Supporting Decisions With Powerful Analytics

Parsons Digital Engineering Framework (PDEF) is an architecture based off-the-shelf technology and open-source tool that is configured to client-specific needs. PDEF is created in the Parsons Universal Modeling & Analysis (PUMA) Lab, which is considered an engineering “distillery”. PUMA Labs provides a digital engineering modeling and simulation team with a high degree of autonomy to create and develop analysis and analytics for complex problems. The lab enables users to condense, collect and integrate innovative digital engineering concepts into a decision analytic architecture. It is unique to the modeling and simulation industry, capable of assisting decision makers through exclusive functionalities.

PDEF is an architecture that uses Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) technology and Open-Source tools configured to client-specific needs. It supports Digital Mission Engineering (DME), Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE), Model Based Engineering (MBE), Distributed Engineering (DE), and collaborative decision support in a variety of industries. PDEF can also be integrated with new innovative technologies to allow users to work in an augmented reality environment.

PDEF helps decision makers in your organization through a variety of functions including:

• Multi-Disciplinary Analysis and Optimization
• Multivariate Optimization
• Trade Studies
• Design of Experiments
• Sensitivity Analysis
• Analysis of Alternatives
• Visualization of Simulation and Data
• Managing, Archiving, and Sharing Data and Meta Data

Current Systems Engineering architectures are heavily dependent on static diagrams and documents that require hundreds to thousands of individual updates when designs are changed. With PDEF, the architecture is a model and all data flows through a dynamic system that automatically tracks changes. Our MBSE analysis capability allows for automated trade study analysis and requirements verification/validation through modeling & simulation or test data. This architecture allows for enhanced Model Based Engineering by reducing the reliance on physical prototypes.

The Parsons Digital Engineering Framework (PDEF) Distributed Engineering capability allows for remote connections to models and simulations at different facilities that can be maintained by remote subject matter experts, making PDEF implementable in a Client/Server system. Finally, purchasing the complete instantiation of PDEF allows for the decision maker to have access to traceable analysis, visualization, and management tools in a single environment.

Breakdown Of Functionality

Digital Mission Engineering

• Applying Modeling and Simulation (M&S) PDEF provides for scenario design and the ability to “wrap” a clients existing models into executable workflows without impacting source code.
• Systems performance modeling and integration with MBSE capabilities provide for automated requirements trace
• Application of Multi-disciplinary analysis and optimization enables analytics that is inclusive of behavioral interactions between engineering disciplines.

Model Based Engineering (MBE)

• Utilizes M&S throughout the product lifecycle to reduce the use of physical prototypes
• Provides the capability to perform Trade Studies between performance, cost, and risk
• Aids in early detection of design issues, reducing cost and establishing a library of analysis models and engineering workflows
• Automatically executes across different computers and operating systems

Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE)

• Formalizes the practice of development using models and simulations
• Broad in scope, containing multiple modeling domains across the lifecycle
• Includes ease-of-communication between the system developers and the customer, providing better management of a complex development process

Distributed Engineering (DE)

• Architecture allows for Modeling and Simulation as a Service, giving the user the ability to share models without exposing proprietary information or intellectual property
• Includes automated workflows that are published to a network so that team members and partners can all share in access
• Workflows can contain intellectual property (IP) that remains protected, only information is exchanged with the external users.
• Processes and simulations can be virtualized for cloud computing

Decision Support

• Provides the decision maker means to modify and assess any candidate changes across a range of the core attributes in the designed model/environment
• This flexibility allows the decision maker to arrive at a suitable, acceptable, and feasible final specification of the candidate change
• In addition, the architecture will be traceable back to its requirements

Saving Time And Money

Since Parsons Digital Engineering Framework (PDEF) is customizable in construction, the environment only contains the tools that your organization requires, thus saving you costs on components you don’t need. Moving to the PDEF system reduces reliance on physical prototypes, paperwork and documentation associated with systems engineering activities by its nature as a custom optimizable project. The use of DME, MBSE, MBE, and DE have been shown to drastically reduce the cost of developing complex systems and systems of systems by early identification of design issues, managing requirements evolution, and architecture evolution.