabilities that accommodate cross-domain interoperability, information sharing, data fusion, situational awareness, and learning. Each year of this solicitation is focused on a specific technical area: FY06: Semantic Interoperability Studies. Information transformation is the processing of elementary forms of information into rich interoperable decision making knowledge structures for human, enterprise, and machine learning and growth. Semantic interoperability is considered an important foundation for increasingly effective information transformation capabilities that accommodate cross-domain information sharing and understanding. This solicitation is seeking studies of the current state of the art in semantic interoperability technologies and how these technologies might best be applied to solving military interoperability problems, where current technologies fall short in this regard, and where research investments in this area are most prudent; particularly as they apply to developing scalable information services in support of multiple Communities of Interest (COIs) with multiple producers and consumers of information. These studies will serve as input to the semantic interoperability research and development roadmap for future years (FY07, FY08, and FY09) under this BAA. Current speculation for out-year research in semantic interoperability is as follows, but is not cast in stone and in most likelihood will change based on the studies being sought in FY06 and the results of future research and development conducted under the auspices of this solicitation and elsewhere. FY07: Ontological Interoperability. Important to information transformation is gaining an understanding of the context of an information request (e.g., so that an information system can distinguish between whether the term "Predator" refers to an unmanned aerial vehicle, an animal, or a movie). A context contains metadata relating to its meaning, properties (such as its source, quality, and precision), and organization. Modeling and representing context can lead to several benefits in dealing with information overload by transforming information from its source context into the context of another user or system domain. This in turn promotes interoperability at the semantic level. Several approaches for representing context can be found in the literature. One suggests bringing together metadata, user profiles, information modeling abstractions, and ontologies to construct a model of the application domain and user needs (Amit P. Sheth , "Changing Focus On Interoperability In Information Systems: From System, Syntax, Structure To Semantics", available at: http://lsdis.cs.uga.edu/library/download/S98-changing.pdf). Another proposes emergent semantics where the meaning of information is extracted from the manner in which they are used (K. Aberer, T. Catarci, P. Cudr?-Mauroux, T. S. Dillon, S. Grimm, M.-S. Hacid, A. Illarramendi, M. Jarrar, V. Kashyap, M. Mecella, E. Mena, E. J. Neuhold, A. M. Ouksel, T. Risse, M. Scannapieco, F. Saltor, L. De Santis, S. Spaccapietra, S. Staab, R. Studer, O. De Troyer: "Emergent Semantics Systems", (invited paper) ICSNW 2004: 14-43. Available at: http://lsirpeople.epfl.ch/aberer/PAPERS/ICSNW-2.2004.pdf). Many suggest using agent technology to gather context information and negotiate contexts (Mohamed Khedr and Ahmed Karmouch, "Negotiating Context Information in Context- Aware Systems", University of Ottawa, Available at: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/9670/29878/01363730.pdf?isnumber=&arnumber=1363730), as well as rule-based (Holger Wache, "Toward Rule-Based Context Transformation in Mediators", University of Bremen, Available at: http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/cache/papers/cs/9658/http:zSzzSzwww.informatik.uni-bremen.dezSz~wachezSzPaperszSzefis-99-wache.pdf/wache99towards.pdf ), classification-based (Robert MacGregor, William Swartout, "Using a Description Classifier to Enhance Knowledge Representation," IEEE Expert: Intelligent Systems and Their Applications, vol. 06, no. 3, pp. 41-46, Jun., 1991, Available from: http://www.computer.org/portal/site/ieeecs/index.jsp), pattern-based (Steffen Lamparter, Marc Ehrig, and Christoph Tempich, "Knowledge Extraction from Classification Schemas", Institute of Applied Informatics and Formal Description Methods (AIFB), University of Karlsruhe, Germany, Available at: http://www.aifb.unikarlsruhe.de/WBS/sla/paper/ODBASE04_Lamparter.pdf) and heuristics-based (Aris M. Ouksel, "In-Context Peer-to-Peer Information Filtering on the Web", The University of lllinois at Chicago, Dept. of Information and Decision Sciences, Available at: http://www.sigmod.org/record/issues/0309/C12.ouksel.pdf) methods to perform context characterization that would enable mediation between contexts. The primary goal is not to develop new reasoning methods