    [Senate Hearing 113-762]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

           DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2015

                                  ----------

                            WEDNESDAY, MAY 14, 2014

                                           U.S. Senate,
               Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The subcommittee met at 9:59 a.m., in room SD-192, Dirksen
    Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard J. Durbin (chairman)
    presiding.
        Present: Senators Durbin, Cochran, Shelby, Collins, and
    Murkowski.

                             DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

                        Defense Research and Innovation

    STATEMENT OF ALAN SHAFFER, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF

                DEFENSE FOR RESEARCH AND ENGINEERING

                 opening statement of senator richard j. durbin

        Senator Durbin. Good morning. Today the subcommittee meets
    to receive testimony on the fiscal year 2015 budget request for
    science and technology (S&T) funding for the Department of
    Defense (DOD), the military services, and defense medical
    research programs.
        I want to welcome our witnesses: Mr. Alan Shaffer, Acting
    Assistant Secretary of Defense for Development, Research and
    Engineering for the Department of Defense; Dr. Arati Prabhakar,
    Director of DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency);
    Dr. Terry Rauch, Director of Defense Medical Research and
    Development Program with the Office of Force Health Protection
    and Readiness Programs; Ms. Mary Miller, Deputy Assistant
    Secretary of the Army for Research and Technology; Dr. David
    Walker, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for
    Science, Technology, and Engineering; and Rear Admiral Matthew
    Klunder, Chief of Naval Research.
        This year's budget request for science and technology
    funding among the Department and the services is $11.5 billion
    out of a total research and development (R&D) request of $63.5
    billion. In fiscal year 2015, the overall R&D budget increases
    $569 million. However, this growth is not reflected in science
    and technology research. Basic research is down by $150 million
    across the Department and the services, overall science and
    technology reduced by almost $500 million. I hope our witnesses
    can provide some insight into the choices that need to be made
    with these numbers.
        Science and technology investments have led to stunning
    advancements on behalf of our military men and women and the
    Nation. From DARPA's early investments that led to the Internet
    to the Department's development of one of the most widely used
    drugs to fight breast cancer, these investments are critical in
    keeping the U.S. at the top when it comes to new ideas and new
    innovation.
        I am worried that the budget decisions we have made over
    the past several years may be putting this leadership at risk.
        Two weeks ago, the full Appropriations Committee held a
    hearing examining Federal investments that drive innovation.
    During that hearing, Dr. Collins from NIH (National Institutes
    of Health) presented a slide that was extremely worrisome. I
    have provided a copy to our members and our witnesses. It shows
    the relative decline in U.S. Federal investment in biomedical
    research and compares this with the research of our allies and
    competitors who are significantly increasing their biomedical
    investments.
        To address this research deficit, I have introduced a bill.
    It is called the America Cures Act. The bill will make stable
    investments in biomedical research at a rate of inflation plus
    5 percent. This funding would provide stability to NIH, CDC
    (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), the Department of
    Defense, and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) so they
    can plan and execute their research programs with certainty.
        But it is not just our biomedical edge that is at risk.
    Lagging investments in science and technology risk sacrificing
    America's technological edge to our enemies. It also poses
    significant challenges to sustaining America's talented pool of
    engineers and Ph.D.'s in computing, materials science, and many
    other fields.
        Advances in these fields are not just for our national
    security. They find their way into high-tech components in
    almost every household in America. Right now, we are carrying
    around in our pockets a GPS device. This was designed and
    originally discovered with the launch of Sputnik, a satellite
    in 1957. They tried to track that Russian satellite and the
    beep that it was emitting they were able to determine how they
    could position themselves on earth and identify that location
    based on where the satellite was. Now we carry it around in our
    pockets and do not think twice about it. That is the kind of
    thing where what looks like pure defense research turns out to
    be research of great value to us in many other areas. The
    gyroscopes in our cell phones, lithium batteries--the list goes
    on and on--originating in the Department of Defense.
        Ignorance is no shelter or refuge. I think back to that
    same era when Congress decided to create the National Defense
    Education Act in 1958, the first time in the history of the
    United States that we gave scholarships to anyone who was not a
    veteran. And the reason was we were scared of the Soviet Union
    and their satellites. Our first line of defense was to educate
    America. Let us get ready to fight this battle with people who
    are well educated and trained and can not only defend us but
    make us a stronger Nation and a stronger economy.
        Now look where we are today. We are backing off of our
    commitment to research, science, and technology. What does that
    say about our future? How do we explain that to our kids?
    Extremely shortsighted. That is why we are having this hearing.
        I look forward to your testimony and note your full
    statements will be part of the record.

                               prepared statement

        Before I turn to the vice chairman of the subcommittee,
    Senator Thad Cochran, Senator Collins submitted a statement to
    be included in the record.
        [The statement follows:]
                 Prepared Statement of Senator Susan M. Collins
        Thank you, Chairman Durbin, for holding this important hearing on
    Defense Research and Innovation.
        Research and innovation reflect the American spirit of ingenuity.
    Our national labs, colleges and universities (including the University
    of Maine), private sector entrepreneurs, small businesses, investors,
    and countless others play a significant role in spurring innovation,
    and we should support policies that encourage such inventiveness and
    allow the United States to remain a leader in creating cutting edge
    technologies. I would note that one area where we can do more to
    encourage innovation is increasing investment in small businesses that
    are developing technologies that contribute to the national defense and
    reducing the barriers they face in contracting with the Federal
    Government.
        The Rapid Innovation Program, which transitions small business
    technologies into Defense Acquisition Programs, is a great example of
    how the Defense Department can assist small business innovation.
    MARCOR, located in Boothbay, Maine, is just one of the more than 360
    companies since 2011 that have received contracts worth nearly $900
    million in research and development (R&D) investment.
        Another program that makes it easier for small businesses to apply
    their innovation to our national security is through the Procurement
    Technical Assistance Program, which has six locations in Maine. This
    program helps small businesses seeking to do business with the Federal
    Government. The Procurement Technical Assistance Centers plays a
    critical role in facilitating matches by connecting small businesses
    with prime contractors and Federal agencies, and by helping them
    through the contracting process from start to finish.
        A strong partnership between the public and private sectors is
    vital to getting the most out of our R&D dollars, and as such this
    partnership is vital to our national security as well.
        I look forward to your testimony today.

        Senator Durbin. Senator Cochran.

                       STATEMENT OF SENATOR THAD COCHRAN

        Senator Cochran. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to join you in
    welcoming our panel of witnesses at the hearing this morning.
    We appreciate the work that you do in identifying areas of
    emphasis where we want to be sure that we appropriate the
    adequate sum of dollars that are needed to take advantage of
    the emerging technology in our society as it relates to our
    national defense and the security of American citizens. We
    thank you for being here this morning to share your thoughts
    and observations about these issues.
        Thank you.
        Senator Durbin. Thank you very much, Senator Cochran.
        We are going to ask the witnesses to each give a brief
    opening statement before questions, and of course, their
    written statements will be made part of the record.
        Mr. Shaffer, why do you not start?

                       SUMMARY STATEMENT OF ALAN SHAFFER

        Mr. Shaffer. Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran,
    members of the committee, I am pleased to come before you today
    to testify about the state of the Department of Defense science
    and technology program. I am proud to be here representing the
    roughly 100,000 scientists and engineers in the Department's
    workforce, a workforce that has provided, as you said, Mr.
    Senator, remarkable achievements in the past but one that is
    now showing the early stages of stress due to downsizing and
    the combined sequester, furlough, and Government shutdown
    challenges of the last year. These affected the health of our
    workforce and their programs they execute in ways we are just
    beginning to understand. We have begun to address these
    challenges, but they remain a concern to us.
        As you said, sir, the 2015 S&T budget request is down about
    5 percent to $11.5 billion compared to the fiscal year 2014 $12
    billion request. While the DOD tries to balance our overall
    program, there are factors that led Secretary Hagel to conclude
    in his February 24 budget rollout that we are entering an era
    where American dominance on the seas, in the skies, and in
    space can no longer be taken for granted.
        The Department is in the third year of a protracted overall
    budget drawdown and, as highlighted by Secretary Hagel, there
    are three major areas that compromise the Department's budget:
    force size, readiness, and modernization.
        The current budget is driving a force reduction, but this
    reduction will take several years to yield savings. In the
    fiscal year 2015 budget, readiness and/or modernization will
    pay a larger percentage of the overall Department bill.
        To address the challenges, we needed to examine the
    strategy we are using to focus the S&T investment on high
    priority areas. From that review emerged a strategy for
    investment. The Department invests in science and technology
    for one of three reasons.
        The first is to mitigate new and emerging threat
    capabilities, and we see a significant need in the areas of
    electronic warfare, cyber, counter-weapons of mass destruction,
    and preserving space capabilities.
        The second reason we invest in science and technology is to
    affordably enable new or extended capabilities in existing
    military systems and our future systems. We see a significant
    need in growing our Department's system engineering, modeling
    and simulation and prototyping.
        The third reason we invest in science and technology is to
    develop technology surprise. We want to keep potential
    adversaries on their heels. We see significant need in areas
    such as autonomy, human systems, quantum sensing, and big data.
        While there are challenges, the Department continues to
    perform. I would like to highlight several areas.
        First, advances in understanding and treating such things
    as traumatic brain injury. In addition, to the DARPA BRAIN
    (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies)
    Initiative, the Department has developed some successful
    technologies in this area in both the medical research program
    and in our Army's research program. The combination of DARPA's
    small blast gauge to measure the blast over-pressures and
    acceleration of the head, coupled with the Defense Health
    Programs' advances in therapeutics and photonic medicine,
    provides promise to allow us to treat TBI (traumatic brain
    injury) more quickly and effectively. The photonics
    advancements, I will tell you, show real potential. Growing out
    of that program, researchers have discovered that intense light
    outside the skull prevents brain tissue decay after a TBI-
    inducing event. The treatment is in clinical trials.
        The Air Force X-51 WaveRider hypersonic demonstration was
    the second successful demonstration of powered scramjet
    technology demonstrating that we are getting close to
    developing a full hypersonic system. No one else in the world
    has done this.
        The Navy is making dramatic progress on high energy laser
    systems and is deploying a 30-kilowatt electric laser on the
    USS Ponce this summer. If successful, this will be the first
    operational deployment of a directed energy system.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        The Army is forging the next generation of military
    helicopters with their joint multirole technology demonstrator,
    a program currently in design phase with four vendors leading
    to the next generation of military-relevant helicopters.
        These successes highlight that in spite of a difficult year
    and in spite of difficult budget pressures, the DOD S&T program
    continues to produce capability for our future force. With your
    continued support, I am confident we will continue to do so in
    the future.
        [The statement follows:]
                     Prepared Statement of Alan R. Shaffer
        Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran, members of the committee: I
    am pleased to come before you today to testify about the state of the
    Department of Defense's science and technology (S&T) program. I am
    proud to be here representing the roughly 100,000 scientists and
    engineers in the science and engineering (S&E) workforce, a workforce
    that has had remarkable achievements in the past, but is now a
    workforce showing the early stages of stress due to downsizing and the
    budget challenges of the last year. This past year has been unlike
    previous years in our community; the collective impact of the
    sequester-forced civilian furlough and program curtailment, the October
    2013 Government shutdown, and the indirect impacts of the sequester,
    such as restrictions on our young scientists and engineers attending
    technical conferences, has impacted the health of our workforce and the
    programs they execute in ways that we are just beginning to understand.
    We have begun to address these challenges but they remain a concern for
    us.
                                  introduction
        The fiscal year 2015 budget request for science and technology
    (S&T) \1\ is relatively stable, when compared to the overall DOD top
    line \2\ and modernization accounts. The DOD fiscal year 2015 S&T
    request is $11.51 billion, compared to an fiscal year 2014
    appropriation of $12.01 billion. This request represents a 4.1 percent
    decrease (5.8 percent in real buying power) in the Department's S&T
    compared to Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) account
    that was virtually unchanged. While we continue to execute a balanced
    program overall, there are factors that led Secretary Hagel to conclude
    in his February 24, 2014 fiscal year 2015 budget rollout that ``we are
    entering an era where American dominance on the seas, in the skies, and
    in space can no longer be taken for granted''.\3\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ Science and Technology is defined as program 6, budget
    activities 1, 2, and 3; frequently called 6.1, 6.2, and 6.3 (basic
    research, applied research, and advanced technology development);
    Research and Engineering adds Advanced Capability Development and
    Prototyping (6.4).
        \2\ Top line refers to the total funds appropriated by Congress to
    include ``supplemental'' or Oversees Contingency Operations funds.
        \3\ Remarks by Secretary Hagel on the fiscal year 2015 budget
    preview in the Pentagon Briefing Room on 24 February 2014.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Simultaneous with the challenges of balancing a reduced budget and
    continuing to engage the total defense workforce in meaningful research
    and engineering (R&E), the capability challenges to our R&E program are
    also increasing. This is attributable to changes in the global S&T
    landscape and the acceleration globally of development of advanced
    military capabilities that could impact the superiority of U.S.
    systems. The convergence of declining budgets, in real terms, and
    increased risk is not a comfortable place to be. However, as I will
    highlight in the latter sections of my statement, the Department has
    begun to reshape the focus of our technical programs to address some of
    our new challenges. We are also beginning to shift our programs to
    better position the Department to meet our national security
    challenges. Finally, we have some areas where we need your help in
    order to be successful executing our fiscal year 2015 budget. I will
    cover these areas at the end of my statement.
                  fiscal year 2015 president's budget request
        The current fiscal environment presents significant challenges to
    the DOD budget. The Department is in the third year of a protracted
    overall topline and RDT&E budget drawdown. As highlighted by Secretary
    Hagel, there are three major areas that comprise the Department's
    budget: force size, readiness, and modernization. The current budget is
    driving a force reduction, but this reduction will take several years
    to yield significant savings. In the fiscal year 2015 budget, readiness
    and/or modernization will pay a larger percentage of the ``bill''. As a
    former airman who entered service in the 1970s, I am very well aware of
    what happens when savings are gleaned from readiness--the hollow force
    is not acceptable. Over the next several years of the budget we expect
    modernization accounts (Procurement and RDT&E) to pay a large portion
    of the Department's fiscal reduction bill. At the same time, Secretary
    Hagel's strategy is to protect advanced technologies and capabilities.
    The fiscal year 2015 budget must balance all of these drivers; we
    believe we have done well, but do acknowledge there is increased risk.
        The last several budgets have been characterized by instability and
    rapid decline of the modernization accounts. The fiscal year 2013
    sequestration reduced all accounts by 8.7 percent; for S&T, this
    amounted to a loss of about $1 billion. The December 2013 Bipartisan
    Budget Act increased the discretionary caps in fiscal year 2014 and
    fiscal year 2015 to provide some relief, but less in fiscal year 2015
    than fiscal year 2014. From fiscal year 2013 to 2015, the S&T program
    operated with reductions of $1.4 billion compared to what had been
    planned in the fiscal year 2013 budget.
        One of the key points for S&T of the fiscal year 2015 budget is a
    shift in focus at the macro scale from basic research to advanced
    technology development and a shift from the Services to DARPA to
    develop advanced capabilities. In fiscal year 2015, we funded DARPA at
    the same level, after inflation, as was planned in fiscal year 2014
    PBR. These numbers are shown in Tables 1 and 2.

    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                       % Real change
                                                                       FY 2014      PBR 2015  (FY 14   from FY 2014
                                                                    appropriated         CY $M)        appropriated
                                                                        ($M)                           (FY 14 CY $)
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Basic Research (BA 1)........................................           2,167    2,018   (1,982)          -8.55%
    Applied Research (BA 2)......................................           4,641    4,457   (4,378)          -5.66%
    Advanced Technology Development (BA 3).......................           5,201    5,040   (4,951)          -4.81%
                                                                  --------------------------------------------------
          DOD S&T................................................          12,009   11,515  (11,311)          -5.81%

    Advanced Component Development and Prototypes (BA 4).........          11,635   12,334  (12,116)           4.14%
                                                                  --------------------------------------------------
          DOD R&E (BAs 1-4)......................................          23,644   23,849  (23,427)          -0.92%

    DOD Topline..................................................         496,000  495,604 (486,841)          -1.85%
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Table 1--Defense Budget for Science &Technology; Research & Engineering; and DOD Top Line Budget (FY 2014
      Appropriated and PBR 2015).

