ON THE USE OF SIMILARITY THEORY TO ASSESS THE DYNAMICS OF CLUSTERS OF SUBJECTS OF INTEREST ON THE GROUND

Abstract

The experience of modern combat operations has initiated the high relevance of the tasks of airdelivered
assessing the dynamics of changes in time characteristics of groups (clusters) of objects of
interest on the ground. The active development of unmanned aviation, including within groups, provides
new opportunities for periodic monitoring of the area with the solution of problems of detection and
recognition of clusters of objects of interest in dynamics. The article analyses the possibility of using the
theory of resemblance to solve the problems of assessing the similarity of types of weapons, military and
special equipment by the nature of distribution in various clusters, including in various geographical
conditions. It is shown that the dynamics of objects can be established by regular monitoring of the terrain
with the estimation of various measures of similarity and difference for clusters. At the same time,
the applicability of well-established statistical methods of biodiversity research developed in biology to
assess the diversity of population, their complexity, similarity, relationships, etc. is proved. The characteristics
of the species diversity of the most important deterministic clusters of troops and equipment of
NATO countries are given. The efficiency of the proposed approach demonstrated by the example of
aerial reconnaissance of a conditional area with recognition of the dynamics of five types of clusters,
including various types of military personnel, personnel and engineering equipment. General recommendations
for conducting appropriate assessments and decision-making are given.The following basic similarity measurements are recommended for use: Jacquard similarity coefficients to determine the
similarity level of clusters by their constituent types of VVST samples (cars, tanks, guns, armored vehicles,
etc.), the Margalef index to determine the number of types of VVST in the total number of VVST
units in the cluster, the generalized Shannon diversity mass to assess the diversity of species in a cluster,
the Sorensen-Chekanovsky coefficient is used to determine the degree of occurrence of the selected type
of samples in the cluster. It is advisable to use the obtained results in multi-criteria tasks of preflight and
operational planning of group operations of unmanned aerial vehicles in the interests of monitoring the
controlled territory, taking into account the required schedule for obtaining reliable information.