DSIAC collects and publishes articles related to our technical focus areas on the web to share with the DoD community.
Laser weapons will be developed through a three-phased approach in order to fire the weapon from destroyers at cruise missiles, drones, aircraft and small boats. The U.S. Navy is moving at warp speed to develop lasers with more lethality, precision and power sources as a way to destroy attacking missiles, drones aircraft and other threats.
AMES, Iowa – Money doesn’t grow on trees, but electricity might someday. Iowa State University scientists have built a device that mimics the branches and leaves of a cottonwood tree and generates electricity when its artificial leaves sway in the wind. Michael McCloskey, an associate professor of genetics, development and cell biology who led the
Why do militaries invest in some emerging technologies but not others? Conventional wisdom suggests that capable states have reasons to hedge their bets and invest in emerging military technologies as widely as they can. Yet, even the most capable states do not invest in all technologies of military utility. Moreover, in some cases, early investments
U.S. Army counter-unmanned aircraft experts are asking Syracuse Research Corp. (SRC) in North Syracuse, N.Y., to build as many as 15 ruggedized deployable counter-drone systems designed to destroy or disable enemy unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Officials of the Army Contracting Command at Redstone Arsenal, Ala., announced a $65 million contract to SRC on Tuesday to
Chinese scientists have reportedly achieved unexpected success in their development of a high-power microwave (HPM) weapon. This promising form of directed energy weapon combines “soft” and “hard kill” capabilities through the disruption or even destruction of enemy electronics systems. Such a powerful “new concept weapon” possesses unique advantages, including its potential speed, range, accuracy, flexibility,
All indications from the pilots and commanders at Red Flag are that the F-35A performed far better than recent reports from the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation seemed to indicate. The now-departed Director of Operational Test and Evaluation, Michael Gilmore, said the Lockheed Martin-built aircraft is “not effective and not suitable across the required
Tank and maintenance crews from 1st Battalion, 66th Armor Regiment, are giving their M1A2 Abrams main battle tanks a buffed up look that improves the overall defensive capabilities of the tank. The crews, who are part of 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, which is serving as the initial ABCT rotational force in
The future of rotary-wing or vertical lift aircraft across the services is the focus of a Defense Department initiative that seeks to improve the speed, range, refueling and interoperability capabilities across the military services, U.S. Special Operations Command and the Coast Guard, and was the subject of a discussion today at the Center for Strategic
Researchers at the U.S. Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center (ARDEC) successfully fired the first grenade created with a 3-D printer from a grenade launcher that was produced the same way. This demonstration shows that additive manufacturing (commonly known as 3-D printing) has a potential future in weapon prototype development, which could allow engineers
The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory”s (NRL) Navy Center for Applied Research in Artificial Intelligence (NCARAI) has conducted initial human studies of the tactical battle manager (TBM) technology. NRL’s TBM is a software system that deploys intelligent agents to guide unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that each serve as a ‘wingman’ in manned / unmanned teams, in
AFRL researchers recently traveled to Hill Air Force Base, Utah, to demonstrate the Remote Access Nondestructive Evaluation (RANDE) system. Developed through a contracted effort with OC Robotics of Bristol, United Kingdom, RANDE is a flexible, robotic snake-arm tool that can reach into confined areas to perform required inspections, or simply look into tight spaces. Typically,
Unavoidable vibrations, such as those on airplanes, cause rigid structures to age and crack, but researchers at the University of Michigan may have an answer for that—design them more like tooth enamel, which could lead to more resilient flight computers, for instance. Most materials that effectively absorb vibration are soft, so they don”t make good