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26 Jan 23. LDRA Celebrates 25th Anniversary of MISRA C. The Pioneer in Safety-Critical Software Guidelines. MISRA C, the leading set of guidelines for the production of safe, secure, and reliable code by engineering organizations and software practitioners, marks its 25th anniversary this month. As a key contributor to the MISRA C Working Group, LDRA brings its expertise in standards compliance, automated software verification, static code analysis and test tools to evolve the standard to better align to modern C language and development practices.
“From automotive software to medical devices, manufacturers at any stage of maturity rely on MISRA C to guide, evaluate, and certify their safety- and security-critical products,” said Ian Hennell, Operations Director, LDRA. “LDRA recognizes MISRA’s long-standing dedication to reducing and eliminating risks in the safe application of software through continued participation in the MISRA C working group and concurrent development of industry-leading products in support of manufacturers’ certification activities.”
In collaboration with manufacturers, component suppliers and engineering consultancies, MISRA published its first C programming language guidelines in 1998 to help embedded software developers reduce coding risks that could lead to undesired or hazardous behavior. This restricted subset of a standardized programming language set the stage for decades of development and compliance activities, including two subsequent editions, four amendments and multiple guidance documents.
“For 25 years, the MISRA C guidelines have been an invaluable resource in helping developers prevent serious issues from cropping up in their code by enabling them to limit the occurrence of undefined and unspecified behaviors,” said Andrew Banks, Technical Specialist, LDRA, and Chairman of the MISRA C Working Group. “MISRA continues to help countless systems and product teams minimize safety and security risks in increasingly dynamic and complex software environments.”
LDRA products form a key part of manufacturers’ development environments, supporting the identification, reporting and remediation of critical coding flaws. Often difficult or impossible to detect by humans, such flaws are minimized using LDRA static code analysis tools, including support for all versions of the MISRA guidelines.
26 Jan 23. Hoverfly Technologies Secures Landing Ring Design Patent.
Hoverfly Technologies Inc. announced that it has been issued U.S. Patent No. 11,518,542 from the U.S. Patent Office for the “Landing Structure for an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.”
One of the largest concerns with UAVs has been determining where the system will land when it is commanded to land or power is interrupted. Free-flying drones have the concern of battery running out, but tethered systems operate differently. Because power and data are transmitted through the tether to the aircraft, tethered UAVs can fly persistently for hours, days, or weeks at a time. All the while, there remain questions on where the tethered system will land when commanded. Hoverfly tethered aircraft possess proprietary landing technology that allows the aircraft to land in its landing ring without fail. The patent protects our landing ring technology for the tethered UAV, allowing for takeoff and landing in the defined precision landing nest.
Hoverfly tethered systems first began with a landing platform, but quickly realized that a redesign was necessary. Requirements from end users and discussions with key decision makers challenged Hoverfly to create a much more compact system. The priority was to integrate on to manned and unmanned vehicles or vessels, and the form factor of the tethered platform had to be much smaller. The compact tethered system with the patented landing ring is second to none in terms of size and capability.
Hoverfly tethered UAVs, often referred to as the Variable Height Antenna (VHA), are multi-purpose UAVs with versatile capabilities. They can be found integrated on both manned and unmanned vehicles or vessels in defense, security, and public safety industries across the globe.
Al Ducharme, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, explains, “The driving force of this evolution came from the end users. We wanted to make a more compact system that was easily transportable and able to integrate on a variety of platforms. I’m proud of our engineering team for providing a novel solution to our customer’s needs.” (Source: UAS VISION)
26 Jan 23. Mercury Makes Intel’s Newest Data Center-class Xeon Processors Available for Aerospace & Defense Missions with Its Next-Generation Rugged Rack Servers. Mercury Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: MRCY, www.mrcy.com), a technology company that delivers processing power for the most demanding aerospace and defense missions, today announced its next-generation rugged edge servers, featuring 4th generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors—formerly known as Sapphire Rapids—that will accelerate compute-intensive edge workloads and drive faster insights for critical aerospace and defense missions.
Building on decades of heritage in its COTS Rugged Edge Server (RES) rackmount family, Mercury’s new RES X08 servers support low-latency PCIe 5.0 fabrics, powerhouse NVIDIA H100 GPUs, 400 Gbps network cards, high-speed DDR5 memory, and versatile Compute Express Link (CXL) expansion in an ultra-rugged, highly configurable chassis. Designed from the ground up to dissipate massive thermal loads created by larger and more powerful components, Mercury’s innovative and secure design delivers higher computational performance in a smaller footprint optimized for accelerated workloads in military and industrial applications.