    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                       % Real change
                                                                       FY 2014      PBR 2015  (FY 14   from FY 2014
                                                                    appropriated         CY $M)        appropriated
                                                                        ($M)                           (FY 14 CY $)
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Army.........................................................           2,455    2,205   (2,166)         -11.77%
    Navy.........................................................           2,102    1,992   (1,957)          -6.91%
    Air Force....................................................           2,308    2,129   (2,091)          -9.39%
    DARPA........................................................           2,707    2,843   (2,793)           3.17%
    Missile Defense Agency (MDA).................................             255      176     (173)         -32.20%
    Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA).......................             476      473     (465)          -2.39%
    Chem Bio Defense Program (CBDP)..............................             393      407     (400)           1.73%
    Other Defense Agencies.......................................           1,313    1,290   (1,267)          -3.49%
                                                                  --------------------------------------------------
          DOD S&T................................................          12,009   11,515  (11,311)          -5.81%
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Table 2--Service and Agencies S&T Budgets (FY 2014 Appropriated and PBR 2015)

    Research and Development is Not a Variable Cost
        Over the past decade, the R&D accounts have been quite variable,
    but this counters one of the key tenets of R&D investment made by the
    Honorable Frank Kendall in discussing the fiscal year 2015 budget.
    There has been a tendency in the past to reduce research and
    development more or less proportionately to other budget reductions.
    This tendency, if acted upon, can be detrimental because research and
    development costs are not directly related to the size of our force or
    the size of the inventory we intend to support. The cost of developing
    a new weapons system is the same no matter how many units are produced.
    In a recent speech, Secretary Kendall explained the invariant nature of
    research and development this way:

          R&D is not a variable cost. R&D drives our rate of modernization.
            It has nothing to do with the size of the force structure. So,
            when you cut R&D, you are cutting your ability to modernize on
            a certain time scale, period--no matter how big your force
            structure is.\4\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \4\ Honorable Frank Kendall presentation to McAleese/Credit Suisse
    fiscal year 2015 Defense Programs Conference on 25 February 2014.

    If we don't do the research and development for a new system than the
    number of systems of that type we will have is zero. It is not
    variable.
        Secretary Kendall said it this way:

          [T]he investments we're making now in technology are going to
            give us the forces that we're going to have in the future. The
            forces we have now came out of investments that were made, to
            some extent, in the 80s and 90s . . . if you give up the time
            it takes for lead time to get . . .  a capability, you are not
            going to get that back.\5\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \5\ Kendall, 25 February 2014.

        There is another trend impacting the Department's ability to
    deliver advanced capabilities. Recent data from the Nation Science
    Foundation shows an upward trend in industry R&D spending compared to a
    downward trend in Federal Government R&D spending (Figure 1). Industry
    in the United States performs roughly 70 percent of the Nation's R&D
    with the Federal Government and academia making up the remaining 30
    percent. Figure 1 also shows the dependence of academic researchers on
    Federal Government funding, as noted by the National Science Board:
        Most of U.S. basic research is conducted at universities and
    colleges and funded by the Federal Government. However, the largest
    share of U.S. total R&D is development, which is largely performed by
    the business sector. The business sector also performs the majority of
    applied research.\6\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \6\ National Science Board. 2014. Science and Engineering
    Indicators 2014. Arlington VA: National Science Foundation (NSB 14-01).
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        This implies that DOD needs to be more cognizant of industry R&D as
    part of our overall capability development and remain sensitive to the
    importance of federally funded academic research. We continue to push
    in these areas through our continued support of the university research
    portfolio and our recent emphasis on Independent Research and
    Development (IR&D).

              Figure 1--Changes in US GDP and R&D by Performer \7\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \7\ Science magazine. 13 January 2014. Retrieved from http://
    news.sciencemag.org.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                       science and engineering workforce
        The Department's scientist and engineering (S&E) workforce consists
    of in-house labs, engineering centers, test ranges, acquisition program
    offices and so forth, and is augmented by our partners in the federally
    funded research and development centers (FFRDCs) and University
    Affiliated Research Centers (UARCs). The talented scientists and
    engineers working within these organizations form the foundation of the
    Department's technology base and are responsible for conceiving and
    executing programs from basic research through demilitarization of
    weapon systems. The technical health of this workforce is a priority
    for me and the Department.
        Our in-house labs have been designated by Congress as Science &
    Technology Reinvention Laboratories (STRL) providing the directors of
    these facilities special authorities to manage their workforce via pay-
    for-performance personnel systems. Each director is granted flexibility
    to create workforce policies unique to his/her lab with new personnel
    initiatives being transferable to other STRLs if proven to be effective
    in the hiring, retention and training of S&Es. Each year my office
    works with the Services and their labs to ensure they have the
    authorities our lab directors need. Recent accomplishments include
    direct hiring authority for bachelors, masters and doctoral level
    graduates, increase in the number of technical senior executive
    billets, and authority for lab directors to manage their workforce
    based upon available budgets.
        Data from the Strategic Human Capital Workforce Plan published in
    September 2013 indicates that our lab workforce is getting older. From
    2011 to 2013, the average age of our scientists and engineers in our
    labs has grown from 45.6 years to 45.7 years for scientists and from
    43.2 years to 43.9 years for our engineers. Although the change seems
    minimal over the past 2 years, it reverses the trend over the past
    decade when we had been driving the average age down. Data from the
    Science and Technology Functional Community indicate that the
    combination of fewer new hires and retirement-eligible employees
    working longer both contribute to the increase in average age. In 2013,
    there were only 731 new hires in the S&T Functional Community, whereas
    in 2010 there were 1,884. In 2010, retiring workers were retirement-
    eligible for an average of only 4.1 years. From 2011-2013, that average
    grew to 4.5 years. The trend indicates that we may not be replacing our
    seasoned employees with enough young scientists and engineers who will
    shape our future. This could be an indicator of older employees working
    longer because of a down economy or it could be an indicator that we
    are not hiring or retaining enough young scientists and engineers.
        Although anecdotal, we are seeing a trend in why younger workers
    may be leaving. We saw a number of young scientists and engineers leave
    in 2013, early in their career. In conducting exit interviews, our
    laboratory directors reported that these young workers consistently
    cited travel and conference restrictions, as well as perceived
    instability of a long term career as motivating factors for their
    departure. This information, although anecdotal, is of concern;
    consequently, we are attempting to gather data to see if we can discern
    a definite signal.
        Another area of significant Department and national interest is
    building a robust science and engineering workforce through various
    Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) initiatives.
    My office recently created the STEM Executive Board who has the
    authority and continues to provide strategic leadership for the
    Department's STEM initiatives.
        Significant change to the Federal portfolio of STEM programs has
    occurred over the past year. In response to the requirements of the
    America Competes Reauthorization Act of 2010, Federal STEM-education
    programs were reorganized with the goals of greater coherence,
    efficiency, ease of evaluation, and focus on the highest priorities.
    This resulted in the Federal STEM Education 5-Year Strategic Plan
    designating the Smithsonian, Department of Education and National
    Science Foundation as lead agencies in implementing this plan. The DOD
    STEM Strategic plan is aligned with the Federal plan to achieve Federal
    and Departmental STEM education goals.
        We are also developing Department-wide guidance on STEM program
    evaluation, coordinating within the Department and across the Federal
    Government to improve effectiveness and efficiencies in these
    investments in future workforce needs. A DOD STEM Annual Report,
    expected to be delivered in fiscal year 2015 based on fiscal year 2014
    data, will communicate the activities and results in achieving
    Departmental goals.
        In summary, budget constraints, furloughs, and conference and
    travel restrictions have contributed to a drain on our most valuable
    resource--people. To replace our losses and rebuild our workforce for
    the future, we are working on bringing stability back to our S&E
    programs, give our people challenging while enriching environments in
    which to work.
              challenges to maintaining technological superiority
        The United States has relied on a DOD that has had technological
    superiority for the better part of the post-World War II era. There are
    factors that are converging such that the DOD maintaining technological
    superiority is now being challenged. These challenges come from both
    changes in the way technology matures and in advanced capabilities
    being developed in the rest of the world. The Department is emerging
    from over a decade of focusing on countering terrorism and insurgency.
    While the challenges of counter terrorism remain, new national security
    challenges are emerging. Other nations are developing advanced
    capabilities in areas such as: cyber operations, advanced electronic
    warfare, proliferation of ballistic missiles for strategic and tactical
    intent, contested space, networked integrated air defenses, and a host
    of other capabilities stressing the Department's capability advantages.
    The Department's S&T program is being re-vectored to meet these new
    challenges. In addition, the Department is shifting to a focus on the
    Asia-Pacific region, a region with unique and challenging geographic
    and cultural features. Most notably, the geographic extent of the Asia
    Pacific region adds new challenges in terms of fuel efficiency and
    logistics.
        In short, the Department and Nation are at a strategic crossroads--
    the funds available to the Department (and national security
    infrastructure in general) are decreasing, while the complexity and
    depth of the national security challenges are growing. The world we
    live in is an uncertain place. Secretary Hagel said it best in his
    recent roll out of the fiscal year 2015 budget:

          The development and proliferation of more advanced military
            technologies by other nations that means that we are entering
            an era where American dominance on the seas, in the skies, and
            in space can no longer be taken for granted.\8\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \8\ Remarks by Secretary Hagel on the fiscal year 2015 budget
    preview in the Pentagon Briefing Room on 24 February 2014.

    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Secretary Hagel went on to say:

          To fulfill this strategy DOD will continue to shift its
            operational focus and forces to the Asia-Pacific, sustain
            commitments to key allies and partners in the Middle East and
            Europe, maintain engagement in other regions, and continue to
            aggressively pursue global terrorist networks.\9\
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        \9\ Hagel, 24 February 2014.

        Global Changes in S&T Impact Technology Development.--The nature of
    the international technology landscape is much different than it was
    even 20 years ago in two fundamental ways:
      --Many technologies of importance to the Department's capability
            developments are driven by the commercial sector, and have
            become a global commodity.
      --The pace of maturation of technology is accelerating; that is,
            technology maturation occurs on a more rapid scale than in the
            past.
        Our DOD S&T community needs to identify areas where technology has
    become a global commodity and not expend resources working to develop
    the same capability. We must track global technology developments,
    harness them and apply the technology to our needs. This year, we have
    initiated a project at the Defense Technical Information Center to
    improve our ability understand global technology development, and are
    in pilot phase to use automated tools to assess technology advances.
        We already know that industry drives most microelectronics and
    semiconductors development; older infrared focal planes, routine
    communications, computers. The technology coming from these sectors is
    sufficient to meet most DOD capability needs. The DOD should be an
    adopter, not a leader in these areas while addressing the unique
    security concerns of these technologies used in our military, cyber and
    IT systems. The DOD should focus our research in technology integration
    or in developing technologies into products at performance levels
    beyond those commercially available or planned. Examples would include
    electronic travelling wave tubes (led by Naval Research Lab), which
    provide higher frequency and higher power output than is needed in
    commercial applications; and infra-red (IR) ``super lattice''
    semiconductors (led by the Army's Night Vision Laboratory), which give
    high enough resolution in IR to make ``movies'' out of simple data and
    images. The DOD should monitor and apply these technologies to meet our
    needs.
        At the same time, we know that the time to mature many technologies
    is decreasing. We have seen the time from invention to market
    penetration decrease by a factor of two over the past half century.
    Consequently, I would like to cite comments made by Mr. Frank Kendall,
    Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics,
    who states that one of the key factors to maintaining technological
    superiority is to maintain a steady investment in technology.

          The effects of time (lost) cannot be reversed. It is well
            understood in the R&D community, and most particularly in the
            S&T community, that the investments we make today may not
            result in capability for a generation. It takes upwards of 5,
            10, even 20 years to develop a new system, test it, and put it
            into production. By taking higher risks and accepting
            inefficiencies and higher costs we can reduce the ``time to
            market'' of new weapon systems; in fact, we have reduced this
            time . . . with reforms put in place in recent years.

