An Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) “Human Systems Integration to Enhance Maritime Domain Awareness for Port/Harbour Security” was held in Opatija, Croatia, December 8-12, 2008.

An ARW is one of many types of funded group support mechanisms established by the NATO Science Committee to contribute to the critical assessment of existing knowledge on new important topics, to identify directions for future research, and to promote close working relationships between scientists from different countries and with different professional experiences.

The NATO Science Committee was approved at a meeting of the Heads of Government of the Alliance in December 1957, subsequent to the 1956 recommendation of “Three Wise Men” – Foreign Ministers Lange (Norway), Martino (Italy) and Pearson (Canada) on Non-Military Cooperation in NATO. The NATO Science Committee established the NATO Science Programme in 1958 to encourage and support scientific collaboration between individual scientists and to foster scientific development in its member states. In 1999, following the end of the Cold War, the Science Programme was transformed so that support is now devoted to collaboration between Partner-country and NATO-country scientists or to contributing towards research support in Partner countries. Since 2004, the Science Programme was further modified to focus exclusively on NATO Priority Research Topics (i.e. Defence Against Terrorism or Countering Other Threats to Security) and also preferably on a Partner country priority area.

The objective of this multidisciplinary workshop was to bring together experts in the domains of Harbour Security and Human Factors, as well as Knowledge Management, Knowledge Exploitation and Decision Support Technologies from the NATO, NATO Partner and Mediterranean Dialogue Countries to discuss the problems of enhancing Maritime Domain Awareness in Harbours through application of Human-System Integration and advanced technologies. The ARW provided an opportunity for exchange of information in harbour security practice and research in the areas of cognitive engineering and advanced information processing.

To facilitate information exchange and a better understanding of mutual problems, the ARW comprised presentations as well as brainstorming sessions in the form of Working Group discussions.

Presentations by domain, human factors, and technology experts were devoted to domain understanding, and the theory and practice of designing decision support systems for harbour security and integration of human factors in such systems.

The workshop also included three break-out sessions, in which the smaller working groups of mixed expertise held brainstorming sessions. These working groups investigated:

1. Process, organizations, and technology requirements to meet challenges of the seaport infrastructure security;

2. Methodology for a human/machine information system to support harbour security;

3. Regulations, infrastructure, stakeholder responsibilities, as well as technology requirements to meet challenges of cargo security.

Through lectures and working group discussions, the participants of this workshop were able to enhance understanding of the problems, approaches, methodology and technical language used in various disciplines related to designing harbour security systems. These discussions were built upon lessons learned during the previous ARW (ARW981703) on Data Fusion Technologies for Harbour Protection, Tallinn, Estonia, June 27 – July 1, 2005.

This volume consists of two sections. Section one includes papers by lecturers, and Section two contains the reports developed by the working groups.

Lecture topics were devoted to the discussion of challenges and possible approaches to:

– Effective representation of domain characteristics and user requirements;

– Modelling of human systems, their behaviour, and their impact on port security;

– Information modelling, characterization, and processing for situation awareness and decision support;

– Designing the situation and threat assessment systems.

Participants representing Armenia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Germany, Italy, Russia, Spain, Sweden and the USA contributed in this ARW. A distinguished group of experts was assembled, and the technical program was organized with the generous and very capable assistance of the Organizing Committee composed of Dr. Elisa Shahbazian (Canada), Dr. Damir Zec (Croatia), Dr. Galina Rogova (USA), Dr. Eloi Bossé (Canada), Darren P. Wilson (USA), and Ms. Hasmik Atoyan (Canada).

The organizers offer their deep appreciation to the ARW participants, who devoted so much of their time and talents to make the ARW successful.

We are grateful to the NATO Security Through Science Programme, which provided important financial support. The organisers are especially grateful to Prof. Fernando Carvalho Rodrigues, head of the Human and Societal Dynamics Panel (HSD), whose suggestions for providing a systemic approach to the discussions and the technical program contributed to the success of the ARW. In addition, the following sources made significant contributions: the Defence Research and Development Canada in Valcartier, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Science & Technology Directorate; the Department of Maritime Studies, University of Rijeka, Croatia; the Department of Mathematics and Statistics of Université de Montreal Canada; Encompass Consulting, USA; and OODA Technologies, Inc., Canada.

We would like to thank the management of Hotel Ambassador in Opatija, Croatia for ensuring that all the needs of the ARW were satisfied to the fullest.

A very special acknowledgement goes to Ani Shahbazian who undertook the very challenging task of performing the English Language editing of all the lecturers’ manuscripts and producing a camera-ready document for the publisher.

And, finally, all of our thanks go to the people of Croatia, who certainly displayed, in every way, their warmth and hospitality.

Elisa Shahbazian

Montreal, Canada

Galina Rogova

Honeoye Falls, USA

October 2009