The proliferation of sensors on aerospace and defense platforms has created a tsunami of data that must be processed and exploited in real-time using sensor fusion, artificial intelligence (AI), and high-performance computing (HPC) technologies to gain a situational awareness advantage. But insights derived are often bottlenecked by outdated computing infrastructure that does not adequately allow data to flow seamlessly between peripheral devices and the CPU. Besides compute and network performance, modern edge servers must also support seamless integration into retrofit platforms, extended lifecycles, manufacturing to high AS9100 quality standards, and validation testing for extreme environmental conditions.
“The RES X08 follows in the lineage of field-proven RES X07 and RES X06 servers that meet the demanding requirements of mission-critical workloads at the edge,” said Brian Perry, General Manager of Mercury’s Sensor Systems business unit. “Tens of thousands of Mercury rugged servers are currently deployed across U.S. and international defense programs, and Mercury is proud to make the latest commercial Silicon Valley technologies profoundly more accessible to aerospace and defense customers.”
RES X08 delivers significant performance improvements over prior-generation technology:
- 50% increased CPU core count
- 6x greater GPU performance
- 50% increased memory bandwidth
- 2x faster PCIe throughput
- 2x faster optical networking
- 1.5x faster NVMe data storage speeds
- 2.5x increase in total compute capability per rack unit
- 15% improved power efficiency
25 Jan 23. Blue Force Technologies Conducts Ground Test. Blue Force Technologies (“BFT”) and the Air Force Research Laboratory (“AFRL”) have successfully completed a ground test for a novel carbon fiber composite propulsion flowpath system for BFT’s Fury uncrewed fighter under the AFRL Bandit program.
Agile small business awarded SBIR conducts successful ground engine test on a future unmanned fighter aircraft.
As announced in Mar 2022 BFT, an agile aerospace and defense company based in North Carolina, is maturing a high-performance uncrewed 5th generation fighter design that provides replication of pacing threats at a fraction of the cost of a crewed fighter. The air vehicle technology developed under Bandit supports uncrewed adversary air training objectives relevant to the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and can be adapted for other Autonomous Collaborative Platform (ACP) mission areas. The Bandit program further demonstrates the impact that small businesses can have in the defense industrial base.
AFRL, in collaboration with BFT, is exploring the value of digital engineering to expedite ground and flight test by harnessing the artifacts generated through digital analysis as proof of capability. This ground test provided high-fidelity data that will be used in validation of computational methods over the coming months.
“On an uncrewed fighter like Fury, proper integration of the propulsion flowpath is the most significant design driver for the overall vehicle. It was crucial to us to demonstrate, prior to building flight test aircraft, that we could correctly predict the interaction between the propulsion flowpath components and the Williams International engine,” said Scott Bledsoe, President of Blue Force Technologies.
Leading into testing, the BFT and AFRL team performed time-accurate computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis which leveraged the extensive computational resources of AFRL and Army Engineer Research and Development Center. The purpose of the test was to validate the analysis to gain confidence by the team in using the CFD tool in other portions of the flight envelope. “With AFRL’s help, we are further building out our digital engineering toolchain to enable future ACP variants to be designed quickly,” said Bledsoe.
“The Bandit program is about demonstrating ever tighter model-to-hardware prototype development cycles for autonomous collaborative platforms, and this integrated propulsion flowpath test is indicative of that approach. After making the engine selection in June 2022, the AFRL and Blue Force Technologies team worked to finalize test objectives and procedures concurrently with Blue Force’s hardware build to ensure this full-scale test came together in under six months,” said Alyson Turri, AFRL Bandit Program Manager. (Source: PR Newswire)
25 Jan 23. $38m investment in Aerospace Research and Innovation in Quebec. The Consortium for Research and Innovation in Aerospace of Quebec – CRIAQ announces 6 new collaborative research and development projects, for a total of 17 projects approved and funded by the industry and the Quebec government to advance aerospace technology innovations in Quebec in direct response to market demand.
These 6 new collaborative research and innovation partnerships bring together 7 national and international private companies, in addition to 5 academic research centres pooling their expertise to create new solutions.