        Even during World War II we fought with the systems that had been
    in development for years before the war began. We can shorten, but not
    eliminate the time required to field new cutting edge weapons systems.
    But one thing is for sure, if we do not make R&D investments today, we
    will not have the capability in the future.
        Capability Changes to DOD Technology Superiority.--More significant
    than the changes in how technology is developed and delivered globally
    are changes in military capabilities being developed by other nations.
        I will cite just one example; there are many more. The convergence
    of advanced digital signals and computer processing has given rise to
    proliferation of a new class of system--the digital radio frequency
    memory (DRFM) jammer. DRFM jammers are fairly inexpensive electronic
    systems that ingest the radar (or communications) signal, analyze the
    digital waveform, and then generate random signals, with the same
    waveform, back to the transmitting radar receiver. The result is the
    radar system sees a large number of ``electronic'' targets. If the U.S.
    employed conventional weapons systems using the traditional methods, we
    could shoot at or chase a lot of false targets. The consequence is that
    the U.S. needs to develop a counter to DRFM jammers.
        The convergence of computer processing, digital signal processing,
    digital electronics, optical fibers, and precise timekeeping are giving
    rise to inexpensive enablers that can improve the ability to counter
    conventional weapons platforms. We are starting to see other nations
    advance technologies to counter U.S. overmatch by combining the
    components listed above to enhance capabilities in electronic warfare,
    longer range air-to-air missiles, radars operating in non-conventional
    bandwidths, counter-space capabilities, longer range and more accurate
    ballistic and cruise missiles, improved undersea warfare capabilities,
    as well as cyber and information operations. We see these types of new
    capabilities emerging from many countries; to include China, Iran,
    Russia and North Korea. This has led to a situation where, in the next
    5 to 10 years, U.S. superiority in many warfare domains will be at
    risk. Accordingly, the following section highlights some of the areas
    where we are watching.
        Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD).--The 2013
    National Security Interests published by the Chairman of the Joint
    Chiefs of Staff lists as the top priority interest ``Survival of the
    Homeland''. The one existential threat to the United States comes from
    Weapons of Mass Destruction. Traditionally, WMD has included nuclear,
    chemical and biological weapons and their delivery systems. The
    emergence of new countries with nuclear ambitions, such as North Korea
    and Iran, make today's world much more dangerous. Chemical and
    biological weapons, used in both World Wars, have been resurgent in the
    past two decades. Perhaps the gravest danger for the United States and
    the rest of the world is the possibility of WMD falling into the hands
    of terrorist groups and other groups in the midst of instability. We
    must continue our vigilance in this area and continue to develop ways
    to deal with their use.
        The United States is currently rebalancing to the Asia Pacific
    region. As we do so, the Department is faced with a host of new
    challenges. I will discuss some of the challenges over the next several
    paragraphs.
        Vulnerability of the U.S. Surface Fleet and Forward Bases in the
    Western Pacific.--U.S. Navy ships and Western Pacific bases are
    vulnerable to missile strikes from ballistic and cruise missiles
    already in the inventory. China has prioritized land-based ballistic
    and cruise missile programs to extend their strike warfare capabilities
    further from its borders. Chinese military analysts have concluded that
    logistics and power projection are potential vulnerabilities in modern
    warfare, given the requirements for precision in coordinating
    transportation, communications, and logistics networks. China is
    fielding an array of conventionally armed ballistic missiles, ground-
    and air-launched land-attack cruise missiles, special operations
    forces, and cyber-warfare capabilities to hold targets at risk
    throughout the region. The most mature theater missiles are the DF-21
    C/D, which both have 1,500 km radius. They are also developing a longer
    range missile that would be able to strike as far as Guam. These
    ballistic missiles are coupled with advanced cruise missiles that could
    threaten any surface warfare fleet by 2020.
        The People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy has the largest force of
    major combatants, submarines, and amphibious warfare ships in Asia.
    China's naval forces include some 79 principal surface combatants,\10\
    more than 55 submarines, 55 medium and large amphibious ships, and
    roughly 85 missile-equipped small combatants. The first Chinese-built
    carrier will likely be operational sometime in the second half of this
    decade. In the next decade, China will likely construct the Type 095
    guided-missile attack submarine (SSGN), which may enable a submarine-
    based land-attack capability. In addition to likely incorporating
    better quieting technologies, the Type 095 will likely fulfill
    traditional anti-ship roles with the incorporation of torpedoes and
    anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs). Since 2008, the PLA Navy has also
    embarked on a robust surface combatant construction program of various
    classes of ships, including guided missile destroyers (DDG) and guided
    missile frigates in addition to more modern diesel powered attack
    submarines.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \10\ As of 2013.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        U.S. Air Dominance.--We see the same trend--development of systems
    to push U.S. freedom of movement further from the Asia mainland. China
    is developing an integrated air defense system that could challenge
    U.S. air dominance and in some regions, air superiority is challenged
    by 2020. The challenge to our air dominance comes primarily through the
    aggregation of capabilities starting with an extensive integrated air
    defense system (IADS), moving to development of advanced combat
    aircraft, to enabling technologies, primarily electronic warfare
    capabilities. China is demonstrating a systems approach through
    advanced aircraft design of 5th generation fighters, advanced combat
    systems, and advanced dense long range, networked air defense systems.
    It should be noted that others (such as Iran, Syria, and North Korea)
    are developing well integrated air defense systems. The PLA Air Force
    is continuing a modernization effort to improve its capability to
    conduct offensive and defensive off-shore operations such as strike,
    air and missile defense, strategic mobility, and early warning and
    reconnaissance missions. China continues its development of stealth
    aircraft technology, with the appearance of a second stealth fighter
    following on the heels of the maiden flight of the J-20 in January
    2011, a 5th generation fighter scheduled to enter the operational
    inventory in 2018.
        Vulnerability of U.S. Satellites in Space.--China has been rapidly
    expanding both the number, and quality of space capabilities; expanding
    its space-based intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, navigation,
    meteorological, and communications satellite constellations. In
    parallel, China is developing a multi-dimensional program to rapidly
    improve its capabilities to limit or prevent the use of space-based
    assets by others during times of crisis or conflict.
        China continues to develop the Long March 5 (LM-5) rocket, intended
    to lift heavy payloads into space, doubling the size of the Low Earth
    Orbit (LEO) and Geosynchronous Orbit (GEO) payloads China can place
    into orbit. During 2012, China launched six Beidou navigation
    satellites completing a regional network and the in-orbit validation
    phase for the global network, expected to be completed by 2020. From
    2012-2013 China launched 15 new remote sensing satellites, which can
    perform both civil and military applications. China will likely
    continue to increase its on-orbit constellation with the planned launch
    of 100 satellites through 2015. These launches include imaging, remote
    sensing, navigation, communication, and scientific satellites, as well
    as manned spacecraft.
                       research and engineering strategy
        To address the challenges of an accelerating, globalized research
    and development environment coupled with pressurized DOD budgets and
    the rapid growth of capabilities in other nations, we needed to examine
    the strategy we are using to focus the DOD investment on high priority
    areas.\11\ To develop the research and engineering strategy, we had to
    go back to first principals. Why does the Department conduct research
    and engineering? What does the Department expect the DOD R&E program to
    deliver? After examination, we contend the Department conducts research
    and engineering for three reasons, in priority order:
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \11\ While the priorities listed below capture the cross-DOD
    priorities, there are still individual Service priorities they must
    address. These priorities do not address Naval responsibilities for the
    Ocean, Army responsibilities for the ground or Air Force for the Air.
    Rather, they comprise a set of areas that must be addressed across
    component. It is interesting to note the large efforts in the Services
    and DARPA largely align with the strategy.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
          (1) Mitigate New and Emerging Threat Capabilities.--The
            Department must defend the homeland and overseas forces and
            national interests against threats that exist today, and
            threats that are still in development.
          (2) Affordably Enable New or Extended Capabilities in Existing
            Military Systems.--Coincident with a tighter budget, and the
            fact that time is not recoverable, the DOD R&E program should
            focus on controlling costs, both in existing and future weapons
            systems.
          (3) Develop Technology Surprise.--Finally, throughout the past
            century, the Nation and the Department have looked to the
            Department's R&E program to continually develop and mature new
            capabilities that surprise potential adversaries.
       priority 1: mitigating or eliminating new and emerging threats to
                               national security
        The Department must be prepared to meet its current and future
    national security missions, which include defending the homeland,
    securing freedom of navigation, and being able to project power. The
    research and engineering priorities inherent in this principal also
    include protecting the nation against nuclear, chemical, and biological
    weapons, from both State and non-State actors. This principal also
    includes protecting the nation against new threats, such as cyber
    operations and the proliferation of cruise missiles and UAVs. The final
    emerging vector in this area is to find solutions to the new
    capabilities that would prevent the US armed forces from fulfilling our
    global mission, such as electronic warfare and maintaining space
    capabilities.
        Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (C-WMD).--The Department's
    investment in countering weapons of mass destruction is made primarily
    by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the Chemical Biological
    Defense Program, as well as the Army. All totaled, the Department's
    investment in C-WMD is about $800 million per year. Countering weapons
    of mass destruction poses some unique challenges because of the urgency
    and immediacy of the threats, the fact that threats present low
    probability but high consequence events, and that there is a need for
    on-call, comprehensive expertise. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency
    emphasis for fiscal year 2015 include kinetic and non-kinetic means to
    counter and defeat WMD in non-permissive environments, low visibility
    search (and identification) for all threats (nuclear and chemical/
    biological), global situational awareness through mining large, diverse
    datasets, application of autonomy to reduce risk to the human,
    persistent intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) for WMD,
    WMD modelling and simulation, and operating in a high electromagnetic
    pulse environment. To date, we have not identified the ``silver
    bullet'' solution, so a sizable portion of the C-WMD program involves
    international and interagency partnership.
        Emerging trends over the last year includes the need to counter
    threats as far ``upstream'' or left of event as possible. Therefore,
    the entire C-WMD community is strengthening their program to interdict/
    render safe WMD before they are used.
        Missile Defense.--In fiscal year 2015, the investment in missile
    defense S&T dropped from roughly $350 million in fiscal year 2014 to
    $176 million in fiscal year 2015. Yet, missile defense remains a
    priority. The reduction in missile defense is more than offset the Navy
    and by the Office of the Secretary of Defense efforts in
    electromagnetic rail gun technology; a nearly $200 million investment
    in fiscal year 2015. This push in rail gun is being made to determine
    if the technology is mature enough to field an inexpensive, kinetic
    kill system to intercept theater ballistic missiles in terminal and
    mid-course. The current investment supports demonstration of an
    advanced rail gun against a missile surrogate in 2015.
        Although not a capability that will be fielded soon, the Missile
    Defense Agency continues to look at Directed Energy for missile
    defense. They are the primary investor in both hybrid (diode pumped
    alkaline laser) and fiber lasers. Significant demonstrations for both
    of these directed energy capabilities will occur in 2015 to 2016.
        A strategy based on only kinetic defense which requires a high-end
    US missile intercept against this proliferation of missiles is cost-
    imposing on the United States. Our research and engineering program is
    also working on developing non-kinetic capabilities and less expensive
    kinetic capability to reduce the effectiveness of potential
    adversaries' missiles; we are making strides in this area.
        Cyber and Information Operations.--The Department's investment in
    Cyber S&T in fiscal year 2015 is $510 million. With the growing
    reliance of modern military forces on information technology, cyber
    operations will play an increasingly important role in ensuring
    continuity of missions in the physical domains. Having effective
    technologies to support those cyber operations makes cyber security
    research an essential element in our long-term abilities to defend the
    Nation.
        This year, the Department rebuilt the cyber S&T investment around
    warfighting capability requirements. We have then built a strong
    integrated technical foundation across the Cyber research and
    engineering enterprise through our Cyber Community of Interest, a group
    made up of Senior Executive Service representatives from the Services,
    NSA, and my organization. Our cyber S&T investments are guided by an
    S&T Capabilities Framework that captures new and emerging mission
    requirements including improved situation awareness and course of
    action analysis. The framework has been developed with participation of
    all the Services as well as the Intelligence Community, National
    Laboratories, and our federally Funded Research and Development
    Centers. We are placing emphasis on broadening the research beyond
    standard computing systems to include defending against cyber threats
    to tactical and embedded systems. Our cyber research includes
    investments in providing a testing and evaluation environment for the
    experimentation and testing of cyber technology across the full
    spectrum of capabilities to help validate and accelerate research.
    Additionally, and very importantly, it is a priority for the DOD to be
    an early adopter of emerging technologies in cyber defense and to
    ensure the transition of those products to our warfighters and the
    programs supporting them.
        Though challenges remain in all areas, Cyber S&T is making progress
    and having significant impacts. Over the past few years, our cyber
    investments, from fundamental research through advanced technology
    demonstrations have resulted in many successes that directly benefit
    our warfighters and the broader defense enterprise. Some highlights
    are:
      --Securing our telecommunications infrastructure through
            vulnerability assessment, tool development, and best practice
            dissemination;
      --Developing technologies to accurately geo-locate illicit commercial
            wireless devices to protect our networks;
      --Producing a game-changing approach to signature-free malware
            detection capable of defending against zero-day attacks;
      --Designing a flexible, mission-based interoperability framework
            enabling rapid, low-cost capability integration for our cyber
            operation forces; and
      --Developing tools and techniques that assure the secure operation of
            microprocessors within our weapons platforms and systems.
        This year, in concert with White House Priorities,\12\ we created
    the Cyber Transition to Practice (CTP) Initiative. The goal of this
    initiative is to mature and ultimately transition S&T products to
    operational use. The development of cyber tools frequently happens on a
    time scale much less than the traditional acquisition process. The CTP
    initiative is intended to accelerate fielding of cyber tools.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \12\ This is in direct response to the NSS Cybersecurity FY2014
    Budget Priority of September 11, 2012 (section 4.a of the annex).
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Loss of Assured Space.--Other nations have developed both kinetic
    and non-kinetic means to degrade or deny the U.S. space layer.
    Consequently, the DOD S&T program is working on developing the space
    capabilities our forces rely on whether or not the space layer exists.
    The capability may be degraded, but will also not be vulnerable. Other
    nations are seeking to asymmetrically disrupt our military capabilities
    that depend upon assured satellite communications; global systems for
    positioning, navigation, and timing; and on-demand ISR, even in denied
    areas. The U.S. will respond to these actions through increasing the
    resilience of our space assets so they are free from interference as
    well as develop alternative means to deliver the capabilities we
    currently obtain from our space assets.
        Current technologies in development include, but are not limited to
    the following: improving our space situational awareness capabilities
    employing improved ground- and space-based systems (such as the Air
    Force Research Lab's 2006 demonstration of on-orbit, localized Space
    Situational Awareness), enhanced terrestrial and airborne
    communications or jam resistant communications (such as laser
    communications); novel timing devices decoupled from continuous access
    to GPS (like the Tactical Grade Atomic Clock, projected for transition
    to the acquisition community in 2017); high performance Inertial
    Measurement Units (like DARPA's High Dynamic Range Atom Sensor (HiDRA),
    projected for 2016, and small-form-factor anti-jam GPS antennas); and
    alternative ISR capabilities (which may incorporate advanced electro-
    optic coatings and thermal protections measures under development at
    the Air Force Research Lab). Finally, we have several Joint Capability
    Technology Demonstrations (JCTDs) to determine the viability of
    capabilities delivered from very small satellites. Kestrel Eye and
    Vector JCTDs will demonstrate the viability of small satellite tactical
    communications and ISR by 2016.
        Electronic Warfare (Both Attack and Protection).--The Department's
    investment in electronic warfare (EW) S&T is about $500 million per
    year. This is an area that is evolving rapidly because of technology
    advances. The two key parameters in EW are the frequency the system
    operates and how complex is the signal. The concept behind electronic
    warfare is simple--the goal is to control your electronic signature or
    confuse an opponent's system if you are defending and to simplify the
    overall situation (reject false targets and clutter) if you are
    attempting to use your own electronic systems (radar, communications
    and radio frequency).
        Electronic warfare is becoming important and more critical because
    the enabling technologies underlying frequency and complexity are
    progressing very rapidly. To address the underlying technologies, the
    components have coalesced around a concept called Advanced Components
    for EW (ACE), which is focusing on Integrated Photonic Circuits,
    Millimeter Wave, Electro-Optical and Infrared (EO/IR), and
    Reconfigurable and Adaptive RF electronics. As a whole, these
    technologies should improve simultaneous transmit and receive; expand
    instantaneous bandwidth, and allow a huge leap ahead in complexity. ACE
    kicked off in fiscal year 2013, with the components continuing to
    develop components.
        In addition to the underlying technology, the Services are involved
    in building advanced electronic systems. We will cover two of them. The
    Navy's Integrated Topside program is just completing attempting to use
    multifunction transmitters on the top of a ship. This will reduce the
    number of individual systems with a unique electronic signature, and
    improve ship survivability.
        The Home on GPS-Jam (HOG-J) is a small munition that will identify
    foreign GPS jammers and vector the munition into the jammer. HOG-J has
    had some preliminary successful tests, and could be ready to enter the
    inventory in 2-3 years. There are other EW systems that could be
    covered at the appropriate security level.
     priority 2: affordably enabling new or extending military capabilities
        The cost of Defense acquisition systems continues to be a challenge
    for the Department. Over the past 3 years, the Department introduced
    ``Better Buying Power'' initiatives to improve the cost effectiveness
    of the Defense acquisition system. Cost effectiveness and affordability
    of defense systems starts before the acquisition enterprise kicks in.
    There are two vectors to increasing affordability; technology to lower
    cost and extend life cycle, and research and engineering processes to
    address costs early in system development.
        Systems Engineering.--The Department's systems engineering
    capability and capacity are critical to enabling affordability across
    the system life cycle of an acquisition program. The Department's
    systems engineers drive affordable designs, develop technical plans and
    specifications to support cost-effective procurement, and conduct
    trade-off analyses to meet program cost, schedule and performance
    requirements. Systems engineers are enabling strategies to identify
    opportunities to reduce life-cycle costs. My organization has taken a
    lead role in improving the Department's ability to achieve affordable
    programs through strong SE policy, guidance, dissemination of best
    practices, execution oversight and support for a healthy, qualified
    engineering workforce.
        Through an emphasis on affordability in recently updated policy and
    guidance, the Department has established a clear role for systems
    engineers in defining, establishing, and achieving affordability goals
    and processes throughout the life cycle. Through required systems
    engineering trade space analyses, individual acquisition programs
    establish the cost, schedule and affordability drivers and can
    demonstrate the cost-effective design point for the program. These
    trade space analyses will be conducted across the program's life cycle
    to continuously assess system affordability and technical feasibility
    to support requirements, investments, and acquisition decisions and
    depict the relationships between system life-cycle cost and the
    system's performance requirements, design parameters, and delivery
    schedules. Recent emphasis on better reliability engineering has
    focused the Department's acquisition programs on reducing overall life-
    cycle costs. My systems engineering staff maintains regular and
