Design optimization of flight simulator's instructor/operator station

The U.S. Army Research Institute and its Program Manager for Training Devices are developing a large scale computerized system to enable trade-off studies leading to the design of cost-effective simulators. An important component of this system is the Optimization of Simulation-Based Training Systems (OSBATS). In its present form the development of OSBATS includes five software sub-systems. The most important sub-system, based on operational critically (simulator training performance), costs and design difficulties, is the Instructor/Operator Station (IOS) sub-system. This paper presents some of the industrial and human factors engineering issues related to the conceptual framework of the design of the IOS. It also presents a large scale mix-integer programming formulation of the design problem, and briefly elaborates on the data collection procedures being developed for the highly subjective training components of the model.