$38m invested to address the challenges facing the global aerospace ecosystem and accelerate R&D
Since the Quebec government launched the Quebec Aerospace Strategy Horizon 2026 last February, CRIAQ has set up 17 research partnerships involving a total of 24 companies and 12 research centres for a total value of $38m. Of this total investment, $15m comes directly from public funds announced by the Quebec Government, MEIE in April 2022. In addition to these public funds, there are budgetary envelopes from Mitacs and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).
One of the major strengths of CRIAQ’s R&D investment model is the leverage effect that public funds generate by necessarily adding private sector investments. In the creation of these collaborative research partnerships, the companies that are part of them must invest, which brings the total amount of investment to two, and sometimes, even three times that amount.
“To meet the major challenges facing the entire global aerospace ecosystem and accelerate the transition to a new resilient and sustainable air mobility, we must be bold and invest in research and development. It is crucial that Quebec consolidate its leadership position by accelerating the evolution of the entire sector through new technologies geared towards decarbonization, customer-centric air mobility of the future and its renewal in the digital age,” says Alain Aubertin, President and CEO of CRIAQ.
In a global context where the aerospace industry is facing, more than ever, the challenges of political, economic, technological, societal, and environmental changes; CRIAQ is firmly committed to the increase of the mobilization of the research and innovation community, industrial and governmental partners, and other collaborators of the ecosystem, to stimulate diversity, creativity, talent development and the emergence of entrepreneurs and innovators to support the evolution of the sector.
“Every day at CRIAQ, our role is to bring ideas together, to stimulate them, and sometimes even to confront them with the aim of creating innovation. For the past 20 years, with the financial support of the Quebec government, we have been linking the specialized scientific researchers of our universities with the industrial sector to further develop science and technological solutions to strengthen the leadership of the Quebec aerospace industry,” adds Mr. Aubertin.
See the annex for a full list of the 17 new projects and partners teams. Further details are available on request.
64 new project ideas will also be presented by aerospace companies at the RDV Forum 2023 on February 14 and 15, 2023, at the largest meeting of its kind in Canada, bringing together aerospace technology experts. These experts will present their projects with the aim of creating partnerships that will be supported by CRIAQ in setting up these projects and their financing. All the details on this high place of discussions on aerospace technologies and solutions of the future can be found here: https://rdvforum2023.criaq.aero/en.
ABOUT CRIAQ
The Consortium for Research and Innovation in Aerospace in Quebec (CRIAQ) is a unique model of collaborative aerospace research conducted by companies of all sizes involving universities and research centres. Its mission is to increase the competitiveness of the aerospace industry by stimulating business innovation through collaborative R&D. Its role is to bring together ecosystems and develop a new generation of innovators to strengthen Quebec’s technological leadership in cutting-edge aerospace applications: digital aviation, future air mobility and sustainable aerospace.
More than 220 projects have been completed and are underway, with a value of more than $300 m, involving more than 1,900 scientific researchers and academic members and 2,200 students over the last 20 years of CRIAQ’s existence. (Source: PR Newswire)
25 Jan 23. Pentagon tech hub reports strong year with 17 projects fielded. The Defense Innovation Unit more than doubled the number of programs it transitioned from commercial prototypes to military capabilities in fiscal 2022, pushing 17 technologies in a banner year for the organization, according to its annual report.
These include a highly maneuverable drone to support Army ISR missions and an Air Force pilot training program that incorporates commercial gaming technology, representing about $1.3bn in follow-on contract awards to companies that haven’t traditionally worked with the Department of Defense. That transition total is up from eight transitions in fiscal 2021.
“This momentum in production contracts is accelerating, with ceiling totals and averages growing substantially year-over-year,” DIU said in the report, released Jan. 25. “With appropriate resourcing for DIU, we anticipate both the total transitions and contract ceilings to grow, signaling increased adoption, revenue and scale for vendors across the nation.”
The organization was created in 2015 to push commercial technology into the department and help companies navigate the bureaucracy of defense acquisition. Since then, DIU has awarded 360 prototype deals and transitioned 52 capabilities with a follow-on contract value of $4.9bn. Those 52 projects leveraged $18.6bn in private investment, according to the report.
Lawmakers have largely backed the organization, but DIU officials — including former director Mike Brown, who resigned last April — have reported a lack of support from senior leaders in the Pentagon and have called for a larger share of the department’s annual budget.
DIU funds its efforts through partnerships with defense agencies and through annual appropriations. Congress allotted $111m for the organization in fiscal 2023, about $45m more than what DoD requested.
