The Competence Center Defence AI brings together DFKI's expertise in research, development and testing of trustworthy, integrative and sovereign AI systems for security and defence, in particular with respect to dual-use technologies with clear civil transferability.
Its objective is to make a substantial contribution to the technological sovereignty, resilience and operational capacity with respect to Germany and Europe, in particular in relation to security-critical, highly dynamic and crisis scenarios. The work of the Competence Center Defence AI is in line with democratic values, legal frameworks, as well as ethical and humanitarian principles, and also addresses civil-military cooperation.
In doing so, the DFKI advances its mission for research on "Human Centric AI", with a focus on the security of society and the state. This applies in particular to controllability, robustness, reliability and explainability through Responsible AI, as well as the integrative system design of corresponding Trusted AI systems in complex environments and system contexts. This enables intelligent decision-support systems, reconnaissance, situational awareness, and the integrative AI design of autonomous systems, which can serve to detect and prevent threats, thereby minimising risks and contributing to stabilisation in order to enhance overall security and resilience.
Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) and Decision Support
AI-supported detection, analysis, fusion, and visualization of complex security situations
Projects
All Projects
Team
| Departments | Contact Person | Key Competencies |
|---|---|---|
| Agents and Simulated Reality - ASR (Saarbrücken) | Dr.-Ing. Christian Müller | Trusted AI and hybrid AI; intelligent agents, synthetic data and simulation; verification, certification and IT security assessment |
| Cooperative and Autonomous Systems - CAS (Osnabrück) | Dr. Alexander Sung | Sensor-based reconnaissance and situational awareness; cooperative and autonomous systems with embedded AI; robust, explainable autonomy and simulation-based logistics |
| Laboratory for Certification and Digital Sovereignty - CertLab | Roland Vogt | Trusted Physical AI; security engineering for complex systems; securing communication; enabling control (Human-in-the-Loop); validation, auditing and certification according to regulatory requirements |
| Cognitive Assistants - COS (Saarbrücken) | Dr. Anselm Blocher | Real-time human-robot collaboration; digital twins; simulation-based resource planning, prediction and optimization |
| Cyber-Physical Systems - CPS (Bremen) | Prof. Dr. Christoph Lüth | Functional safety and IT security; formal modelling and verification; securing safety-critical cyber-physical systems |
| Cognitive Social Simulation - CSS (Trier) | Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ingo Timm | Modelling human decision-making and interaction behaviour; agent-based crisis and operational simulations; planning and optimization of socio-technical systems |
| Experience-Based Learning Systems - EBLS (Trier) | Prof. Dr. Ralph Bergmann | Experience-based and hybrid reasoning; knowledge graphs, process mining and generative AI; explainable decision support in dynamic situations |
| Embedded Intelligence - EI (Kaiserslautern) | Prof. Dr. Paul Lukowicz | Connected sensor-actuator systems and multimodal sensing; embedded and energy-efficient AI; mobile and continuous monitoring |
| Intelligent Markets - IM (Osnabrück) | Dr. Friedemann Kammler | Coordination and allocation mechanisms for autonomous and hybrid systems; self-coordinating resource systems and adaptive performance orchestration (e.g., additive component repair in the field); operationalisation of regulatory requirements, e.g., in procurement and tendering processes |
| Interactive Machine Learning - IML (Oldenburg / Saarbrücken) | Omair Bhatti | Robust and secure machine learning; detection of attacks, poisoning and bias; XAI and neuro-symbolic validation |
| Robotics Innovation Center - RIC (Bremen) | Dr. Daniel Kühn | Mobile robotics for ISR and reconnaissance; autonomous perception, navigation and manipulation; robust land and water systems for challenging operational environments |
| Smart Data & Knowledge Services - SDS (Kaiserslautern) | Dr. Tobias Wirth | Geo and Earth observation data for situational awareness; robust and transparent AI; strategic foresight, scenario analysis and adaptive decision dashboards |
| Speech and Language Technologies - SLT (Berlin) | Dr. Tim Polzehl | Media forensics, OSINT analysis, deepfake and disinformation detection for situational awareness and credibility assessment; robust and transparent AI; strategic foresight |
| Smart Service Engineering - SSE (Saarbrücken) | Dr.-Ing. Sabine Janzen | Multimodal crisis and anomaly detection; explainable decision support and maritime situational awareness; quantum AI and systems-of-systems simulation |