    frequent engagement with acquisition programs to support the planning
    and execution of effective technical risk management, as well as
    affordability considerations. They provide regular oversight and
    guidance to assist the programs as they mature through the life cycle.
        Developmental Test and Evaluation.--Developmental Test and
    Evaluation (DT&E) efforts focus on engaging major acquisition programs
    early in their life cycle to ensure efficient and effective test
    strategies, thereby ensuring a better understanding of program
    technical risks and opportunities before major milestone decisions. In
    2013, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Developmental Test
    and Engineering (DASD(DTE)) introduced the ``shift left'' concept--
    specifically to drive DT earlier in the acquisition process. Early DT&E
    engagement with programs not only reduces acquisition costs through
    efficient testing, but finding and fixing deficiencies early, well
    before production and operations, drastically reduces overall life-
    cycle costs. The DASD(DT&E) is focusing on a few key areas to improve
    the overall effectiveness of developmental test and evaluation; use of
    the Developmental Evaluation Framework, increased emphasis on testing
    in a mission context, earlier cyber security testing, and an increased
    emphasis on system reliability testing.
        The Developmental Evaluation Framework is a disciplined process
    that results in a clear linkage between program decisions, capability
    evaluation, evaluation information needs, and test designs. Using the
    Developmental Evaluation Framework provides an efficient, yet rigorous
    T&E strategy to inform the program's decisions. Developmental Test and
    Evaluation is also moving beyond the traditional technical test focus
    to include testing in a mission context to characterize capabilities
    and limitations before production. Robust DT&E should also include
    early cyber security testing that previously was not tested until late
    in the acquisition life cycle, where deficiencies are costly to fix.
    Finally DT&E is focusing on increased system reliability testing.
    System reliability is a major driver in the affordability of future
    weapon systems. Improved reliability information early in the program
    allows acquisition leadership to understand the program technical and
    cost risks and take steps to improve system reliability and therefore
    the affordability of the system.
        Prototyping.--Another way to drive down costs of weapons systems is
    through the expanded use of prototypes, which we use to prove a concept
    or system prior to going to formal acquisition. Consequently, in fiscal
    year 2015, we look to expand the use of developmental and operational
    prototyping to advance our strategic shift to a greater emphasis on
    future threats. In fiscal year 2015, the Department's investment in
    prototypes or prototype like activities is around $900 million. This
    includes activities that are not classical prototype efforts, but will
    demonstrate capabilities, such as the Navy's Future Naval Capabilities,
    Integrated Naval Prototypes, the Army's Joint Multi-role Helicopter and
    Future Fighting Vehicle, as well as Air Force Flagship programs, and
    the revamping of the Department's Joint Capability Technology
    Demonstrations and Emerging Capabilities Technology Development
    programs.
        The RAND Corporation provides a good definition for prototyping,
    describing it as ``a set of design and development activities to reduce
    technical uncertainty and to generate information to improve the
    quality of subsequent decisionmaking.'' \13\ We distinguish between two
    types of prototyping activities. Developmental prototyping demonstrates
    feasibility of promising emerging technologies and helps those
    technologies overcome technical risk barriers. Operational prototyping
    focuses on assessing military utility and integration of more mature
    technologies.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \13\ ``From Marginal Adjustments to Meaningful Change'', pg 64,
    Jeffrey Drezner and Meilinda Huang, RAND Corporation, 2010.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        A recent example of an operational prototype is Instant Eye, a one
    pound quad-copter. We outfitted Instant Eye with an electro-optical
    camera and IR illuminator, bringing a field repairable, overhead
    surveillance capability to the soldier in the field at a unit cost of
    less than $1,000. Instant Eye would go on to provide targeting
    information for the neutralization of seven insurgents waiting to
    ambush a U.S. combat patrol.
        Joint Multi-Effects Warhead System (JMEWS) is a good example of a
    higher-risk, higher reward developmental prototype. The JMEWS project
    took on the challenge of in-flight targeting and re-tasking of the
    Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM). JMEWS' flexible lethality
    increases the combat power of these expensive weapons by tailoring the
    TLAM flight profile for best effect, taking advantage of information
    often not available until after the weapon has launched. With the
    developmental prototyping effort demonstrating the essential technical
    aspects, all that remains for Navy is to integrate JMEWS into the TLAM
    program of record.
        Throughout the history of the Department, periods of fiscal
    constraint have been marked by the use of prototypes to mature
    technology and keep design teams active in advancing the state of
    practice. We will use prototyping to demonstrate capability early in
    the acquisition process. Prototyping will also be used to improve
    capability development methods and manufacturing techniques, evaluate
    new concepts, and rapidly field initial quantities of new systems.
    Prototyping's ability to evaluate and reduce technical risk, and
    clarify the resource picture that drives costs makes it a critical
    piece of the larger research and engineering strategy. Put simply, by
    prototyping in research and engineering, we can focus on key knowledge
    points and burn down the risk before the risk reduction becomes
    expensive.
        Energy and Power.--Energy and Power Technology has a strong focus
    of reducing DOD operational energy risks and costs. Power requirements
    of new DOD systems continue to grow every year, and energy is a major
    cost driver and logistic burden. The Department spends approximately
    $300 million per year on Energy and Power science and technology. Some
    significant programs are:
          Unmanned Underwater Vehicles--Air Independent Propulsion (UUV-
            AIP).--The Navy program is developing and delivering long
            endurance, scalable air-independent propulsion solutions for
            UUVs. Highly efficient fuel cell technologies will provide
            extended mission duration in excess of 60 days, well beyond the
            current and projected capability of batteries. Fuel cells are
            also being assessed by other Services to extend duration of
            UAVs and UGVs. These systems are already spinning out to
            industry.
          The Integrated Vehicle Energy Technology (INVENT).--The Air Force
            INVENT program is developing power and thermal management
            technologies and architectures that not only address today's
            aircraft performance limits but also work with adaptive cycle
            engines to enable next generation game changing high power
            airborne capabilities. There are related Service initiatives to
            realize higher performance, more fuel efficient designs for
            rotorcraft and ground vehicles.
          Advanced Vehicle Power Technology Alliance (AVPTA).--The Army is
            working collaboratively with DoE (with secondary partners from
            the National Labs, industry and academia) to accelerate energy-
            related R&D initiatives into new vehicle designs. Current
            efforts include: (1) advanced combustion, engines and
            transmission with the help of Sandia National Laboratory; (2)
            examination of lightweight structures for vehicles (partnering
            with General Dynamics); (3) energy recovery and thermal
            management for improved efficiency and reduced emissions
            (industry partner, Gentherm); (4) advanced fuels and
            lubricants; (5) integrated starter-generators (ISGs) without
            rare earth permanent magnet materials (partners, Remy Intl and
            Oak Ridge National Laboratory); and (6) computer-aided
            engineering for electric drive batteries (CAEBAT).
        Engineered Resilient Systems.--To address the need for more
    affordable and mission-resilient warfighting systems, we are developing
    an integrated suite of modern computational modeling and simulation
    (M&S) capabilities and engineering tools aligned with acquisition and
    operational business processes to transform engineering environments
    under the Engineered Resilient Systems (ERS) initiative. The ERS tool
    suite allows warfighters, engineers, and acquisition decisionmakers to
    rapidly assess the cost and performance of potential system designs by
    providing many data-driven alternatives resulting in systems which are
    less sensitive to changes in external threats, mission needs, and
    program constraints. ERS has already demonstrated that the insertion of
    advanced S&T models, tools and techniques into early phases of
    engineering processes and decisionmaking will positively impact
    effectiveness, affordability and sustainability of defense systems,
    thus addressing these most critical challenges head on. These new M&S-
    based frameworks adopt the most advanced design and modeling approaches
    of government, industry and academia to enable our Nation to meet
    emergent threat, while insuring that we can do that affordably, today
    and in an uncertain future.
         priority 3: creating technology surprise through science and
                                  engineering
        The third and final reason the Department conducts research and
    engineering is to create surprise to potential adversaries. Previous
    Department of Defense investment in basic and applied research has a
    long history of developing technologies that led to superior
    capabilities. The DOD research program led to stealth, the Internet,
    synthetic aperture radar, precision weapons, infra-red focal planes and
    night vision devices, among others. Frequently, when investing in basic
    research, we don't know the specific application that will emerge; in
    fact, by definition, basic research is conducted without a specific
    product or system in mind.
        The Department invests in a structured way to create surprise.
    Creation of surprise requires a robust basic research program coupled
    with a strong applied research. While it is not really possible to know
    where technology surprise will come from, there are several areas that
    highlight the possibility; we will discuss several of them in
    increasing level of maturity. The least mature is quantum science,
    followed by nanotechnology, autonomous systems, human systems, and then
    finally, directed energy systems.
        Quantum Sciences.--The discoveries a century ago of the quantum
    properties of the atom and the photon defined and propelled most of the
    new technology of the 20th century--semiconductors, computers,
    materials, communication, lasers--the technological basis of much of
    our civilization. Now, the next quantum revolution may define new
    technological directions for the 21st century, building upon the
    intersection of quantum science and information theory. Consequently,
    the DOD is increasing its basic research investment in Quantum
    Information Science (QIS). QIS exploits our expanded quantum
    capabilities in the laboratory to engineer new properties and states of
    matter and light literally at the atomic scale. We are already
    developing new capabilities in secure communication, ultra-sensitive
    and high signal to noise physical sensing of the environment, and a
    path to exponentially faster computing algorithms in special purpose
    computers. The DOD research funding has driven quantum sciences in the
    past decade. This funding has led to the demonstration to measure time
    through cold atom research at 1,000 times more accurate than GPS. Using
    quantum sciences, the DOD is likely within 10 years of fielding an
    affordable timekeeping system that will cut our tether to GPS. We are
    building in the laboratory gravity sensors of unprecedented
    sensitivity, opening the possibility of remote detection of tunnels (or
    submarines). Other military applications are just being realized, but
    quantum science is a technology that will provide surprise.
        Nanoengineering/Nanotechnology.--QIS is based on the ability to
    control atoms. Nanoengineering also deals with the ability to develop
    and engineer systems at the molecular level. This will, in turn, lead
    to new system level capabilities. For instance, one of the limitations
    to systems like directed energy is thermal management. By designing
    systems at the molecular level, it is possible to increase thermal
    management by several orders of magnitude. Materials like
    ``metamaterials'' (engineered materials for specific properties)
    provide a promise of development of radars and electromagnetic systems
    that operate much more effectively at much broader frequency ranges.
    Metamaterials are especially intriguing because through clever design
    and dissimilar materials integration, properties that are never seen in
    nature's materials may be obtained. An example from the Navy's
    fundamental research realm is the investigation of a metamaterial
    suitable for antennas. This material system could become transparent to
    radio frequency waves when exposed to high power radio frequency
    radiation or pulses, preventing the coupling of this energy to an
    aircraft's electronic systems and, thereby, avoiding damage. Engineered
    nanomaterials and nanotechnology research remain very competitive in
    our research portfolio for their potential to provide capability
    advantage. Both the Navy and Army have explored coatings based on
    materials with nanometer dimensions that have wear and corrosion
    resistance superior to traditional and often hazardous metals. Most
    recently a nanocrystalline coating based on nickel-tungsten alloys has
    demonstrated properties exceeding hard chromium coatings without the
    potential environmental problems of chromium. One of the most exciting
    applications for engineered nanomaterials for defense and the whole
    economy is catalysts. The Air Force is supporting research on
    nanoparticle catalysts that are much more efficient in eliminating
    methane, a greenhouse gas, from exhausts while using the same quantity
    of the precious metal palladium and the rare earth element cerium.
    Energetic nanomaterials comprise one area of nanotechnology that is of
    interest primarily to defense at this time. The Army is examining
    highly reactive, energetic materials based on metals and metal oxides
    that are much less sensitive that traditional explosives. Because the
    DOD is committed to prudent development and application of new
    materials, we are studying the materials for any potentially unusual
    toxic properties based on their chemistry or extremely small particle
    size.
        Autonomy.--A major cost driver to the Department of Defense is the
    force structure but, technology is maturing to augment the human,
    possibly keeping the warfighter out of harm's way and reducing the
    numbers of warfighters needed to conduct operations. Autonomous
    capabilities range from software to aid the intelligence analyst in
    processing exploitation dissemination (PED) through very complex
    networked autonomous air systems working in tandem with unmanned ground
    or undersea vehicles. We could field simple autonomous systems within a
    couple of years, but true autonomy will take years to realize.
    Autonomous systems are truly multidisciplinary, in that they rely on
    technologies ranging from sensors that understand the environment, to
    software algorithms that aid decisionmaking or decide to seek human
    assistance. Through autonomy, we seek to reduce the manpower required
    to conduct missions, while extending and complementing human
    capabilities. The Department has four technical areas of focus for
    investments in Autonomy: Human and Agent System Interaction and
    Collaboration; Scalable Teaming of Autonomous Systems; Machine
    perception, Reasoning and Intelligence; and Test, Evaluation,
    Validation, and Verification. Built around these four technical areas,
    we launched an experiment last year to develop an in-house capacity in
    autonomous systems. This experiment, called the Autonomy Research Pilot
    Initiative (ARPI), funded seven proposals to work on technologies in
    one of the four technical areas above. The awards were for 3 years, and
    had to be completed in DOD laboratories by DOD personnel. ARPI efforts
    include: Autonomous Squad Member--enabling robots to participate in
    squad-level missions alongside soldiers; and Realizing Autonomy via
    Intelligent Adaptive Hybrid Control-increasing robustness and
    transparency of autonomous control to improve teaming of unmanned
    vehicles with each other and with their human operators. Advancement of
    technologies from the successful Department investment in the four
    technical areas will result in autonomous systems that provide more
    capability to warfighters, reduce the cognitive load on operators/
    supervisors, and lower overall operational cost.
        Human Systems.--Previous wars were won by massing power through
    weapons systems. It is not clear that will be the case in future
    conflicts. With the proliferation of sensors and data, future conflicts
    may well be won by the person that can react quickest. Studies of human
    cognition suggest that cognitive response times can be reduced by using
    display systems that present information using multiple sensory
    modalities. Such a reduction would give the force that is enabled with
    these technologies the ability to process more information, faster than
    their adversaries. Additionally, we are learning how to tailor training
    to adapt to individual students' unique needs, leading to reductions in
    the time needed to acquire expertise. Reducing the time to train forces
    to an advanced level of competence offers another way to respond faster
    than our adversaries. Additionally, robots, unmanned vehicles and other
    advanced technologies continue to be deeply integrated with our
    warfighters. We are developing new methodologies and technologies to
    enable our warfighters to interact with these systems as naturally as
    they do with their human counterparts leading to faster and more
    accurate responses by these ``hybrid teams''. Lastly, we are optimizing
    warfighter physical and cognitive performance for long durations, in
    dynamic and unpredictable environments, through personalized
    conditioning and nutritional regimens.
        Directed Energy.--One of the most mature ``game changing''
    technology areas is Directed Energy, and specifically, High Energy
    Lasers. High Energy Lasers have been promised for many years, but these
    lasers were always based on chemical lasers, which are difficult to
    support logistically, and the byproducts are toxic. Over the past
    several years, however, solid state (electric) lasers have matured,
    largely through the Joint High Power Solid State Laser, a cross DOD
    effort to develop a 100 kilowatt (KW) laser. At close range, 10-30 KW
    is lethal. The JHPSSL was demonstrated in 2009. Since then, the
    Services have worked on packaging a solid state laser that could be
    deployed. In summer 2014, a 30 KW laser will be prototyped on the USS
    Ponce in the CENTCOM area of responsibility. In December 2013, the Army
    demonstrated the High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator at White Sands
    missile range. This 10 KW laser successfully engaged nearly 90 percent
    of the available targets. This system will be further demonstrated in a
    maritime environment at Eglin Air Force Base.
                                  reliance 21
        The Department's Research and Engineering (R&E) Enterprise is wide-
    ranging, and is the foundation of the Department's technological
    strength. The enterprise includes DOD laboratories and product centers,
    other government laboratories, federally funded research and
    development centers (FFRDC's) and University affiliated research
    centers (UARCs), U.S. and allied universities, our allied and partner
    government laboratories, as well as industry. Last year I took the
    opportunity to brief the members of this Committee as my impetus to
    develop a strategy for the R&E Enterprise; this strategy was discussed
    earlier. What is important this year is putting in place the structure
    to attempt to optimize the S&T investment. Consequently, the
    Department's S&T Executives and I have worked to put in place Reliance
    21. Under Reliance 21, most of the Department's S&T program will be
    managed in one of 17 cross-cutting portfolios. Each of these portfolios
    will be made up of Senior Executive or Senior Leader from each Service
    and Agency with investment in the area. These teams are building
    integrated roadmaps, and beginning the process of integrating allied
    and industry efforts onto our roadmaps. Each year, about one third of
    the portfolios will be reviewed, in depth to the S&T Executives, who
    will approve or redirect the roadmaps. The roadmap will include the
    technical and operational objective, the critical technical efforts
    needed to meet the objective, the gaps to reaching the objectives, and
    an assessment of where the portfolio leads recommend changes. The 17
    portfolios are all called Communities of Interest (COI). Done
    correctly, management of a large portion of the Department's S&T
    execution will be collaboratively achieved by the COIs.
                what congress can do for the defense s&t program
        We are the most technologically advanced military in the world but,
    as Secretary Hagel so aptly stated in his remarks on the 24th of
    February of this year, ``we must maintain our technological edge over
    potential adversaries''.\14\ I have outlined what we are doing with the
    resources that we have been given and what we plan to do with the
    resources in the fiscal year 2015 President's budget. Success, however,
    will depend on your support. In that regard I have two requests.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \14\ Hagel, 24 February 2014.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        I ask that you enact the Research, Development, Test and Evaluation
    portion of the President's Budget as submitted. We spent a lot of time
    to balance the program to best meet DOD priorities.
        The President's budget seeks funding for fiscal year 2016-2021 that
    is above the estimated sequestration levels under current law. As
    pointed out earlier, with no relief from the BCA in the out years, we
    expect modernization and readiness accounts to bear the brunt. This
    would heighten the increased risk we are already seeing. Simply, at
    that sequestration level, we expect continued erosion of the S&T and
    RDT&E accounts.
        Second, I would ask that you support our efforts in prototyping. We
    are expanding the use of developmental and operational prototyping in
    lieu of formal acquisition programs. Throughout the history of the
    Department, during periods of fiscal constraint, the Department has
    used prototypes to mature technology and keep design teams intact and
    moving forward. Prototyping has another advantage--it allows the
    Department to build a capability early in the acquisition process,
    before all the structure affiliated with the acquisition process
    begins. By prototyping in research and engineering, we can acquire
    valuable knowledge and buy down risk and lead time to production at
    relatively low cost.
                                    closing
        In summary, the last year has been a challenge to the Department's
    S&T program. The risk to our force is growing, and the need for the S&T
    community is likewise increasing. We have shifted our focus to
    protecting the future by countering anti-access, area-denial threats,
    addressing the increasing complexity of adversary's weapons systems,
    shortening the maturation time of developing our own systems, and
    addressing the erosion of the United States' stature in international
    science markers. We need your help to remove the crippling uncertainty
    associated with sequestration so that we can transition to the balance
    of force structure, readiness and modernization the country needs and
    deserves from us.

        Senator Durbin. Thank you.
        Dr. Prabhakar.
    STATEMENT OF DR. ARATI PRABHAKAR, DIRECTOR, DEFENSE
                ADVANCED RESEARCH PROJECTS AGENCY
        Dr. Prabhakar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Cochran,
    and members of the subcommittee. It is very good to be here
    today with my colleagues, and I appreciate the chance to talk
    with you all.
        DARPA is part of this Defense Department's science and
    technology community. We are also part of the larger national
    ecosystem for research and development. Within these
    communities, we have a particular role and that role is to make
    the pivotal early investments that change what is possible so
    that we can take big strides forward in our national security
    capabilities.
        And very much in keeping with your comments, Mr. Chairman,
    DARPA too was started in the wake of Sputnik. So we have been
    around pursuing that mission for 56 years. We were created
    precisely to prevent that kind of technological surprise that
    Sputnik had created for us. We have delivered on our mission
    for 56 years by creating a few surprises of our own, and while
    our output is technology, we really count our successes when
    those technologies change outcomes. So every time a stealth
    aircraft evades an air defense system, every time a soldier on
    the ground can place himself precisely using GPS so that he can
    call for fires, every time that a radar tells a carrier strike
    group about a threat that is out there long before it sees us,
    that is when we have succeeded in our mission at DARPA because
    in each of those cases, we made those early investments. We
    showed what was possible.
        And in every one of those cases, it took a much larger
    community to turn those ideas into real capabilities. Of
    course, it took our partners that we work with very closely
    across the services in science and technology. It also took the
    services' further development work and acquisition efforts.
    Every one of these technologies traces back to research often
    conducted in universities or other labs. Every one of these
    advances relied on industry, defense, and commercial industry,
    large companies and small. And at the end of the day, it took
    warfighters to turn those technologies into real military
    capabilities.
        So that is how that whole ecosystem works for that DARPA
    portion of it. That mission that we have had of breakthrough
    technologies for national security has not changed over 56
    years. The world in which we work continues to change, but that
    core mission is still why our people charge through the front
    doors every single morning.
        And so let me just share with you a few of the things that
    we are doing today to deliver on our mission in the context of
    the world that we are living in.
        One thing that we see happening today is that the classic
    approach to major military systems has gotten so costly and
    inflexible that it is really not going to be effective for the
    challenges that we are going to face in the future. So a number
    of our investments at DARPA are rethinking complex military
    systems, and we are coming up with powerful, new approaches for
    new radars and weapons, new ways to do navigation and
    communications, new ways to architect space systems.
        In a very different arena, we can see the massive scale of
    information changing every aspect of national security. So here
    we are creating first a new breed of cybersecurity technologies
    so that we can actually trust the information that we have
    become so reliant on.
        We are also inventing new tools to keep up with and to
    start using this explosion of data. One example is a new
    program that we have that is tackling the networks involved in
    human trafficking. Today these trafficking networks very easily
    can hide in the vast data that is online. So really finding
    ways to see those bad actors in vast volumes of data is part of
    the objective of our programs.
        And then in a very wide range of research areas today, we
    see the seeds of what could be the next generation of
    technological surprise. One area that I think is quite vibrant
    right now is in the research where biology is intersecting with
    engineering. And here we are investing to create the capability
    to outpace the spread of infectious disease, to understand and
    even harness brain function, and to speed the development of
    new chemistries and materials coming out of synthetic biology.
        So, obviously, I would be happy to talk about any of these
    or other efforts in the DARPA portfolio.
        But let me just end my remarks this morning by saying that
    when I talk with our leaders in the Pentagon and here on
    Capitol Hill, I often feel that I can see the weight of our
    national security challenges weighing on them and on you. I
    think we all feel it. We do live in a volatile world. We all
    see the shifting threats. We are all dealing with constrained
    budgets and the corrosive effects of sequestration. But I also
    know that American innovation has turned the tide time and
    again, and I am really confident that the work that we are all
    doing today can do that again for the years to come.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        Your support to make that possible to this point has been
    essential. So I really thank you for that. I would also like to
    ask for your full support of the President's budget request for
    fiscal year 2015 so that we can continue these vital
    investments.
        Thank you, and I look forward to answering your questions
    along with my colleagues.
        [The statement follows:]
                   Prepared Statement of Dr. Arati Prabhakar
        Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran and Members of the
    Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before you
    today. I am Arati Prabhakar, Director of the Defense Advanced Research
    Projects Agency, DARPA. It is a pleasure to be here with my colleagues
    across the Department of Defense (DOD) Science and Technology (S&T)
    community. Our organizations work together every day to advance our
    Nation's defense technologies. DARPA plays a particular role in this
    community, and in the broader U.S. technology ecosystem. That role is
    to anticipate, create, and demonstrate breakthrough technologies that
    are outside and beyond conventional approaches--technologies that hold
    the potential for extraordinary advances in national security
    capability. This mission and our current work and plans are the focus
    of my testimony today.
           darpa's mission and the diverse threats facing our nation
        In the fall of 1957, a polished metal sphere, 23 inches in diameter
    and launched from Soviet soil, began its orbit around the Earth,
    passing over American skies approximately every 96 minutes and
    initiating the space age, a space race, and a new era in the long
    struggle to maintain American military and technological superiority.
    Starting DARPA was one of the pivotal choices our Nation made in the
    wake of Sputnik. America today enjoys a hard-earned, privileged
    position, with tremendous military might, economic strength, and social
    and political freedom. Yet, as this Subcommittee knows well, risk is
    ever evolving in our complex and dynamic world. Regional instability,
    shifting military and economic positions, demographic and natural
    resource trends--these forces drive constant change in our national
    security environment. Today and in the years ahead, our potential
    adversaries will still include nation states, but also smaller, less
    well defined bad actors and an increasingly networked terror threat.
    National security challenges will continue to range from the acute to
    the chronic. This is the threat environment that shapes our technology
    investments today at DARPA.
        Adding to the security challenges we face is the fact that
    technology and its accessibility have changed so significantly.
    Startlingly powerful technologies--semiconductors, information systems,
    and nuclear and biological technologies among them--are now globally
    available to a much wider swath of society, for good and for evil. And
    while the cost of some technologies has dropped precipitously, other
    technology and non-technology related costs have risen steeply, leading
    DOD to make difficult choices about our operational capabilities. That
    means our assumptions about the cost of military systems must change.
    These factors will also continue to shape our investments at DARPA.
        DARPA was designed and built for just this kind of shifting,
    challenging threat environment. Through more than 5 decades of
    tumultuous geopolitical and technological change, we have delivered
    outsized impact by focusing on our mission of breakthrough technologies
    for national security. We imagine groundbreaking new technology
    advances with the potential for defense applications. We bring the best
    of those ideas to fruition by providing the right mix of research
    support, intellectual freedom, and responsible oversight to outstanding
    performers in industry, academia, and other government organizations.
    And we facilitate the transition and operationalization of these new,
    paradigm-shifting capabilities.
     harnessing complexity to create exceptional new capabilities: darpa's
                                    programs
        Like most truly great problems that confront us, today's diverse
    threats can either be viewed as an imposing barrier or as an
    opportunity to overcome a difficult challenge. Either way, I believe
    our national security will depend upon how we deal with complexity.
    DARPA chooses to tackle complexity by harnessing it, and our programs
    reflect that approach of playing offense. We do that with game-changing
    new capabilities and with layered, adaptable, multi-technology systems.
    We do that by catalyzing major new national technology advances and by
    rapidly exploiting commercially available technologies. And at a time
    when systems cost is the difference between building operational
    capability or just building PowerPoint, we do that by striving to
    invert the cost equation for our military.
        DARPA has made important strides forward in delivering key
    breakthrough technologies. In discussing how we are tackling various
    aspects of technological complexity, I will update you on several new
    programs that we have launched, results we have achieved, and
    transitions that have been accomplished or are in process.
    Rethinking Complex Military Systems
        Much of DARPA's work rethinks complex military systems, recasting
    today's approach with the intention of achieving far greater
    capabilities at lower cost. Today, our military relies upon the meshing
    of electronic, optical, software, and mechanical components to create
    satellites and the vehicles, aircraft, and ships that carry our
    Warfighters into battle. We also depend upon this integration of
    components in designing and producing the weapons these men and women
    must be prepared to use. That is not new. But today, these technology
    components are becoming ever more complex. Consider: radar systems have
    thousands of antenna elements, platforms run millions of lines of code,
    and integrated circuits are made of billions of transistors. These many
    components are also now interdependent and interacting to an
    unprecedented degree. And, of course, these platforms and mission
    systems must operate in an environment that will be increasingly
    contested by others with access to ever-improving global technologies.
    All these factors contribute to the high cost, long development times,
    and inflexibility of today's most advanced systems. This demands that
    we rethink--sometimes in fundamental ways--how we approach the next
    generation of defense systems.
        Let me give you a few examples of how DARPA is tackling this
    challenge from our portfolio of programs.
                Robust Space
        In times of conflict, our Nation's leaders count on our military to
    wage precise, overpowering war. This type of highly effective
    warfighting is critically dependent on space--for imaging and sensing,
    for communications, for navigation, even for keeping time. As never
    before, we require ready access to space and strategic control over our
    assets in space. But while space is becoming increasingly important,
    it's also becoming increasingly crowded and contested, and DOD's
    ability to access and operate in space has become less nimble and more
    expensive over many years. DARPA has several programs underway to
    change that equation.
                    Rapid Launch: Experimental Space Plane (XS-1) and
                        Airborne Launch Assisted Space Access (ALASA)
        Imagine a world in which getting a satellite into orbit can be as
    quick and reliable as an aircraft takeoff. Our new Experimental
    Spaceplane is designed to take a 3,000- to 5,000-pound payload into
    orbit using an expendable upper stage, all for under $5 million; that
    is one-tenth the cost of a comparable launch today. Our ALASA program
    focuses on 100-pound payloads for less than $1 million. Even more
    striking is our goal of providing satellite launches for these payloads
    with just 24 hours' notice.
                    Avoiding Collisions in Space: Space Surveillance
                        Telescope (SST)
        In space, one major challenge is simply a lack of knowledge of what
    is around you. With satellite traffic and the risk of space collisions
    growing, space domain awareness is a top priority. DARPA's SST enables
    much faster discovery and tracking of previously unseen, hard-to-find
    objects in geosynchronous orbits. We expect it to be ready for
    operations within 2 years in Australia as a result of a memorandum of
    understanding signed last November by Secretary of Defense Hagel with
    his counterpart. Once operational on the Northwest Cape of Australia,
    SST will provide detection and tracking of satellites and space debris
    at and near geosynchronous orbits within the Asia-Pacific region,
    information U.S. space operators can use to better protect critical
    U.S. and Allied space-based capabilities.
                    Lowering the Risk and Cost for Satellites
        Communications satellites in geosynchronous orbit, approximately
    36,000 kilometers above the Earth, provide vital communication
    capabilities to Warfighters and others. Today, when a satellite fails,
    we usually face the expensive prospect of having to launch a brand new
    replacement. Our Phoenix program strives to develop and demonstrate
    technology to robotically service, maintain, and construct satellites
    in the harsh environment of geosynchronous orbit. Phoenix is also
    exploring a paradigm change to satellite design that would enable
    ground and on-orbit assemble-able platforms to potentially lower the
    cost of next-generation space systems by a factor of 10 compared to
    what is possible today.
                Winning in Contested Environments
        Space is not the only environment that is growing more crowded and
    dangerous. We must always anticipate an actively contested environment
    as we look ahead to potential challenges from future adversaries.
    Today, we are dependent on centralized command and control, and the
    fragile lines of communications linking tactical assets to decision
    makers. While DARPA has multiple programs addressing these challenges
    for the air, ground and sea, a common thread is the development of
    technologies to shift and distribute capability at the forward edge of
    the battle and to adapt quickly to a changing technology landscape.
                    Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM)
        Today's anti-ship missiles face challenges penetrating
    sophisticated air defense systems from long range. As a result,
    Warfighters may require multiple missile launches and overhead
    targeting assets to engage specific enemy warships from beyond the
    reach of counter-fire systems. In important progress to overcome these
    challenges, the DARPA-Navy LRASM program has had a series of successful
    flight tests on a precision-guided anti-ship standoff missile. That
    will reduce dependence on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance
    platforms, network links, and Global Positioning System (GPS)
    navigation in electronic warfare environments. DARPA is collaborating
    with the Navy via a new joint program office, helping to move this
    leap-ahead capability to deployment very quickly.
                    Distributed Battle Management (DBM) and Communications
                        in Contested Environments (C2E)
        Under our Air Dominance Initiative, DARPA, the Air Force and the
    Navy together have been exploring systems-of-systems concepts in which
    networks of manned and unmanned platforms, weapons, sensors and
    electronic warfare systems interact to succeed in a contested
    battlespace. These approaches could offer flexible and powerful options
    to the Warfighter, but the complexity introduced by the increase in the
    number of employment alternatives--particularly in a dynamic
    situation--creates a battle management challenge. Further complicating
    matters, in future conflicts U.S. forces may face degradation or denial
    of critical communications capabilities essential for coordination and
    shared situational understanding.
        We recently launched two programs that address these challenges.
    The Distributed Battle Management (DBM) program seeks to develop
    control algorithms and demonstrate robust decision-aid software for air
    battle management at the tactical edge. Our new Communications in
    Contested Environments (C2E) program is, at the same time, exploring
    the use of reference architectures to enable robust, scalable and
    rapidly evolvable airborne communications networks.
                Dominating the Electromagnetic Spectrum
        The challenge of the threat environment extends to the airwaves as
    well, a reality that also is beginning to affect commercial and civil
    activity as demand continues to grow for access to the electromagnetic
    spectrum. The United States and our Allies learned an important lesson
    in World War II, when we became the first to control and take advantage
    of one small part of the spectrum--the range occupied by radar. By many
    assessments, Allied dominance in radar technology was pivotal to our
    winning that crucial war. Today we can say that the next war may be won
    by the nation that controls the electromagnetic spectrum over the full
    range of wavelengths--a degree of control that can ensure dominance in
    communications and in the important linked domains of timing, location
    and navigation. It also can ensure dominance in seeing what our
    adversaries are doing, and in controlling what they see of us--both our
    capacity to hide things from their sensors and our capacity to make
    ``visible'' an array of things that are not really there.
                    Spectrum Challenge
        One approach to dominating the spectrum is simply to be more
    nimble, both in sensing and using whatever portions of the spectrum are
    available. Radios, for example, lack agility, despite the fact that
    they are used for the most mundane to the most critical of
    communications, from garage door openers to first responders to
    military operations. Wireless devices often inadvertently interfere
    with and disrupt radio communications, and, in battlefield
    environments, adversaries may intentionally jam friendly
    communications. To stimulate the development of radio techniques that
    can overcome these impediments, DARPA launched its Spectrum Challenge,
    a national competition to develop advanced radio technology capable of
    communicating in congested and contested electromagnetic environments
    without direct coordination or spectrum preplanning. We expect to see a
    massive increase in innovation when the teams return for the final part
    of the Challenge with promising results for future applications.
                    Moving to New Frequency Domains: Terahertz Electronics
                        (THz)
        Another way to control the spectrum is to move to new frequency
    domains, where hardware limitations currently prevent us from operating
    effectively. The submillimeter wave, or terahertz, part of the
    electromagnetic spectrum falls between the frequencies of 0.3 and 3
    terahertz, between microwaves and infrared light. Unlocking this band's
    potential may benefit military applications such as high-data-rate
    communications, improved radar, and new methods of sensing. But access
    to these applications has been limited due to physics and our limited
    understanding.
        Researchers under DARPA's Terahertz Electronics (THz) program have
    designed and demonstrated a 0.85 terahertz power amplifier using a
    micromachined vacuum tube; we believe it to be a world first. The
    vacuum tube power amplifier is one achievement of the broader THz
    program, which seeks to develop a variety of breakthrough component and
    integration technologies necessary to 1 day build complex terahertz
    circuits for communications and sensing.
        Many more DARPA programs also rethink complex military systems.
    These include efforts to use the undersea environment to observe and
    access regions around the world; to rapidly bring advances in
    commercial technology to the battlefield; to develop hypersonic
    technologies for advanced speed, reach and range; and to create new
    distributed architectures for the contested environments of the future.
    Information at Scale
        Let's consider a different aspect of complexity. As the information
    revolution continues, the sheer scale and variety of data seems
    immensely, and perhaps overwhelmingly, complex--but this challenge also
    presents major opportunities.
                  Insight to Enhance Analysts' Capabilities and Performance
        Military intelligence analysts face the monumental and escalating
    task of analyzing massive volumes of complex data from multiple,
    diverse sources such as physical sensors, human contacts, and
    contextual databases. DARPA's Insight program addresses the need for
    new tools and automation to enhance analyst capabilities and
    performance. The program seeks to enable analysts to make sense of the
    huge volumes of intelligence-rich information available to them from
    existing sensors and data sources. Automated behavioral learning and
    prediction algorithms help analysts discover and identify potential
    threats, as well as make and confirm hypotheses about those threats'
    potential behavior. The goal is a comprehensive operating picture in
    which expedient delivery of fused actionable intelligence improves
    support of time-sensitive operations on the battlefield. We are working
    closely with the Army and the Air Force to transition operational
    capabilities to programs of record.
                    MEMEX: A Different Approach to Search
        Despite the vast amounts of data available, today's Web searches
    use a centralized, one-size-fits-all approach that searches the
    Internet with the same set of tools for all queries. While that model
    has been wildly successful commercially, it does not work well for many
    government use cases. Current search practices miss information in the
    deep Web--the parts of the Web not indexed by standard commercial
    search engines--and ignore shared content across pages.
        To help overcome these challenges, DARPA launched the Memory and
    Exploration of the Internet for Defense (MEMEX) program. This ambitious
    effort seeks to develop domain-specific search technologies and
    revolutionize the discovery, organization and presentation of the types
    of search results needed for national security concerns. MEMEX's
    initial focus will be human trafficking, which is a factor in many
    types of military, law enforcement and intelligence investigations and
    has a significant Web presence to attract customers.
                    Mining and Understanding Software Enclaves (MUSE)
        Information at scale includes not just data, but software code as
    well. Within the last few years, there has been a tremendous explosion
    in the number of open source projects and the size of codebases these
    projects contain. Software repositories today are estimated to contain
    more than 100 billion lines of code, and the number continues to grow.
    Open source software is widely used in mission-critical DOD systems as
    well as in the commercial world. DARPA's new Mining and Understanding
    Software Enclaves (MUSE) program aims to harness the scale and
    complexity of this array of software to instigate a fundamental shift
    in the way we conceive, design, implement, and maintain software. If
    successful, MUSE could lead to a new programming methodology, leading
    to automated mechanisms for improving resilience, reducing
    vulnerabilities, and simplifying the construction of software systems.
                    High-Assurance Cyber Military Systems (HACMS)
        Embedded systems form a pervasive network that underlies much of
    modern technological society. Such systems range from large supervisory
    control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems that manage physical
    infrastructure to medical devices such as pacemakers and insulin pumps,
    to computer peripherals such as printers and routers, to communication
    devices such as cell phones and radios, to vehicles such as automobiles
    and airplanes. These devices have been networked for a variety of
    reasons, including the ability to conveniently access diagnostic
    information, perform software updates, provide innovative features,
    lower costs, and improve ease of use. But researchers and hackers have
    shown that these kinds of networked embedded systems are vulnerable to
    remote attack, and such attacks can cause physical damage while hiding
    the effects from monitors. DARPA launched the High-Assurance Cyber
    Military Systems (HACMS) program to create technology to construct
    high-assurance cyberphysical systems. Achieving this goal requires a
    fundamentally different approach from what the software community has
    taken to date. If successful, HACMS will produce a set of publicly
    available tools integrated into a high-assurance software workbench,
    which will be widely distributed for use in both the commercial and
    defense software sectors. For the defense sector, HACMS will enable
    high-assurance military systems ranging from unmanned vehicles to
    weapons systems, satellites and command and control devices. In an
    early demonstration of the program, we are running first-of-its-kind
    provably correct software on a commercially available automobile.
        These programs are examples from DARPA's broader portfolio in cyber
    and information at scale. Other efforts are developing new technologies
    to enable distributed computer systems to work through attacks; permit
    trustworthy Internet communications in untrusted environments; automate
    the discovery, identification and characterization of new malware;
    provide DOD with military cyber capabilities; and automatically process
    text information to discover meanings and connections that might
    otherwise not be readily apparent to analysts.
    Biology as Technology
        A third area of complexity of growing interest and importance to
    DARPA--and among the most promising for future major capabilities--is
    the idea of biology as technology. Biology is nature's ultimate
    innovator, and any agency that hangs its hat on innovation would be
    foolish not to look to this master of networked complexity for
    inspiration and solutions.
                    Living Foundries
        Synthetic biology--a hybrid discipline of biology and engineering--
    has already proven itself capable of using customized bacteria to
    produce medicines, and now it is heading toward even more interesting
    applications as we harness it to create entirely new chemistries. Our
    Living Foundries program seeks to develop the next-generation tools and
    technologies for engineering biological systems, compressing the
    biological design-build-test cycle in both time and cost. For example,
    the program has demonstrated the ability to generate a suite of novel
    bioproducts in weeks rather than years. The program is also producing
    new classes of materials with novel properties that can enable a new
    generation of mechanical, optical and electrical products.
                    Rapid Threat Assessment (RTA)
        Even as we develop new materials and tools for engineering
    biological systems, we understand that we must also be prepared to
    react quickly to how our adversaries may seek to use similar
    capabilities. This concern is not new: novel chemical and biological
    weapons have historically been mass-produced within a year of
    discovery. Using current methods and technologies, researchers would
    require decades of study to gain a cellular-level understanding of how
    new threat agents affect humans. This gap between threat emergence,
    mechanistic understanding and potential treatment leaves U.S. forces
    and populations here and around the world vulnerable.
        DARPA launched the Rapid Threat Assessment (RTA) program with an
    aggressive goal: develop methods and technologies that can, within 30
    days of exposure to a human cell, map the complete molecular mechanism
    through which a threat agent alters cellular processes. This would give
    researchers the framework with which to develop medical countermeasures
    and mitigate threats. If successful, RTA could shift the cost-benefit
    trade space of using chemical or biological weapons against U.S. forces
    and could also apply to drug development to combat emerging diseases.
                    Brain Function Research
        In an era when harnessing complexity will be the sine qua non of
    success, it should not be surprising that DARPA has a particular
    interest in tackling the brain. DARPA's interest starts with our desire
    to protect and assist our Warfighters, whether it means preventing or
    treating traumatic brain injury, easing the effects of post-traumatic
    stress disorder, or learning to operate sophisticated prosthetic limbs
    with thoughts alone, as is now increasingly possible with our new and
    exciting technologies. These advances also open the door to a much
    deeper understanding of how humans interact with the world around
    them--new insights that may fuel the next revolution in how we work
    with complex technologies and systems. Over the past year, we launched
    several new brain function-related programs that are now getting
    underway. These efforts are part of the President's initiative in brain
    research. Recently, we have made unprecedented advances in developing
    advanced prosthetic arm systems and methods to restore near-natural
    movement and control, as demonstrated by the DEKA Arm System approved
    by the Food and Drug Administration last week.
        DARPA's biology-related investments also include diagnostics and
    novel prophylaxes to outpace the spread of infectious disease and new
    methods to accelerate the testing of critical therapeutics.
    New Frontiers
        Consistent with our mission to prevent technological surprise by
    creating it, DARPA continues to invest across a wide range of fields
    where we see promising research that could lead to powerful technology
    capability. These investments are the seeds of what my successors,
    perhaps 5, 10, or 15 years from now, will be describing to you as
    technology revolutions.
        I described earlier our work in developing new algorithms, software
    and architectures that allow us to better mesh our electronic, optical
    and mechanical components together. What about those components
    themselves? We are pushing the frontiers of physics to make them
    dramatically smaller, or more capable, or both.
                    iPhod, COUGAR, and ORCHID
        Consider the many ways we are developing to harness light, which
    will directly affect the size, weight, cost and performance of military
    components ranging from small navigation sensors to phased array radars
    and communication antennas. One recently concluded program (iPhod)
    successfully miniaturized tools for creating delays in light
    transmission, while another (COUGAR) demonstrated unique designs in
    hollow-core fibers, which guide light within a device much more
    efficiently than conventional optical fibers. Yet another (ORCHID)
    successfully demonstrated the ``squeezing'' of light, a concept in
    quantum optics that can ultimately lead to dramatic performance gains
    in microsystems. These programs challenge the assumption that highly
    specialized, high-precision systems must be large and expensive.
                    Miniaturization with National Security Implications
        Other advances in miniaturization include a recent demonstration by
    DARPA-funded researchers of the world's smallest vacuum pumps. This
    breakthrough technology may create new national security applications
    for electronics and sensors that require a vacuum: highly sensitive gas
    analyzers that can detect chemical or biological attack, for instance,
    or extremely accurate laser-cooled chip-scale atomic clocks and
    microscale vacuum tubes. As part of another program (QuASAR), one which
    seeks to exploit the extreme precision and control of atomic physics
    for new sensor technology, researchers have developed methods for
    measuring magnetic fields at scales smaller than the size of a single
    cell. Applications include critical advances in position, timing and
    navigation--all critical to military situational awareness and
    operations.
                    Ground Robotics
        Some advances seem much closer to our doorstep than they really
    are--thanks to science fiction and the amazing special effects of
    creative individuals and teams who lead our entertainment industry.
    Ground robotics is one such domain. At the DARPA Robotics Challenge
    trials a few months ago, we drove robotics technology forward by
    engaging teams of creative specialists at companies, universities and
    other government agencies. These world-leading experts were charged
    with advancing the capabilities of robots to perform basic skills that
    would be required in carrying out humanitarian and disaster relief
    missions. The Robotics Challenge--which is still underway--is showing
    how robotics capabilities can advance. It is also demonstrating just
    how far these kinds of robots are from serious battlefield application.
    That, too, is part of DARPA's mission: push the research frontiers of
    what is possible and inform our military decision makers where those
    limits are and the prospects for the future.
                    Algorithms Opening New Horizons
        Research in mathematical algorithms is also creating important new
    technological opportunities. Clustering algorithms can detect common
    activity patterns across a vast data set. A combination of vector
    mathematics, time integration, and power law distributions enables the
    analysis of ensemble behaviors--patterns that only become visible when
    correlated across large numbers of points. Time series analysis can
    find previously unknown outliers in a data set for anomaly detection.
    Our programs apply these mathematical techniques to immense data sets
    with hundreds of millions or even many billions of elements.
    Individually or in combination, these new algorithmic approaches enable
    rapid analysis of data volumes that finally begins to scale with the
    complexity of the national security challenges that we face today.
        I have cited several examples of DARPA technologies that made
    significant progress in the last year. There are many more in that same
    category. Additional examples of successes in the making are attached
    to my testimony.
                the president's fiscal year 2015 budget request
        The President's fiscal year 2015 budget request for DARPA is $2.915
    billion. This compares with $2.779 billion appropriated for fiscal year
    2014, an increase of $136 million. Before describing our fiscal year
    2015 plan, let me put this number in context.
        From fiscal year 2009 to fiscal year 2013, DARPA's budget declined
    through a series of small reductions followed by the 8 percent across-
    the-board sequestration cut in fiscal year 2013. The total reduction to
    DARPA's budget from fiscal year 2009 to fiscal year 2013 was 20 percent
    in real terms.
        This pernicious trend turned around last year. I thank this
    Subcommittee, and Congress more broadly, for your support in helping us
    to begin to address this issue in fiscal year 2014 by restoring an
    initial $199 million. The President's fiscal year 2015 request
    continues restoration, almost returning the Agency's budget to its pre-
    sequestration level in real terms.
        Let me outline what these budget changes mean in terms of our
    ability to execute DARPA's vital mission. As budgets eroded over the
    last few years, one effect was a reduction in our major demonstration
    programs. In some cases, we have been unable to advance our work to the
    point of actually demonstrating that a totally new approach is
    workable. In other cases, we had to rely on a single approach to
    solving a particularly challenging problem because we could fund only
    one performing organization. That is especially problematic since we
    are trying to do things that have never been achieved before. Reduced
    funds also meant fewer early-stage investments to explore new research
    frontiers. Sequestration further affected our programs, with many being
    delayed or reduced.
        In the current fiscal year, the partial restoration of funds is
    making a real difference in DARPA's ability to attack the thorny
    problems the Nation faces in today's military and national security
    environment. As a projects agency, DARPA is always beginning new
    programs as old ones end. But the new efforts in fiscal year 2014 are
    stronger because of the healthier budget level. In some areas, we are
    now able to plan for the real-world prototyping and field testing
    needed for new concepts to be fully evaluated. And our new programs
    include the important exploratory projects that will expand future
    national security opportunities. The fiscal year 2015 request before
    you today will allow us to continue to restore and strengthen our
    portfolio of investments. With this funding level, we will be on the
    right track.
        Let me close by saying that I am mindful of the challenges that our
    Nation faces and the increasingly difficult environment in which we
    work, including severe constraints on resources. But I also am excited
    about what lies ahead and confident that--with your support for the
    President's fiscal year 2015 budget request--DARPA will continue to
    make a real and outsized difference in redefining the national security
    landscape and our Nation's security.
        Again, thank you for your support--past, present, and future. I
    look forward to working with you, and will be pleased to respond to
    your questions.
                                    addendum
    DARPA Transitions
        Many technologies from earlier DARPA investments are now moving
    forward with a wide variety of our partners and customers. These
    summaries provide snapshots of progress for some programs from recent
    years.
    Leap Ahead in Surface Warfare Capabilities by Reducing Dependence on
            ISR Platforms, Network Links, and GPS: Long Range Anti-Ship
            Missile (LRASM)
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --Our current anti-ship missiles must penetrate sophisticated enemy
            air defense systems from long range. As a result, Warfighters
            may require multiple missile launches and overhead targeting
            assets to engage specific enemy warships from beyond the reach
            of counter-fire systems. To overcome these challenges, the
            DARPA-Navy Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) program is
            investing in advanced technologies to provide a leap ahead in
            U.S. surface warfare capability.
      --LRASM aims to reduce dependence on intelligence, surveillance and
            reconnaissance (ISR) platforms, network links, and GPS
            navigation in electronic warfare environments. Autonomous
            guidance algorithms should allow LRASM to use less-precise
            target cueing data to pinpoint specific targets in the
            contested domain. The program also focuses on innovative
            terminal survivability approaches and precision lethality in
            the face of advanced countermeasures.
      --LRASM began in 2009. Now in its final DARPA phase, this program
            leverages the state-of-the-art Joint Air to Surface Standoff
            Missile Extended Range (JASSM-ER) airframe and incorporates
            additional sensors and systems to achieve a stealthy and
            survivable subsonic cruise missile.
      --In 2013, DARPA conducted two flight demonstrations, each with
            resounding success. The LRASM was dropped from an Air Force B-
            1, successfully separated from the aircraft, navigated through
            a series of preplanned waypoints, and then transitioned to an
            autonomous mode while seeking the target it had been instructed
            to attack. The missile detected, identified, and tracked the
            mobile ship target at extended range; transitioned to guidance
            on the terminal sensor; and impacted the target with a miss
            distance well within acceptable error probabilities. Other
            flight achievements include weapon data link updates,
            transmission of weapon in-flight tracks, and increased flight
            range.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --The program is on track to deliver an advanced prototype weapon to
            the Navy and Air Force with capability for challenging future
            operational environments, while being sufficiently mature to
            transition rapidly to an acquisition program to address near-
            term operational challenges.
      --DARPA is engaged with the U.S. Navy NAVAIR's Program Executive
            Office for Unmanned Aviation and Strike Weapons (PEO U&W) to
            provide an innovative management approach for rapid acquisition
            of LRASM for Air Force and Navy air launch platforms to meet
            offensive anti-surface warfare missions. This approach
            leverages DARPA investment, program security, contracts, and
            infrastructure. Ultimately, it will leverage DARPA's technology
            development and risk reduction efforts to expeditiously field
            LRASM. In fiscal year 2014, DARPA and Navy efforts include
            continued technology development, integration risk reduction,
            and pre-Milestone B activities.
      --DARPA has transitioned the technology to a new DARPA/Navy/Air Force
            co-staffed office chartered by USD(AT&L) to rapidly deploy this
            dramatically enhanced new capability.
    Reducing Drag and Fuel Usage: Formation Flight for Aerodynamic Benefit
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --With the Air Force consuming more than 2.5 billion gallons of
            aviation fuel in 2010, DARPA launched the Formation Flight for
            Aerodynamic Benefit program to seek creative ways to reduce
            drag and fuel usage in the C-17 fleet.
      --C-17s are the largest single user of aviation fuel, consuming 650
            million gallons (26 percent) in 2010. DARPA's goal was to
            achieve a 10 percent reduction in fuel flow.
      --The approach taken was motivated by large flocks of migratory birds
            that fly in a ``V'' formation.
      --All aircraft produce wingtip vortices when flying, which are a drag
            byproduct of producing aerodynamic lift. After analyzing C-17
            wingtip vortices, DARPA predicted optimum formation positions.
      --The DARPA program created new software that innovatively enabled
            precise autopilot and auto-throttle formation flight operations
            with existing C-17 hardware.
      --DARPA simulation, modeling, and lab testing projected success in
            reaching the target reduction in fuel flow using this software
            modification.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --DARPA transitioned the software to the Air Force Research
            Laboratory (AFRL) in July 2012 as the Surfing Aircraft Vortices
            for Energy ($AVE) program.
      --AFRL conducted 30 hours of flight testing in C-17 formation flight,
            including 12 hours on operational flight routes over the
            Pacific in 2013.
      --That testing validated a 10 percent fuel flow reduction with the
            DARPA software modification. Moreover, the changes were safe,
            aircrew friendly, and aircraft friendly--and made business
            sense.
      --The Applied Technology Council approved funding for an Advanced
            Technology Demonstration (ATD) of the DARPA C-17 software-only
            modification. The ATD will enable the Air Mobility Command to
            develop CONOPS for rapid fielding this DARPA energy efficiency
            advancement.
      --AFRL is examining use of this technology to obtain fuel savings on
            C-130s and other DOD platforms.
      --Commercial carriers, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the
            National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) expressed
            interest in civilian applications of this DARPA technology.
      --This DARPA program success reflects significant contributions from
            the Air Mobility Command, AFRL, 412th Test Wing, Air Force Life
            Cycle Management Center, Boeing Company, and NASA Neil A.
            Armstrong Flight Research Center.
    New Approaches to Tackling DOD's Language Challenges: BOLT, RATS, and
            MADCAT
                Technology Description & Program Goal
      --DARPA has invested in solutions for DOD to recognize, classify, and
            help digest written and spoken foreign languages.
      --Technology from the Broad Operational Language Translation (BOLT)
            program provides automated translation and linguistic analysis
            that can be applied to informal genres of text and speech as
            well as multilingual search capability and unrestricted multi-
            turn bilingual conversation.
      --The Robust Automatic Transcription of Speech (RATS) program creates
            algorithms and software to perform the following tasks on
            potentially speech-containing signals received over channels
            that are extremely noisy and/or highly distorted: speech
            activity detection, language identification, speaker
            identification, and keyword spotting in foreign languages.
      --The Multilingual Automatic Document Classification Analysis and
            Translation (MADCAT) program automatically converts foreign
            language text images into English transcripts, eliminating the
            need for linguists and analysts while automatically providing
            relevant, distilled actionable information to military command
            and personnel in a timely fashion.
                BOLT Transition Plan and Status
      --The Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office (CTTSO), under the
            Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations/Low-
            Intensity Conflict, successfully transitioned to military users
            a tool for translation of and topic spotting and data
            exploitation in social media. Initial implementation is with a
            military user with plans to extend use to multiple government,
            military, and academic media monitoring system users.
                RATS Transition Plan and Status
      --The Air Force has provided lab facilities to test RATS capability
            using operational data. Initial evaluations show RATS
            technology superior to any other system, and plans are underway
            for integrating the speech activity detection portion of the
            RATS technology into systems that provide noisy speech signal
            processing capabilities. Other interested DOD elements are
            awaiting the results of operational field trials before
            pursuing acquisition.
                MADCAT Transition Plan and Status
      --MADCAT optical character recognition has been coupled with machine
            translation and deployed in 11 languages to enable English-
            speaking government and military personnel to read hardcopy
            foreign language documents. A project also is underway to
            further develop Korean optical character recognition and
            machine translation to support user requirements.
      --MADCAT offline handwriting recognition system was delivered to a
            government user in 2011 and is in operational use. The CTTSO is
            supporting the MADCAT transition to various other DOD and
            intelligence community users.
    Achieving Dramatically Faster Mapping: High-Altitude LIDAR Operations
            Experiment (HALOE)
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --Leveraging past DARPA developments in Light Detection and Ranging
            (LIDAR) systems, a sensor pod for rapid collect, wide area,
            long range, high-resolution 3D datasets was developed for the
            HALOE system. In 2010 and 2011, DARPA invested funds to harden
            the sensor system in preparation for a prolonged operational
            trial in Afghanistan.
      --HALOE provided forces in Afghanistan with unprecedented access to
            high-resolution 3D data, and it collected orders of magnitude
            faster and from much longer ranges than conventional methods.
            At full operational capacity, HALOE could enable mapping of 50
            percent of Afghanistan in 90 days. State-of-the-art deployed
            systems would have required 3 years to accomplish that task,
            and more conventional systems would have required 30 years.
      --This increased performance is enabled by advances in shortwave
            infrared sensitive material properties that permitted photon-
            counting detector arrays so sensitive that it is now possible
            to make range measurements with fewer than 10 photons received,
            versus tens of thousands of photons. As is true with any
            camera, increased sensitivity means an image can be captured
            more quickly since the shutter has to be open for less time--
            and less light is required to capture an image. Less time and
            less power translate to higher collection rates at greater
            standoff. HALOE can collect data at a rate more than 10 times
            faster than state-of-the-art systems or 100 times faster than
            conventional systems.
      --HALOE was one of several DARPA advances directly supporting the
            Warfighter that earned the agency the Joint Meritorious Unit
            Award from the Secretary of Defense late in 2012.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --The HALOE sensor pod was initially integrated onto a WB-57 aircraft
            and deployed to Afghanistan from November 2010 through August
            2011 in a joint effort with the Army Geospatial Center (AGC).
            During this time, over 70,000 square kilometers of terrain data
            (about 10 percent of Afghanistan) were collected, reflecting
            the priorities of operational units.
      --In March 2012, with AGC funding, the HALOE sensor pod was
            integrated onto a BD700 aircraft, a highly customized, longer-
            range flight platform.
      --In July 2013 the HALOE system was deployed to the AFRICOM Area Of
            Responsibility (AOR). The system collected data in Africa
            during eight flight sorties through August.
      --In September 2013, HALOE was transferred to Afghanistan in
            September 2013.
      --HALOE performed exceedingly well in its several deployments in
            Afghanistan, collecting more than 83 percent of all tasked
            regions with a cumulative mission area of greater than 74,000
            square kilometers. The collected data have been in response to
            multiple RFIs in support of operational units. The HALOE system
            has transitioned out of theater, with the last sortie flown in
            December 2013.
      --Plans call for a 6-month period in CONUS for maintenance and
            training followed by redeployment in June 2014 for the
            remainder of fiscal year 2014. Potential locations include AOR
            of USCENTCOM (not Afghanistan), USAFRICOM, and USPACOM.
    Blast Monitoring Tool Also Will Improve Future Understanding of
            Injuries: Blast Gauge
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --Blast Gauge is a low-cost, disposable, individually wearable sensor
            system that records the environment during an explosive event--
            for example, an attack from an improvised explosive
        device (IED) or a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG), or the firing of
    a missile or rocket during training.
      --The goal was to rapidly develop and field a system to quantify
            blast exposure, assist commanders in finding injured Service
            Members who would otherwise not report, and record data to
            understand blast injuries, including traumatic brain injury
            (TBI).
      --DARPA recognized that blast overpressure and linear acceleration
            must be recorded--and at multiple points on the body--to
            understand blast-related injuries and that the needed
            technology could be built completely out of common commercial
            components.
      --The device was developed in just 11 months; Special Operations
            Forces (SOF) fielded Blast Gauge in Afghanistan in July 2011
            and Rochester Institute of Technology researchers who developed
            the dosimeter quickly formed a small business to commercialize
            and manufacture the gauges.
      --Costing less than $50 per device, the gauge includes a simple
            three-light system (red, yellow, green) to indicate condition
            and magnitude immediately following a blast. Service Members
            wear three gauges: on the back of the helmet, shoulder, and
            chest. This allows a blast to be captured regardless of its
            relative location.
      --Information is transmitted to medical staff and researchers;
            doctors and medics report that the lights are a valuable
            feature for augmenting triage following a blast.
      --DARPA also developed a system to capture the data, contributing to
            better understanding of the effects of blasts on the brain.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --DARPA completed development with release of the latest generation
            gauge in June 2013. It can be purchased directly from the
            manufacturer or from Defense Logistics Agency stock.
      --DARPA initially provided field support to train Soldiers on the
            gauges and to distribute gauges and collect exposure data. More
            than 150,000 gauges (50,000 sets) have been distributed to all
            Services.
      --As a result of the DARPA-funded field trials, Blast Gauge
            technology has been adopted by SOF and the Army:
        --The Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force Afghanistan
                (CJSOTF-A) mandated that all special operators in its task
                forces use blast gauges. They are purchasing 60,000 gauges
                for deployed forces and stateside training.
        --Other SOF units are purchasing and using gauges throughout
                training and operations. In these cases, Blast Gauge has
                become a key component of their strategy for managing TBI.
        --The Army has selected Blast Gauge as one of three components of
                its Integrated Soldier Sensor System (ISSS) requirement.
                DARPA is supporting the Army in designing and evaluating
                the ISSS.
        --While the Army is developing its objective solution (ISSS), it
                selected the Blast Gauge to be fielded to 18,000 Soldiers
                in OEF.
      --Other services (including the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory),
            NATO partners, and Australia have independently evaluated the
            gauges and are deciding on next steps.
      --Blast Gauge was cited as a DARPA advance directly supporting the
            Warfighter that contributed to the agency being awarded the
            Joint Meritorious Unit Award from the Secretary of Defense in
            2012.
      --Military officials have shown interest in examining the data and
            post-event analyses to gain insights into potential issues with
            brain injuries resulting from improper techniques and
            procedures for using equipment, including during training when
            most exposures occur.
    Revolutionizing Prosthetics (RP): Restoring Near-Natural Movement and
            Control of Upper Limbs
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --When DARPA launched the Revolutionizing Prosthetics (RP) program in
            2006, the state of upper-limb prosthetic technology was far
            behind lower-limb technology and was judged to be a more
            difficult medical and engineering challenge.
      --The concept of a new system design may open the option for Service
            Members and others with upper-limb loss the chance to return to
            more fully active lives.
      --The two research teams selected for the program, DEKA Integrated
            Solutions Corporation and the Johns Hopkins University Applied
            Physics Lab (APL), were tasked to:
        --Design and build anthropomorphic electromechanical upper
                extremity prostheses that mimic the capabilities of a
                natural arm for people with loss of an upper-limb.
        --Develop near-natural control modalities including exploration of
                direct neural control from peripheral nerves or the brain.
        --Investigate the ability to provide sensory feedback from sensors
                on the prosthesis through peripheral nerves or directly to
                the brain.
      --Collaboration with Veterans Affairs, National Institutes of Health,
            Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, and Walter Reed
            National Military Medical Center has given more than75 users
            (amputees and tetraplegics) an opportunity to provide input to
            the design of both arm systems and supported regulatory
            submissions. In addition, Revolutionizing Prosthetics became
            the pilot program of the Food and Drug Administration's
            Innovation Initiative in 2011, providing a new pathway for
            novel medical technologies.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --Since February 2012, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, a
            subcontractor to the Applied Physics Lab (APL), has conducted a
            successful clinical study in which research participants living
            with tetraplegia were able to use neural signals from their
            brain to directly control the Modular Prosthetic Limb (MPL).
            This work has demonstrated that advanced prosthetics and direct
            neural interfaces can enable restoration of near-natural arm
            control to improve the quality of life for military personnel
            and civilians living with amputation or paralysis.
      --Veterans Affairs is conducting an independent 3-year home study of
            the DEKA Arm System. The Food and Drug Administration's May
            2014 approval allows DEKA to pursue manufacturing and
            commercial opportunities to bring the arm to market. Their
            transition plan includes development of advanced manufacturing
            and distribution to medical practitioners.
      --The APL's MPL serves as a research platform and some MPL technology
            has transitioned to small robotic systems used in manipulating
            unexploded ordnance and suspicious objects.
    Smartphone Apps for the Dismounted Warfighter: Transformative Apps
            (TransApps)
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --Today's Warfighters perform increasingly complex tasks but are
            still using outdated tools to access and share information on
            the battlefield. From a ground Soldier's perspective, little
            has changed in the last 20 years. They rely on inferior paper
            maps, written notes and reference materials, and voice radio
            transmissions to carry out their missions. Many technology
            advances that consumers take for granted have not made their
            way to the battlefield for a variety of reasons, especially
            security concerns and lack of robust high-bandwidth networks.
      --With the TransApps program, DARPA aims to put today's commercial
            smartphone-grade capabilities in the hands of the Soldiers who
            most need them--those on daily patrols in theater--making their
            work much more effective and their lives easier and safer. In
            the field, the devices are providing Soldiers with an
            integrated ecosystem for situational awareness.
      --Soldiers on patrol can keep up with fast-paced missions and
            changing environments by sharing and managing information in
            real time. That allows Warfighters and decision makers up and
            down the ranks and in various functions to share a common
            operating picture.
      --They do this by using features and apps designed for their unique
            requirements: for example taking note of changes in the field--
            such as new bridges, structures, or civilians in an area--and
            sharing that information immediately with others who will
            direct and carry out future operations in that area.
      --TransApps created a new agile development process, integration
            framework, and customized test cycles to allow rapid
            development of new applications, with new features and
            enhancements deployed quickly based on Soldiers' evolving
            requirements. When Soldiers need new apps, they can get them
            quickly--sometimes the very next day. This is a radical
            departure from how they have been operating. The TransApps
            ecosystem bridges old and new, allowing future technologies to
            work seamlessly with legacy radios and information systems. By
            endowing commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) smartphones with
            custom multilayered security and agile development processes
            modified for the tactical community, TransApps is creating a
            scalable and sustainable infrastructure template.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --A 4-year program that concludes in fiscal year 2014, TransApps was
            first fielded to Afghanistan in 2011; within 18 months, more
            than 3,000 systems were deployed to the battlefield, supporting
            all Army maneuver operations theater-wide.
      --In fiscal year 2014, DARPA is working with the Army Nett Warrior
            Program to fully transition TransApps capabilities into the
            enduring Program of Record, as part of the Army's efforts to
            get new technologies into the hands of the Soldier.
      --Other organizations and agencies are preparing to transition
            program components. These include the Application Testing
            Portal for streamlined security and performance analysis of
            mobile applications, as well as TransApps' custom imagery
            processing and configuration tools, which empower Soldiers to
            manage their own maps based on mission requirements.
    Persistent Close Air Support: Faster and There When Troops Need It
                Technology Description and Program Goal
      --To maintain a decisive tactical advantage in 21st-century combat,
            Warfighters need to safely, rapidly, and collaboratively deploy
            ordnance against elusive mobile targets. Unfortunately, air-
            ground fire coordination, referred to as Close Air Support, or
            CAS, has changed little since World War I.
      --Pilots and dismounted ground agents can focus on only one target at
            a time and often must ensure they hit it using just voice
            directions and a paper map. In complex environments, it can
            take up to an hour to confer, get in position and strike--time
            in which targets can attack first or move out of reach.
      --DARPA created the Persistent Close Air Support (PCAS) program to
            enable dismounted ground agents and combat aircrews to share
            real-time situational awareness and weapons systems data.
      --The system DARPA developed and tested enables ground agents to
            quickly and positively identify multiple targets
            simultaneously. Ground and air forces would jointly select
            precision-guided ordnance that best fits each target and
            minimizes collateral damage and friendly fire.
        Finally, both parties would authorize weapons deployment.
      --Benefits would include reduction in time from calling in a strike
            to target hits reduced from as much as 60 minutes to just 6
            minutes; direct coordination of airstrikes by a ground agent
            from manned or unmanned air vehicles; improved speed and
            survivability of ground forces engaged with enemy forces; and
            use of smaller, more precise munitions against smaller and
            moving targets in degraded visual environments. Another benefit
            is graceful degradation; if one piece of the system fails,
            Warfighters still retain capability of more basic
            functionality.
                Transition Plan and Status
      --In early 2013, DARPA deployed 500 Android tablets equipped with
            PCAS-Ground situational awareness software to units stationed
            in Afghanistan. An operator on the ground--with a tablet and
            voice radio--communicated with a pilot who had a tablet in the
            cockpit about imagery they both share on their tablets. (The
            program also developed a networked solution that allows even
            more rapid information sharing.)
      --Field reports show that PCAS-Ground replaced those units' legacy
            paper maps, dramatically improving ground forces' ability to
            quickly and safely coordinate air engagements.
      --The program, which began in fiscal year 2010 and concludes in early
            2015, is in the flight-testing phase, which concludes with live
            fire demonstrations.
      --Elements of PCAS, particularly the JTAC ground software, are seeing
            traction among various JTAC-related programs of record across
            the Services.