In an introduction to the report, DIU touts its increasing relevance as dual-use technology — or capabilities that have both commercial and defense applications — plays a greater role in modern warfare. The trend is exemplified in Ukraine’s use of commercial satellite imagery and uncrewed systems in its resistance to Russia’s invasion and, DIU says, the U.S. has an imperative to adopt and integrate more commercial technology.
“To gain and maintain operational advantage over competitors, the DoD requires an order of magnitude increase in its adoption of commercial technologies,” the report states. “To this end, DoD must act as a fast follower.”
Transitioned projects
The projects that transitioned into follow-on or production efforts in fiscal 2022 include five cyber efforts, four artificial intelligence initiatives, two autonomy programs, three space efforts and three human systems projects.
In the area of cybersecurity, DIU supported several efforts to better locate software vulnerabilities or malicious activities in systems. One program, called Hunt Forward, gives the Cyber National Mission Forces a portable system built by Maryland-based Sealing Technologies to detect, report and address hardware and software threats. DIU also partnered with Google on the Secure Cloud Management effort, which provides a gateway to control access to cloud applications based on the department’s zero-trust guidelines.
Key autonomy programs include the Short-Range Reconnaissance program, which leverages Skydio’s X2D drone to fly Army ISR missions. DIU also worked with autonomous surface vehicle provider Saildrone to field a system to collect “critical data” in the maritime domain. The organization transitioned the capability in September for use by the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, the Navy, the Coast Guard and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
To support U.S. Cyber Command’s AI and machine learning needs, DIU worked with New York-based software company Accrete Inc., to field an automated system to scour open-source intelligence and process large volumes of data. The effort allows CYBERCOM to more quickly locate foreign adversary investments.
DIU also transitioned two peacetime indication and warning programs from its space portfolio in fiscal 2022. The systems, which leveraged technology from Capella Space and Orbital Insight, provide remote-sensing and exploitation capabilities from small commercial satellites to users in the Air Force and other DoD agencies.
In its human systems portfolio, DIU fielded two Air Force pilot training systems that leverage gaming and cloud services. (Source: Defense News)
18 Jan 23. Classified fighter jet data leaked to online forum. Classified information regarding the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter jet has been leaked to a public internet forum.
Export-restricted documents regarding the fighter jet and its use of AIM-120 advanced medium-range air-to-air missiles (AMRAAM) were shared to forum on 16 January before being quickly removed by forum moderators.
The server relates to the vehicular combat video game War Thunder, published by Hungarian video game developer Gaijin Entertainment.
Gaijin Entertainment head of public relations Konstantin Govorun said the company employs specialists to constantly monitor all legal sources of information and delete any classified data.
“This time, these were the documents about AMRAAM missiles for F-16 and as far as we know, they were export restricted,” he said.
“We never look at the information itself, we never check its authenticity and we do not have any means to do that.
“We deleted the posts. We made sure that those links are not available to the visitors of our forum or our employees.
“Our specialists check if the information on a specific vehicle is classified/restricted or not. As we constantly monitor all legal sources of information, we usually already know what is considered secret and what is not. So when we see something that is forbidden to be disclosed, we immediately delete it.”
Govorun said the company has not received any government requests regarding the classified information.
“We always delete all classified or restricted data as soon as possible, that’s our rule and we clearly tell our users that they should never post this in the first place,” he said.
Restricted military vehicle information has been previously posted on three separate occasions: data leaks related to the Eurocopter Tiger multi-role attack helicopter, the Leclerc third-generation French main battle tank, and the Chinese 125mm armour-piercing, fin-stabilised discarding sabot projectile. All data leaks were removed by forum moderators. (Source: Defence Connect)
25 Jan 23. DARPA, NASA Collaborate on Nuclear Thermal Rocket Engine.
- NTR propulsion more efficient than current methods, expands options for future deep space missions
DARPA, via its Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) program, is collaborating with NASA to build a nuclear thermal rocket (NTR) engine that could expand possibilities for the space agency’s future long-duration spaceflight missions. The goal is to test an NTR-enabled spacecraft in Earth orbit during the 2027 fiscal year. An NTR presents advantages over existing propulsion technologies, such as sending cargo to a new lunar base, humans to Mars, and robotic missions even farther.
“DARPA and NASA have a long history of fruitful collaboration in advancing technologies for our respective goals, from the Saturn V rocket that took humans to the Moon for the first time to robotic servicing and refueling of satellites,” said Dr. Stefanie Tompkins, director, DARPA. “The space domain is critical to modern commerce, scientific discovery, and national security. The ability to accomplish leap-ahead advances in space technology through the DRACO nuclear thermal rocket program will be essential for more efficiently and quickly transporting material to the Moon and eventually, people to Mars.”
NTR propulsion offers a high thrust-to-weight ratio around 10,000x greater than electric propulsion and with two-to-five times greater efficiency than in-space chemical propulsion.
“NASA will work with our long-term partner, DARPA, to develop and demonstrate advanced nuclear thermal propulsion technology as soon as 2027. With the help of this new technology, astronauts could journey to and from deep space faster than ever – a major capability to prepare for crewed missions to Mars,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “Congratulations to both NASA and DARPA on this exciting investment, as we ignite the future, together.”
Nuclear thermal rockets have been built before, so DRACO has a head start. About 50 years ago, the technology was tested on the ground. DRACO is now leveraging lessons learned from past NTR reactor technology, but instead of using highly-enriched uranium, DRACO is using high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) fuel to have fewer logistical hurdles on its ambitious timeline. As an added safety precaution, DARPA plans to engineer the system so that the DRACO engine’s fission reaction will turn on only once it reaches space.
Fission, the same process used for nuclear power, is the splitting of atoms. It creates high levels of heat that can turn rocket propellant such as hydrogen from a liquid to a gas phase. In the NTR, that gaseous propellant is accelerated out a converging/diverging nozzle in the exact same way as a conventional chemical rocket engine. The high performance of an NTR is enabled by the reactor passing its heat along to its rocket propellant. DRACO’s proposed solid core NTR temperatures could reach almost 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit, requiring use of advanced materials.
“NASA is uniquely positioned to provide guidance on the challenging rocket engine and cryogenic fluid management specifications with liquid hydrogen to meet specific mission needs,” said Dr. Tabitha Dodson, DARPA program manager for DRACO. “Since the NTR uses propellant more efficiently, it offers more aggressive trajectories and creative burn profiles to move heavy cargo more quickly in the cislunar domain as compared to today’s in-space propulsion methods.”
The U.S. Space Force has signaled its support for DRACO with the intent to provide the launch for the demonstration mission.
“We will conduct several experiments with the reactor at various power levels while in space, sending results back to operators on Earth, before executing the full-power rocket engine test remotely,” said Dodson. “These tests will inform the approach for future operation of NTR engines in space.” (Source: ASD Network)
25 Jan 23. DOD Modernization Relies on Rapidly Leveraging Commercial Technology. The Defense Innovation Unit focuses on leveraging technology from six areas: artificial intelligence/machine learning, autonomy, cyber, energy, human systems and space.
“Our Defense Innovation Unit is focused on identifying priority technology areas using faster methods to get that tech into the hands of our warfighters,” said Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III at the Reagan National Defense Forum in California in December.
The 2022 National Defense Strategy stated that the department must act because market forces are driving new capabilities that could prove useful, particularly in a confrontation with China.
“To gain and maintain operational advantage over competitors, the DOD requires an order of magnitude increase in its adoption of commercial technologies. To this end, DOD must act as a fast follower, ” the NDS states.
In 2022, DIU assisted in transitioning 17 commercial solutions to Defense Department users.
At DIU, transitioning means going from when a prototype successfully completes and results in a production or service contract with a DOD or U.S. Government partner. This process that typically takes from 12 to 24 months, which is extremely fast in the world of government acquisition. Since 2016, a total of 52 projects have transitioned to DOD, said Mike Madsen, acting DIU director.
In FY22, 86 percent of our awards were non-traditional, 73 percent were awarded to small businesses, with 33 percent first-time DOD vendors. “It is critically important that we are working to lower the barriers to entry so that we can grow and strengthen the national security innovation base.”
Dual-use commercial technologies play an increasingly important role in how DOD solves problems, he said.
“In particular, the war in Ukraine has increased interest within the national security community on the value of commercially available technology, such as satellite services, communications and remote sensing,” Madsen said.
Transitioning commercial technologies includes such innovations as delivering enhanced visibility of cyber threats; using AI to optimize talent discovery; and creating scalable, resilient and responsive communications infrastructure for ground and space systems, he said.
As a joint organization, DIU works with defense partners across the services and combatant commands — and sometimes civilian or intelligence agencies — to modernize their efforts by prototyping and scaling this emerging technology, “The growing success of alternative processes to assess, procure, and field commercial technology serves as a harbinger of an innovative 2023 set to further strengthen the foundations of the defense enterprise,” he said.
Commercial solutions DIU transitioned to DOD in 2022 include:
- AI-based knowledge graphing.
- Automated vulnerability discovery and remediation.
- Autonomous maritime intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
- Commercial threat data.
- Cyber threat deception.
- Transform multi-modal datasets from English and foreign language sources.
- Hall effect thrusters for small satellites designed to increase navigational agility.
- Portable threat-hunting platform designed to eliminate adversary activities in communications.
- Intelligent business automation monitors financial transactions.
- Peacetime indications and warnings using small satellites.
- Pilot simulation training.
- Rapid analysis of threat exposure for early detection of virus exposure.
- Secure cloud management.
- Short-range reconnaissance using unmanned aerial systems.
A link to the entire FY22 annual report can be found at https://www.diu.mil/fy22-year-in-review. (Source: US DoD)
24 Jan 23. General Micro Systems, the world’s leading technology-independent supplier of computing engines, today announced its expanded portfolio of rugged small form factor (SFF), OpenVPX and rackmount equipment that offers next-generation deployed processing and enhanced bandwidth to the U.S. Army. With added capabilities from Dell Technologies OEM, this combined portfolio can enable more U.S. Army programs to realize the latest commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies along with GMS’s rugged server portfolio.
“The computing needs of next-generation Army systems requires new levels of processing power, network connectivity and data bandwidth housed within fit-for-environment enclosures,” said Ben Sharfi, chief architect and CEO, General Micro Systems. “Our small form factor systems—already deployed in a thousand Army platforms—plus our new X9 Spider modular computers and X9 Venom OpenVPX blade computers were developed specifically with the Army’s next-gen requirements in mind. Adding Dell’s rackmount servers to GMS’s existing rugged servers provides a one-stop rugged shop for all of the Army’s computing needs.”
The collection of these product categories from GMS and Dell brings proven capabilities that support high-performance, data-driven decision making in harsh, space-constrained environments. The need for more agile, resilient and upgradable systems has never been greater. Driven by massive amounts of data, “connectedness” and a growing proliferation of processing nodes between in-vehicle, edge and forward command post systems, next-generation computing requires ultra-rapid response times within stringent space and power constraints to win the future fight.
Examples of GMS technologies include the avionics-certified S1202-XVE mission/command computer with NVIDIA® multi-head graphics and stand-alone NVIDIA GPGPU artificial intelligence (AI) coprocessor. Launched at AUSA 2022 in October, GMS’s new X9 architecture is a modular open standards approach (MOSA) that uses the COTS Thunderbolt™ 4 technology. It is also available in 3U OpenVPX and aligned with The Open Group Sensor Open Systems Architecture (SOSA™) technical standard. Plans for Army CMOSS (C5ISR/EW Modular Open Suite of Standards) and CMFF (CMOSS Mounted Form Factor) are underway.
“Whether running in-vehicle AI and image processing systems or ensuring the integrity and security of high-bandwidth networking at the edge, our small form factor and OpenVPX, MOSA and SOSA-aligned embedded solutions set the standard for supporting and protecting units in the field,” said Tom Hazlett, VP of sales, General Micro Systems. “The S1202-XVE, for example, has enough processing power to replace most 1U rackmount servers and operate between -40° to +85°C despite its small package, providing substantial benefits for any rugged system needing real-time transmission and analysis of large amounts of very high-resolution sensor and video data.”
GMS systems are used in shipboard, ground vehicle and other joint service and U.S. Army deployments, and the company is the supplier of record for vehicle platforms such as WIN-T on Stryker and rugged smart displays on MRAPs; several airborne programs, including the AH-64 Apache; a U.S. Air Force widebody command and control platform; the Navy’s P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol/submarine hunter, and various other weapons and shipboard platforms.
“The combined solution from GMS and Dell provide a complete answer to unique U.S. Army edge computing challenges,” Hazlett added. “These capabilities offer Dell servers for the heavy lifting and GMS in the field with SFF and OpenVPX SOSA-aligned embedded computers.”
23 Jan 23. Howard University Will Be Lead Institution for New Research Center. Defense Department leaders today announced the creation of a 15th university-affiliated research center associated with Howard University in Washington, D.C. The research center is sponsored by the U.S. Air Force and focused on tactical autonomy.
