USAF’s two F-22 Raptor aircraft fly over Edwards AFB in California, US. Credit: US Air Force, photo by Chase Kohler.

A US Air Force’s (USAF) team has built and flight-tested a new open systems enclave (OSE) with existing hardware on the F-22 Raptor aircraft.

The team includes members from Air Combat Command (ACC) Federal Laboratory, software developers from the 309th Software Engineering Group and test pilots from Edwards Air Force Base (AFB).

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Historically, the fifth-generation fighter jets are unavailable to third-party software integration and to solve this issue the team worked together to build this systems enclave.

The latest event marked the first time third-party software was used in flight on an F-22 Raptor aircraft.

It is also the first time that open-source container orchestration software has been used in flight on any fighter aircraft.

The OSE, which comprises a government-owned software architecture, was flight-tested on 24 August.

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This test validated OSE’s abilities to rapidly integrate new technologies from the first line of code to flight within 60 days. 

F-22 test pilot and project co-lead major Allen Black said: “This breakthrough fundamentally changes how we can deliver combat capability to the warfighter.

 “We’ve proven the ability to rapidly evaluate and integrate next-generation technologies developed by experts in government, industry, and academia at a lower cost with software portability across defence platforms.”

Following this test, the team now seeks formal directions from the F-22 requirements’ chief for the establishment of OSE on the F-22. The F-22 Program Office is an early adopter of OSE.

The team is also assessing and integrating several warfighter combat capabilities as cross-platform solutions.