and techniques, but rather to apply known approaches from the fields of knowledge representation and reasoning to provide context modeling and transformation solutions. In FY07, this solicitation seeks innovative approaches and technologies for achieving ontological mediation between different domains, vocabularies, information sources, and services. Capabilities of particular interest include ontological interoperability technologies which contribute to our ability to: (a) provide a coordinated view across multiple data sources and knowledge representations, (b) mediate over mappings between multiple data sources and formats into a format conducive to knowledge-based analytical tools and intelligence analysts, (c) consolidate, disambiguate and normalize multi-source data into concrete knowledge representations, and (d) exchange and reuse inference-capable knowledge representations across differing contexts. FY08: Cross-domain Information Sharing and Systems Interoperability. It is challenging for any large enterprise to achieve systems interoperability where there exists incompatible data, data models, services, and applications. Even if interoperability is achieved, to whatever level, it can still be easily broken by the introduction of new technologies, new systems, or upgrades to existing systems. Technologies are needed that make it easier to autonomously bridge the gaps between incompatible data, data models, services, and applications in order to make otherwise monolithic systems interoperate, particularly as enterprise components change over the course of time. Sharing information across domains is exasperated by systems interoperability problems, but other problems also come into play. Effective information exchange across multiple user communities, disciplines, security enclaves, and organizational boundaries is often hampered by differences in the interpretation and use of information, as well as data ownership and governance issues. Information sharing capabilities that allow effective information exchange across a heterogeneous enterprise will only be achieved when information and its meaning can be made explicit, and be done so in a manner that does not infringe upon the stewards of that information. Policy conflicts, often related to data ownership and governance issues, can hamper the efficiency and effectiveness of joint, coalition, and multi-agency operations. Current technologies are insufficient to encode policies for semi-autonomous interpretation, negotiation, enactment, and enforcement. Policy specification and enforcement tools and languages are needed to encode policies in a machine-readable form so that automated mechanisms can interpret, negotiate, enact, and enforce them. In FY08, this solicitation seeks innovative approaches for the use of semantic technologies for achieving cross-domain information sharing and systems interoperability. FY09: Situational Awareness. Maintaining situational awareness is difficult if the necessary collection assets cannot be rapidly deployed and connected. Our inability to autonomously manage and network these assets must be overcome to achieve and maintain on-demand situational awareness. Semantic service descriptions for the discovery, mediation, orchestration, and composition of networks of ad-hoc information assets could play an important role in servicing the need to have these networks put in place quickly to deliver the right information to those who need to be aware of it. Even once delivered, correlating and integrating vast amounts intelligence data remains a hard problem. Particularly as new sensor systems and platforms come on-line, it is difficult to effectively correlate, disambiguate, deconflict and combine sensor and human intelligence data into a common contextual model. Semantic modeling of the contextual information surrounding any given situation could be leveraged to improve the fusion of multi-source intelligence data into knowledge representations that gravitate toward an improved understanding of the situation and evolution of the associated contextual model. These knowledge representations would need accompanying tools to be rendered for human comprehension. Human interpretation of intelligence information is time consuming and sometimes error-prone. If the collection of intelligence data can be effectively culled into knowledge representations that are encoded in a machine readable form, it might then be possible to make use of automated reasoning techniques to infer important logical conclusions from the data that might otherwise be overlooked by a human. In FY09, this solicitation seeks innovative approaches for the use of semantic technologies for achieving situational awareness. II. AWARD INFORMATION: This BAA is open and effective until 30 September 2009. Total funding for this BAA is approximately $2.5M. The anticipated funding to be obligated under this BAA is broken out by fiscal year as follows: FY 06 - $150K; FY 07 - $900K; FY 08 - $700K; and FY 09 - $750K. Individual awards for FY 06 will not normally exceed 6 months with dollar amounts ranging between $50K and $75K per year. Individual awards for FY07 and beyond will not normally exceed 12 months with dollar amounts ranging between $200K and $450K per year. Awards of efforts as a result of this announcement will be in the form of contracts, grants, cooperative agreements, or other transactions depending upon the nature of the work proposed. III. ELIGIBILITY INFORMATION: 1. ELIGIBLE APPLICANTS: All foreign allied participation is excluded at the prime contractor level. 