The announcement represents two firsts for the U.S. military: It’s the first university-affiliated research center associated with one of America’s historically Black colleges and universities and the first sponsored by the Air Force.
“Today as we work to build enduring advantages for our brave men and women in uniform, we must seek the latest innovations in science and engineering,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III told students and faculty at Howard University. “That means building more bridges to America’s outstanding STEM community. You see, we need your ideas; we need your creativity and we need to draw on the skills of all of our people.”
Some 30% of African American STEM professionals graduate from one of America’s historically Black colleges and universities, Austin said, yet only a small fraction of the Defense Department’s research funding is directed towards HBCUs. That’s something Austin said he’s determined to change.
“To sharpen America’s technological edge and to strengthen America’s outstanding military, the department is committed to investing even more in HBCUs and minority-serving institutions,” he said. “Today, we’re taking that commitment to a new level.”
The new research center will be led by Howard University and will focus on tactical autonomy, which is an area of research which is central to U.S. security, Austin said.
“Responsibly used autonomous systems make our military faster, smarter and stronger,” Austin said. “They can identify threats to our troops in real-time and they can help our technical crews conduct maintenance more safely. And they can equip our commanders with the best available information to make life and death decisions.”
The research expected to take place under the leadership of Howard University, Austin said, will focus on those important areas, and will help to protect the men and women who serve the nation’s armed forces.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the United States of America has the strongest fighting force in human history,” Austin said, “And thanks to new partnerships like this one, we’re going to keep it that way. That’s the American way, and it’s the Howard way.”
A UARC is a DOD-supported non-profit research organization affiliated with a university that has a specific area of domain expertise or specialization, and which supports the long-term needs of the Defense Department. With the addition of the newest UARC, to be led by Howard University, the Department will have 15 such research organizations.
Howard University was chosen to lead a consortium of universities that will participate in the newest UARC. Those universities include Jackson State University, Mississippi; Tuskegee University, Alabama; Hampton University, Virginia; Bowie State University, Maryland; Norfolk State University, Virginia; Delaware State University, Delaware; Florida Memorial University, Florida; and Tougaloo College, Mississippi.
Howard University will receive $12 m per year for five years to fund research, faculty and students.
“America is at its best when we knock down barriers, when we search for great ideas wherever they reside and when we draw on the full talents of the American people — all of the American people,” Austin said. “So to Howard and the other schools in the consortium, thank you for lifting up the next generation. Thank you for all that you do for our outstanding men and women in uniform. And thank you for making our democracy more secure.” (Source: US DoD)
20 Jan 23. Critical minerals: US DoD backs plan to revive antimony mine. US-based Perpetua Resources Corporation is trying to revive an abandoned mine in the state of Idaho that it says could eliminate the US military’s reliance on foreign – and potentially unreliable – sources for antimony, a critical mineral used to make ammunition and missiles.
China and Russia produce most of the world’s antimony, which has commercial and military applications. While most of the antimony from the Idaho mine would go towards commercial uses, such as batteries that store solar- and wind-generated energy, the site could provide enough antimony to meet the US Department of Defense’s (DoD’s) needs for “decades”, helping the DoD meet its goal of bolstering domestic production of critical minerals, Mckinsey Lyon, Perpetua vice-president of external affairs, told Janes in December 2022.
Minerals may be deemed ‘critical’ if they are essential to economic or national security and are vulnerable to supply chain disruptions for political or other reasons. US lawmakers have expressed concern that many of the critical minerals the DoD uses to build advanced weaponry come solely or mostly from China and Russia. (Source: Janes)
23 Jan 23. Northrop Grumman starts engineering work on AN/WSN-12 INS sensor packages. Northrop Grumman received a contract from the US Navy (USN) at the end of December 2022 to perform the initial engineering service for the AN/WSN-12 Inertial Navigation System (INS) sensor packages full-rate production, according to Rudy Fernandez, director, Maritime Systems & Integration, Northrop Grumman.
“We hope to work out with the navy to get out a full-rate production order in the next couple of months,” Fernandez told Janes during a 5 January briefing in advance of the Surface Navy Association (SNA) national symposium held from 10 to 12 January.
“We developed the prototype,” he said. “We developed the EDM [engineering demonstration model], and now we’re in transition from low-rate initial production (LRIP) to full-rate production.”
He added, “We delivered the first of LRIP systems, and the first installation on a ship is expected to occur in March-to-April timeframe.”
The installation will likely be on a Flight IIA guided-missile Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. (Source: Janes)
23 Jan 23. Mercury Unveils the Industry’s First Signal Processing Board To Feature Intel’s Latest Direct RF Technology. Mercury Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: MRCY, www.mrcy.com), a technology company that delivers processing power for the most demanding aerospace and defense missions, today introduced a new COTS open-architecture board that delivers the latest commercial signal processing technology for aerospace and defense applications, driving higher performance from a smaller form factor. The DRF3182 Direct RF Processing Module is the first standard product purpose-built for the aerospace and defense industry that leverages Intel’s new Stratix® 10 AX SoC field programmable gate array (FPGA), which adds a key capability to the Mercury Processing Platform by enabling the direct digitization and processing of broadband RF signals.
Unlike traditional systems that use costly analog frequency conversion hardware, direct RF technology allows the direct processing of broadband signals. This streamlined architecture reduces the total system size and cost while increasing flexibility. Designed for radar and electronic warfare (EW), this technology can enhance a wide range of applications including software-defined radio and communications.
Why it Matters
Today’s rapidly evolving threat environment requires deploying advanced processing capabilities to the tactical edge. Through a deep collaboration with Intel, Mercury has set a new standard for performance that will ensure modern EW and radar systems can provide a decision advantage to U.S. and allied forces and make the world a safer, more secure place.
“To maintain technological superiority in today’s complex geopolitical landscape, next-generation radar and EW systems must leverage the latest commercially developed signal processing semiconductor devices,” said Kevin Beals, Vice President and General Manager of Mercury’s Signal business. “The DRF3182 Direct RF Processing Module utilizes Intel’s latest direct RF technology to significantly increase the processing density of modern radar and EW systems.”
Mercury’s DRF3182 Direct RF Processing Module features:
- Four 10-bit ADC channels and four 10-bit DAC channels at 51.2 GSPS
- Intel Stratix® 10 AX-Series SOC FPGA
- Ku band range from 2 – 18 GHz range
- Six 100 GigE data plane interfaces for an aggregate throughput rate of 75 GB/sec
- 3U OpenVPX form factor
The DRF3182 Direct RF Processing Module is now available for commercial order. Mercury envisions, creates, and delivers innovative technology solutions purpose-built to meet its customers’ most pressing high-tech needs. For more information, visit mrcy.com or contact Mercury at (866) 627-6951 or .
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Oxley Group Ltd
Oxley offer a range of Military Marine NVG friendly LED lighting that includes navigation lights and controls, flight deck landing lights and interior compartment lighting. Our lighting products are used by Navies around the world including our own Royal Navy on UK Aircraft Carriers, Canadian Frigates, Swedish Submarines, Australian Surface vessels and Submarines, on board French Naval Carriers and in Naval Gun Turrets.
https://oxleydevelopments.cmail20.com/t/t-l-cdhkulk-yujhutkljd-r/
The technology is extremely energy efficient and built robustly, with proven long life. The lighting is NVG friendly, dimmable and programmable to allow for operations with aircraft pilots using military night vision goggles. They offer superior design giving high reliability for the most demanding environments with high sealing and the ability to meet the most stringent EMC standards.
https://oxleydevelopments.cmail20.com/t/t-l-cdhkulk-yujhutkljd-y/
Oxley are proud to say that we are working in partnership with SeaKing to enable a control panel to be offered with our LED Navigation Lighting. All of Oxley navigation lights have been specifically developed for vessels over 50 metres.
Contact Marcus Goad on 07850 917 263 for more information or to arrange samples.
Oxley specialises in the design and manufacture of advanced electronic and electro-optic components and systems for air, land and sea applications within the military sector. Established in 1942, Oxley has manufacturing facilities in the UK and USA and enjoys representation worldwide. The company’s products include night vision and LED lighting, data capture systems and electronic components. Oxley has pioneered the development of night vision compatible lighting. It offers a total package incorporating optical filters, equipment modification, cockpit and external lighting along with fleet wide upgrade services including engineering, installation, support, maintenance and training. The company’s long experience of manufacturing night vision lighting and LED indicators, coupled with advances in LED technology, has enabled it to develop LED solutions to replace incandescent and fluorescent lighting in existing applications as well as becoming the lighting option of choice in new applications such as portable military hospitals, UAV control stations and communication shelters.
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