Future Defining Innovations: Trustworthy Autonomous Systems

Intelligent systems are already having a remarkable impact on society. Future advancements could have an even greater impact by empowering people through human–machine teaming, addressing challenges with vast geographic scales, and accelerating interstellar discovery. Creating intelligent systems that can be trusted to operate autonomously is a grand challenge for humanity. In this article, we explore potential futures for trustworthy autonomous systems, identify some of the significant challenges, and illustrate potential pathways by describing developments underway at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL).