[ Mission engineering / Agentic systems ]
Intent drifts between agents. The door doesn’t fit.
Watch intent drift- My role
- Concept development and research
- Status
- Research concept
- Year
- 2026
- Methods
- A2A · Mission engineering · Digital twins · Systems engineering
A2A INTENT DRIFT / THE AIRCRAFT STORY
Intent drifts. The door doesn’t fit.
“Fit the door to the approved airframe opening.”
Say
it.
What must every agent preserve?
The mission brief. Build an aircraft with a cabin door that fits its approved opening. Follow that intent through five specialist agents.
A2A intent drift, made physical. “Fit this opening” becomes “make boarding easier,” then “build a wider door.” Each agent acts on the message it receives. The missing constraint is only discovered at prototype, when the door does not fit and time, budget and resources have already been wasted. This is an illustrative research scenario, not an aircraft design or certification result.
[ Inspect the handoffs ]
The messages arrive.
The meaning changes.
- Requirements agent → Specification agent: “Fit the door to the approved airframe opening.”
- Specification agent → Design agent: “Make boarding easier. Widen the door.” The original fit constraint is absent.
- Design agent → Prototype agent: “Build this wider door and its hardware.” The changed intent travels with the design.
- Prototype agent: only now discovers the drift. The door does not fit; time, budget and resources have already been wasted.
- Deployment agent: blocks release and returns the mismatch for rework.
Drift discovered at prototype
Door fits the approved airframe opening
Drift discovered at prototype
Hinge and latch interfaces stay aligned
Carried forward
Integration evidence is reviewed before release
01
Mission engineering
Make the original mission intent explicit. The aircraft example asks whether “fit this opening” survives every A2A handoff.
02
Digital engineering
Connect agent messages to the interface baseline and digital models. Investigate whether intent drift can be exposed before physical prototyping.
03
Systems engineering
Trace the original constraint through each delegated task. Check the whole system’s outcome as well as each agent’s local result.