Military Application of Networking by Touch in Collaborative Planning and Tactical Environments

Human Area Networks represent an emerging field of communications technology with the potential to offer significant advantages to military operations. This thesis explores and defines Human Area Networks (HAN) and addresses how HANs relate to existing network topologies as well as the various terminologies associated with HANs. The focus of research addresses the notion of “touch” as an event and attempts to relate the various interpretations of “touch” networking to HANs while describing a preliminary architecture through the use of multiple scenarios and use cases, quality attributes, and functional requirements. Additionally, this thesis explores the opportunities associated with one particular implementation of HAN: Intrabody Communications (IBC), and proposes an implementation plan for conceptual IBC devices. Ultimately, this thesis demonstrates the potential value of IBC and HANs in a Joint Tactical scenario with recommendations for iteratively evaluating the techniques, tactics and procedures (TTP) in an incremental manner that seamlessly evolves with technology advancements.