October 19, 2021 | International, Other Defence
Here are the Army s new, and ongoing, quality of life initiatives
We always like to say [that] we enlist soldiers, but we retain soldiers and families," the Army chief of staff said.
May 19, 2020 | International, C4ISR, Security
Booz Allen Hamilton wins massive Pentagon artificial intelligence contract
Andrew Eversden
Booz Allen Hamilton won a five-year, $800 million task order to provide artificial intelligence services to the Department of Defense's Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC).
Under the contract award, announced by the General Services Administration and the JAIC on May 18, Booz Allen Hamilton will provide a “wide mix of technical services and products” to support the JAIC, a DoD entity dedicated to advancing the use of artificial intelligence across the department.
The contracting giant will provide the JAIC with “data labeling, data management, data conditioning, AI product development, and the transition of AI products into new and existing fielded programs,” according to the GSA news release.
“The delivered AI products will leverage the power of DoD data to enable a transformational shift across the Department that will give the U.S. a definitive information advantage to prepare for future warfare operations,” the release said.
The contract will support the JAIC's new joint warfighting mission initiative, launched earlier this year. The initiative includes “Joint All-Domain Command and Control; autonomous ground reconnaissance and surveillance; accelerated sensor-to-shooter timelines; operations center workflows; and deliberate and dynamic targeting solutions,” said JAIC spokesperson Arlo Abrahamson told C4ISRNET in January.
The joint warfighting initiative is looking for "AI solutions that help manage information so humans can make decisions safely and quickly in battle,” Abrahamson said. The award to Booz Allen Hamilton will push that effort forward, Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, the center's director, said in a statement.
“The Joint Warfighting mission initiative will provide the Joint Force with AI-enabled solutions vital to improving operational effectiveness in all domains. This contract will be an important element as the JAIC increasingly focuses on fielding AI-enabled capabilities that meet the needs of the warfighter and decision-makers at every level," Shanahan said.
DoD CIO Dana Deasy told Defense News in December that the JAIC would embark on its first lethality project in 2020, which Abrahamson said would be part of the joint warfighting initiative. According to an April blog post from the JAIC, the initiative's first RFP released in March included the ethical principles DoD adopted this year, an effort to quell concern about how the Pentagon uses artificial intelligence.
The award to Booz Allen Hamilton was made by the GSA through its Alliant 2 Government-wide Acquisition Contract, a vehicle designed to provide artificial intelligence services to the federal government. The GSA and JAIC have been partners since last September, when the pair announced that they were teaming up as part of the GSA's Centers of Excellence initiative, a program meant to accelerate modernization with agencies across government.
“The CoE and the JAIC continue to learn from each other and identify lessons that can be shared broadly across the federal space,” said Anil Cheriyan, director of the GSA's Technology Transformation Services office, which administers the Centers of Excellence program. “It is important to work closely with our customers to acquire the best in digital adoption to meet their needs.”
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August 22, 2018 | International, Aerospace
NASA begins test flights to study physiological events on military pilots
BY: GARRETT REIM NASA started a several months-long series of flights on 3 August to identify the physiological impacts of flying in high-performance military aircraft on the human body. The flights are being conducted at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in California and will take place over 160 flight hours. The tests are managed by the NASA Engineering and Safety Center at Langley Research Center in Virginia. During the tests researchers will measure the breathing of five NASA pilots flying in F-18A/B and F-15D aircraft, while they use different equipment types and experience different flight conditions. The flight conditions that will be tested include benign environments, typical in instrument proficiency training, to more strenuous environments, such as those found in high altitude, aerobatic manoeuvring and combat manoeuvring, according to NASA. In recent years, the US Navy and Air Force have been perplexed by an increase in the number of pilots experiencing physiological events during flight across a variety of aircraft. Symptoms from physiological events include cognitive impairment, numbness, tingling, lightheadedness, behavioral changes and fatigue. Data collected will just serve as a baseline for comparison because NASA's aircraft still use the legacy technology of a Liquid Oxygen System as opposed to newer military aircraft that utilise an Onboard Oxygen System. https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/nasa-begins-test-flights-to-study-physiological-even-451308
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November 3, 2020 | International, Naval
DARPA Awards Contracts for Autonomous ‘Sea Train’
11/2/2020 By Connie Lee The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has awarded contracts for its Sea Train program, which seeks to enable autonomous vessels to perform long-range transit operations. In September, Applied Physical Sciences Corp., Gibbs & Cox Maritime Solutions and Mar Technologies were chosen for the program, which will include two 18-month phases. The contract awards' total potential values were $31.2 million, $30.4 million and $28.5 million, respectively. Through the effort, DARPA wants “to provide some operational flexibility for medium-sized unmanned surface vessels,” said Andrew Nuss, a program manager within the agency's tactical technology office. Each company is “developing a unique approach to be able to address the goals of the Sea Train program.” Unmanned surface vessels are generally limited in operational range, typically 3,500 to 4,000 nautical miles, he said in an interview. However, DARPA hopes to extend that to about 14,000 nautical miles under the Sea Train program. Usually unmanned surface vessels must undergo multiple refuelings to go farther distances, he noted. “It's sort of a vicious cycle at that point, where you're constantly chasing efficiencies and whatnot,” he said. However, a Sea Train platform — which is expected to be 40 meters long and carry a 35-ton payload — could give an operational commander “the flexibility to deploy these highly capable medium-sized unmanned surface vessels from many different locations without having to rely on ... refueling operations.” DARPA plans to extend the range of USVs more efficiently by creating a “train” in which four autonomous vessels are physically connected until they reach their destination. The platforms would then detach, conduct their individual operations and then reconnect before returning to their starting point, Nuss said. Unmanned boats must overcome resistance and friction from waves as they move, but attaching the platforms may help increase their efficiency and allow them to travel longer distances, he said. “By physically connecting multiple vessels together, and extending the length of that interconnected system, we could move — in our case — four vessels with ... approximately the same efficiency of a single vessel,” Nuss said. The medium-sized platforms were picked for proof of concept, but the idea could be applied to smaller vessels or manned systems as well, he noted. https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2020/11/2/darpa-awards-contracts-for-autonomous-sea-train