Artificial Intelligence at MITRE

The MITRE Corporation is a scientific and technical organization engaged in system engineering activities, principally in support of the United States Air Force and other government agencies, and primarily in the field of information systems. MITRE is a special kind of engineering organization. The corporation is a Federal Contract Research Center, a designation covering the handful of independent institutions that perform governmentsponsored research. It is an independent, nonprofit corporation designed and m.anagcd to provide long-term assistance to government agencies in planning, design, procurement, and testing of their information systems. Artificial Intelligence (AI) research at MITRE started in the early 1970s with the development of MATHLAB by Carl Engelman. MATHLAB was an on-line system providing a computer aid for the mechanical symbolic processes encountered in mathematical analysis. Many of the ideas generated in its development have influenced the architecture of later systems. Systems such as IAM, MACSYMA, and REDUCE have acknowledged conceptual debts to MATHLAB; ALADIN, SCRATCHPAD, and SIN (the Moses Symbolic INtegration Program) incorporate the actual code of some of the more important MATHLAB subsystems. MITRE has continued artificial intelligence research through internally funded independent research and development (IR&D) programs. In 1978, the Directorate of Mathematical and Information Sciences began sponsorship of a MITRE program to investigate and demonstrate the applicability of promising artificial intelligence technology. The project came to be known informally as “KNOBS,”