2. COST SHARING OR MATCHING: Cost sharing is not a requirement. IV. APPLICATION AND SUBMISSION INFORMATION: 1. APPLICATION PACKAGE: THIS ANNOUNCEMENT CONSTITUTES THE ONLY SOLICITATION. WE ARE SOLICITING WHITE PAPERS ONLY. DO NOT SUBMIT A FORMAL PROPOSAL AT THIS TIME. Those white papers found to be consistent with the intent of this BAA may be invited to submit a technical and cost proposal. See Section VI of this announcement for further details. For additional information, a copy of the AFRL/Rome Research Sites "Broad Agency Announcement (BAA): A Guide for Industry," Aug 2005, may be accessed at: http://www.if.afrl.af.mil/div/IFK/bp-guide.doc. 2. CONTENT AND FORM OF SUBMISSION: Offerors are required to submit a white paper no longer than seven (7) pages in length. Font size should be no smaller than 12 point. The purpose of the white paper is to preclude unwarranted effort on the part of an offeror whose proposed work is not of interest to the Government. The white paper will be formatted as follows: Section A: Title, Period of Performance, Cost of Task, Name of Company; Section B: Task Objective; and Section C: Technical Summary. Multiple white papers within the purview of this announcement may be submitted by each offeror. If the offeror wishes to restrict its white papers/proposals, they must be marked with the restrictive language stated in FAR 15.609(a) and (b). In addition, respondents are requested to provide their Commercial and Government Entity (CAGE) number, a fax number, and an e-mail address with their submission. All responses to this announcement must be addressed to the technical POC, as discussed in paragraph five of this section. 3. SUBMISSION DATES AND TIMES: It is recommended that white papers be received by the following dates to maximize the possibility of award: FY 06 should be submitted by 26 Jan 06; FY 07 by 01 Sep 06; FY 08 by the end of 15 Aug 07; and FY 09 by the end of 15 Aug 08. White papers will be accepted until 2pm Eastern time on 30 September 2009, but it is less likely that funding will be available in each respective fiscal year after the dates cited. Submission of white papers will be regulated in accordance with FAR 15.208. 4. FUNDING RESTRICTIONS: The cost of preparing white papers/proposals in response to this announcement is not considered an allowable direct charge to any resulting contract or any other contract, but may be an allowable expense to the normal bid and proposal indirect cost specified in FAR 31.205-18. Incurring pre-award costs for ASSISTANCE INSTRUMENTS ONLY, are regulated by the DoD Grant and Agreements Regulations (DODGARS). 5. OTHER SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS: DO NOT send white papers to the Contracting Officer. All responses to this announcement should be electronically mailed to jeffrey.hudack@rl.af.mil and reference BAA-06-08-IFKA in the subject line. If this is not possible due to security concerns regarding proprietary data delivery via electronic mail, then offerors will be required to deliver their responses via parcel post on digital media (e.g., CD-ROM) and addressed to ATTN: Jeffrey Hudack, AFRL Rome Research Site/IFED, Ref: BAA 06-08-IFKA, 525 Brooks Road, Rome NY 13441-4505. Respondents are required to provide their Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number with their submittal and reference BAA 06-08-IFKA. V. APPLICATION REVIEW INFORMATION: 1. CRITERIA: The following criteria, which are listed in descending order of importance, will be used to determine whether white papers and proposals submitted are consistent with the intent of this BAA and of interest to the Government: (1) Overall Scientific and Technical Merit -- Including the innovation of the proposed technology, the technical approach, and the operational relevance of the problem solution to address current and future Air Force net-centric interoperability requirements, (2) Related Experience - The extent to which the offeror demonstrates intellect, technical expertise, and domain knowledge, (3) Openness of Solution - The extent to which open architecture standards and technologies are leveraged, and (4) Reasonableness and realism of proposed costs and fees (if any). Also, consideration will be given to past and present performance on recent Government contracts, and the capacity and capability to achieve the objectives of this BAA. No further evaluation criteria will be used in selecting white papers/proposals. Individual white paper/proposal evaluations will be evaluated against the evaluation criteria without regard to other white papers and proposals submitted under this BAA. White papers and proposals submitted will be evaluated as they are received. 2. REVIEW AND SELECTION PROCESS: Only Government employees will evaluate the white papers/proposals for selection. The Air Force Research Laboratory's Information Directorate has contracted for various business and staff support services, some of which require contractors to obtain administrative access to proprietary information submitted by other contractors. Administrative access is defined as "handling or having physical control over information for the sole purpose of accomplishing the administrative functions specified in the administrative support contract, which do not require the review, reading, or comprehension of the content of the information on the part of non-technical professionals assigned to accomplish the specified administrative tasks." These contractors have signed general non-disclosure agreements and organizational conflict of interest statements. The required administrative access will be granted to non-technical professionals. Examples of the administrative tasks performed include: a. Assembling and organizing information for R&D case files; b. Accessing library files for use by government personnel; and c. Handling and administration of proposals, contracts, contract funding and queries. Any objection to administrative access must be in writing to the Contracting Officer and shall include a detailed statement of the basis for the objection. VI. AWARD ADMINISTRATION INFORMATION: 1. AWARD NOTICES: Those white papers found to be consistent with the intent of this BAA may be invited to submit a technical and cost proposal. Notification by email or letter will be sent by the technical POC. Such invitation does not assure that the submitting organization will be awarded a contract. Those white papers not selected to submit a proposal will be notified in the same manner. Prospective offerors are advised that only Contracting Officers are legally authorized to commit the Government. All offerors submitting white papers will be contacted by the technical POC, referenced in Section VII of this announcement. Offerors can email the technical POC for status of their white paper/proposal no earlier than 45 days after proposal submission. 2. ADMINISTRATIVE AND NATIONAL POLICY REQUIREMENTS: Depending on the work to be performed, the offeror may require a SECRET facility clearance and safeguarding capability; therefore, personnel identified for assignment to a classified effort must be cleared for access to SECRET information at the time of award. In addition, the offeror may be required to have, or have access to, a certified and Government-approved facility to support work under this BAA. Data subject to export control constraints may be involved and only firms holding certification under the US/Canada Joint Certification Program (JCP) (www.dlis.dla.mil/jcp) are allowed access to such data. 3. REPORTING: Once a proposal has been selected for award, offeror's will be required to submit their reporting requirement through our web-based, reporting systems known as JIFFY. Prior to award, the offeror will be given complete instructions regarding its use. VII. AGENCY CONTACTS: Questions of a technical nature shall be directed to the cognizant technical point of contact, as specified below: Mr. Jeffrey Hudack Telephone: (315) 330-4348 Email: jeffrey.hudack@rl.af.mil Questions of a contractual/business nature shall be directed to the cognizant contracting officer, as specified below: Ms. Lori Smith Telephone (315) 330-1955 Email: Lori.Smith@rl.af.mil The email must reference the solicitation (BAA) number and title of the acquisition. In accordance with AFFARS 5315.90, an Ombudsman has been appointed to hear and facilitate the resolution of concerns from offerors, potential offerors, and others for this acquisition announcement. Before consulting with an ombudsman, interested parties must first address their concerns, issues, disagreements, and/or recommendations to the contracting officer for resolution. AFFARS Clause 5352.201-9101 Ombudsman (Aug 2005) will be incorporated into all contracts awarded under this BAA. The AFRL Ombudsman is as follows: Amy Smith AFRL/PK Building 15, Room 225 1864 Fourth Street Wright-Patterson AFB OH 45433-7132 (937) 255-3079 All responsible organizations may submit a white paper which shall be considered.
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