        Senator Durbin. Thank you.
        Dr. Rauch.
    STATEMENT OF DR. TERRY RAUCH, DIRECTOR, MEDICAL
                RESEARCH FOR THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
                DEFENSE
        Dr. Rauch. Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran, members
    of the committee, I would like to thank you for the opportunity
    to appear before you to discuss our research within the
    military health system and our collaborations across
    Government, academia, and industry.

                      IMPROVEMENTS IN COMBAT CASUALTY CARE

        The military health system is a complex enterprise that we
    use to gather health care delivery, medical education, public
    health, private sector partnerships and cutting edge research.
    Our research is the engine to integrate and embed emerging
    evidence-based practices into a learning healthcare system
    where healthcare providers, scientists, patients participate in
    the generation of knowledge on health outcomes, identifying and
    evaluating best medical practices, and assessing the impact of
    changes in medical practice.
        Research in the military health system has played a
    significant role in changing health outcomes over the last 13
    years of war. As the war progressed, the case fatality rate of
    our servicemembers was nearly cut in half, and remarkably, this
    occurred when the severity of injuries were increasing. Today
    we deliver the highest survivability rates in the history of
    warfare and that survivability is coupled with greater post-
    injury quality of life. This is a tribute to our learning
    healthcare system.

     PREVENTION, CARE, AND TREATMENT OF POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER AND
                       OTHER PSYCHOLOGICAL HEALTH ISSUES

        Many of the results stemming from our research have not
    only contributed to the survival and recovery of U.S.
    servicemembers, but also translates well into the civilian
    setting. Similar to the military experience, the results of
    military medical research translate into improved hemorrhage
    control, resuscitation en-route care, and damage control
    surgery in the civil setting. Although significant and
    continuing improvements in combat casualty care and personal
    equipment have reduced fatal injuries, many servicemembers
    return home with traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress
    disorder (PTSD), suicidal thoughts or behaviors, and other co-
    occurring conditions such as depression, substance abuse
    related to alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs, including misuse
    and abuse of prescription drugs, and of course, chronic pain.
    All of these complicate the prevention and treatment of PTSD,
    traumatic brain injury, and suicidal behaviors.
        To improve the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of
    mental health conditions affecting veterans and servicemembers
    and military families, the President issued an Executive order
    in 2012 and directed the Federal agencies to develop a
    coordinated national research action plan. The Department of
    Defense with the VA and HHS (Department of Health and Human
    Services) and the Department of Education responded with a
    wide-reaching plan to improve scientific understanding, provide
    effective treatment, and reduce the occurrences of PTSD,
    traumatic brain injury, various co-occurring conditions, and
    suicide. The plan builds on substantial work already underway
    in the Federal agencies and provides a framework for improved
    coordination across Government and in partnership with academia
    and industry to share information, brainstorm innovations, and
    accelerate science.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        Scientific progress is incremental. It takes time, but our
    servicemembers and their family members need more effective
    prevention strategies and treatments. So our research mission
    is urgent, most urgent.
        I am both pleased and proud to be here today to represent
    the women and men who perform the research mission of the
    military health system, and I look forward to answering your
    questions.
        [The statement follows:]
                    Prepared Statement of Dr. Terry M. Rauch
        Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, thank you for the
    opportunity to appear before you today to discuss medical research in
    the Military Health System (MHS) and, in particular, our research
    collaborations across government, academia, and industry.
        The MHS is a complex system that weaves together healthcare
    delivery, medical education, public health, private sector partnerships
    and cutting edge medical research. Research in the MHS is the engine to
    integrate and embed emerging evidenced-based practices into a learning
    healthcare system in which the healthcare providers, scientists,
    systems, and patients participate in the generation of knowledge on
    trends in health and illness, the testing and identification of best
    practices, and the assessment of the impact of practice changes.
        Research by the MHS has played a significant role in the
    performance of military trauma care over the last 13 years of war. As
    the war progressed, we improved survivability rates--although the
    severity of injuries increased. Today, we deliver the highest
    survivability rates in the history of warfare and that survivability is
    coupled with greater post-injury quality of life. These notable
    achievements reflect the return on investment by MHS research in combat
    casualty care, traumatic brain injury (TBI), psychological health and
    suicide, rehabilitation and regenerative medicine, military operational
    medicine, military infectious diseases, and medical training and
    simulation. I will highlight achievements in some of these areas as
    well as our collaborations across government, academia and industry.
                         combat casualty care research
        Accomplishments in combat casualty care have led to the fielding of
    safe and effective tourniquets, improved hemostatic dressings, as well
    as numerous clinical practice guidelines to improve trauma care on the
    battlefield. A significant enabler in these accomplishments is the
    Joint Trauma System or JTS which has developed into the Department of
    Defense's (DOD) ``go-to'' entity for real-time process improvement to
    optimize survival and recovery of the warfighter. The swift translation
    of evidence from military research through the JTS to the battlefield
    represents a first in military medical history. The JTS maintains the
    Department of Defense Trauma Registry (DODTR) which is the largest
    repository of combat injury and trauma management information in
    history. In this capacity, the JTS and the process it supports serve as
    a fitting ``bedside'' to generate many of the clinical questions that
    need answers from military medical and trauma research.
        Recently, MHS researchers collaborating with industry received Food
    and Drug Administration approval for a hemostatic device for the
    control of bleeding from junctional wounds in the groin or axilla not
    amenable to tourniquet application. In addition, the MHS is conducting
    advanced development efforts on a dried plasma product to help control
    hemorrhage on the battlefield. Other research efforts investigate
    genetic, genomic, and immunological responses to trauma and hemorrhage
    and finding improved means to reduce hypothermia.
                    documenting and sharing lessons learned
        Advances in trauma care stemming from the military's learning
    health system have been accelerated by the unprecedented burden of
    injury resulting from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. While the more
    than 30 Clinical Practice Guidelines maintained by the JTS are evidence
    based, they are also responsive and practical. Reports on the
    translation of advances in military trauma care to the civilian
    community have become increasingly common. We are taking intentional
    steps to codify and garner the lessons within the military's learning
    healthcare system and promote their translation to the civilian sector
    in partnership with the Institute of Medicine.
                                vaccine research
        As a final step towards FDA licensure in the United States, a
    clinical trial of a third generation smallpox vaccine, already approved
    in Europe and Canada, is about to start in U.S. forces stationed in
    South Korea. The DOD is participating in the clinical trial with the
    vaccine manufacturer and has designated a staff member from the U.S.
    Army Research Institute of Infectious Diseases to serve as the DOD
    principal investigator. The new product is a modern smallpox vaccine
    that does not replicate in human cells and is expected to be a safe
    alternative for individuals who have certain contraindications to the
    current smallpox vaccine.
                     national interagency biodefense campus
        The National Interagency Biodefense Campus (NIBC) is a prime
    example of interagency collaboration and includes not only DOD, but the
    HHS' National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Centers
    for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Departments of Agriculture
    (USDA) and Homeland Security (DHS). Key DOD components of the NIBC are
    the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases and the
    U.S. Navy Medical Research Center. The NIBC is leading in the
    development of medical counter measures as well as enhancing the U.S.
    response to emerging threats and national emergencies and is one of the
    Nation's few laboratory centers with Biosafety level 3 and 4
    laboratories conducting world class research against the world's most
    dangerous pathogens such as viral hemorrhagic fevers and plague. The
    NIBC is a part of the larger interagency confederation known at the
    National Interagency for Biological Research (NICBR).
            u.s. army medical research institute of chemical defense
        With your support the DOD has invested significantly in the U.S.
    Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense (MRICD) with a
    recapitalization project. The MRICD is currently at the 95 percent
    stage of construction completion for a new Command and state of the art
    laboratory building. They are scheduled to occupy the new building in
    early January 2015. The MRICD is the Nation's Center of Excellence for
    medical chemical defense research. Their world renowned scientists
    conduct basic and applied research on the mechanisms of action of
    chemical warfare threat agents, toxic industrial chemicals, and toxins
    of biological origin. These hazardous chemicals and toxins endanger not
    only our deployed our military forces but also pose an extremely
    serious homeland security threat to our entire civilian population as
    recent events in the Middle East have shown. The MRICD operates on a
    whole of government approach by being the premier laboratory to
    research candidate pretreatment, prophylactic, and treatment compounds.
    These compounds establish a scientific and technical base from which to
    plan and formulate enhanced medical countermeasures for our entire
    population. Their efforts have produced many candidates for transition
    into the advance development arena. Their scientists are on point to
    investigate medical countermeasures for all non-traditional agents as
    well as any emerging chemical threat agent regardless of the source.
    The MRICD also provides consultative subject matter expertise on
    medical chemical defense issues. They educate and train the full
    spectrum of military/civilian first responders and medical
    professionals in the identification and management of chemical
    casualties. Many of our allied partners have recently sent personnel to
    be trained in their courses so they can treat chemical casualties no
    matter the circumstances.
               rehabilitation and regenerative medicine research
        Due to advances in combat casualty care, increasing numbers of
    Service members are surviving with extreme trauma to the extremities
    and head. Research by the MHS in rehabilitation and regenerative
    medicine focuses on definitive and rehabilitative care innovations
    required to reset Service members, both in terms of duty performance
    and quality of life. The program has multiple initiatives to achieve
    its goals, including improving prosthetic function, enhancing self-
    regenerative capacity, improving limb and organ transplant success,
    creating full functioning limbs and organs, repairing damaged eyes,
    treating visual dysfunction following injury, improving pain
    management, and enhancing rehabilitative care. Innovative
    reconstructive research supported by the MHS in partnership with
    Brigham and Women's Hospital has performed successful face transplants
    on patients with severe facial deformity to provide functional and
    aesthetic benefits. In addition, research supported by the MHS in
    partnership with Johns Hopkins Hospital performed a bi-lateral hand
    transplant on a Service member who lost all four limbs from a road side
    bomb in Iraq. Today that Service member has achieved significant
    function in both hands. Regenerative medicine technologies present many
    opportunities for the treatment of combat-related traumatic injury and
    the MHS is supporting the Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative
    Medicine-Warrior Restoration Consortium to position promising
    technologies and therapeutic/restorative practices for entrance into
    human clinical trials. The Warrior Restoration Consortium is a
    partnership with more than 30 academic institutions and industry
    partners to address five focus areas in: extremity regeneration;
    craniomaxillofacial regeneration; skin regeneration; genitourinary/
    lower abdomen reconstruction; and composite tissue allotransplantation
    (i.e., organ transplant from a donor) and immunomodulation or
    modification of the immune response.
      research to improve mental health for service members and military
                  families: the national research action plan
        Although significant and continuing improvements in combat casualty
    care and personal protective equipment have limited fatal injuries,
    many Service members return with TBI, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
    (PTSD), suicidal thoughts or behaviors, and comorbidities. These
    comorbidities include depression; substance abuse related to alcohol,
    tobacco, and other drugs, including the misuse and abuse of
    prescription drugs; and chronic pain, all of which can complicate the
    prevention and treatment of PTSD, TBI, and suicidal behaviors. Family
    members also are affected by the multiple stressors associated with
    deployment and reintegration. Overall, the need for mental health
    services for Service members and their family members is anticipated to
    increase in coming years.
        To improve prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of mental health
    conditions affecting veterans, Service members, and military families,
    the President issued an Executive Order in 2012 directing Federal
    agencies to develop a coordinated National Research Action Plan (NRAP).
    The Departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human
    Services, and Education responded with a wide-reaching plan to improve
    scientific understanding; provide effective treatment; and reduce
    occurrences of PTSD, TBI, various co-occurring conditions, and suicide.
        The NRAP, released in August 2013, is a strategic blueprint for
    interagency research to identify and develop more effective diagnostic
    and treatment methodologies to improve outcomes for TBI, PTSD, and
    related conditions as well as develop and test suicide risk assessments
    and suicide prevention and treatment interventions. These efforts
    include collaborative research on biomarkers to detect disorders early
    and accurately; safe and effective treatments to improve function and
    quality of life; and developing a more precise definition of mTBI. The
    NRAP includes clear timelines and goals to achieve the same level of
    urgency, specificity of deliverables, as well as accountability, as
    expressed in the Executive Order. It is important to note that
    improving mental health outcomes for Service members and Veterans and
    the NRAP are included in the newly-established Cross-Agency Priority
    Goal framework overseen by the Office of Management and Budget and the
    Performance Improvement Council. The Cross-Agency Priority Goal,
    Improving Mental Health Outcomes for Service members and Veterans, was
    announced on March 10, 2014, and will continue over a 3 year period.
    Leadership will report quarterly to the Office of Management and Budget
    on their progress under the Goal.
        Critical to the implementation of the NRAP is a continuing
    understanding of the agency-specific activities and assuring a
    collaborative and integrated research strategy to meet the requirements
    in the NRAP. This collaboration and integration is provided in an
    annual Joint Review and Analysis meeting on research related to PTSD,
    TBI, suicide prevention, and substance abuse. Agency representation at
    the meeting included DOD, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), the
    Department of Education (represented by the National Institute on
    Disability and Rehabilitation Research [NIDRR]), and Health and Human
    Services (represented by the National Institute of Neurological
    Disorders and Stroke, the National Institute of Mental Health, and the
    National Institute on Drug Abuse).
        MHS researchers are attempting to answer questions across the
    research continuum. However, fundamental gaps in scientific knowledge
    remain, such as: the lack of a clinically-useful definition for mild
    TBI (mTBI)/concussion makes it difficult to adequately diagnose this
    condition. Note mTBI and concussion are used interchangeably herein.
    For mTBI, improved techniques are needed to determine if symptoms are
    attributable to the traumatic event. Prevention and treatment
    interventions are needed that address the comorbidities that often
    occur with PTSD. Evidence-based approaches are limited for reducing
    suicide risk, and the relationships between PTSD, TBI, suicide, and co-
    occurring conditions are not well understood.
        Activities are underway in support of inter-agency collaboration,
    including the DOD's Systems Biology Program and the Millennium Cohort
    and Family Cohort Studies, the VA's Million Veteran Program, the
    National Institutes of Health (NIH) biomarker research program, and
    research dedicated to advancing prevention and treatment interventions.
    The DOD and the Centers for Disease Control are partnering with the
    Brain Trauma Foundation to develop a clinically useful definition of
    mTBI/concussion. Suicide prevention research includes the DOD's
    Military Suicide Research Consortium and the National Institute of
    Mental Health and DOD Army Study to Assess Risk and Resilience in
    Service members (Army STARRS) program.
        Data-sharing efforts include the DOD/NIH Federal TBI Research
    Informatics System for TBI clinical research (a central repository for
    new TBI-related data that links to existing databases to facilitate
    sharing of information), the VA computing infrastructure, and NIDRR's
    TBI Model Systems National Database, which contains retrospective data
    on the clinical progress and outcomes of individuals with moderate to
    severe TBI.
        Recently initiated activities include two new joint funded DOD and
    VA research consortium efforts with academia to support PTSD and TBI
    biomarker studies. The Consortium to Alleviate PTSD is a new research
    effort focused on biomarker discovery and development with the aim of
    identifying biomarkers for subacute and chronic PTSD that can be used
    for therapeutic and outcome assessment. This represents a major
    investment to advance knowledge related to biomarkers and clinical
    utility. The Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium will establish
    the association of the chronic effects of mTBI and common
    comorbidities; determine whether there is a causative effect of chronic
    mTBI/concussion on neurodegenerative disease and other comorbidities;
    identify diagnostic and prognostic indicators of neurodegenerative
    disease and other comorbidities associated with mTBI/concussion; and
    develop and advance methods to treat and rehabilitate chronic
    neurodegenerative disease and comorbid effects of mTBI/concussion.
        The MHS is funding a wide variety of studies relevant to military
    family members, including research focused on: understanding risk and
    resilience factors of military families and communities; suicide
    bereavement in Service members and their families; interventions to
    enhance resilience, address and prevent relationship problems, and
    support families during deployment; the effectiveness of web-enhanced
    support tools for military families; and the effects of military
    deployment of parents on adolescent mental health.
                                   conclusion
        Scientific progress is incremental and takes time, but Service
    members and their family members need more effective prevention
    strategies and treatments, so our research mission is urgent. I am both
    pleased and proud to be here with you today to represent the men and
    women who perform the research mission of the MHS, and I look forward
    to answering your questions.

        Senator Durbin. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Miller.
    STATEMENT OF MARY MILLER, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
                THE ARMY FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY
        Ms. Miller. Thank you, Chairman Durbin, Ranking Member
    Cochran, members of the committee. Thank you for this
    opportunity to discuss the Army's science and technology
    program for fiscal year 2015.
        After 13 years of persistent conflict, the Army finds
    itself in a familiar situation, facing a declining defense
    budget and a strategic landscape that continues to evolve. As a
    result, the Army must balance between force structure,
    operational readiness, and modernization to maintain a capable
    force able to prevent, shape, and win in any engagement.
    Modernization will be slowed over the next 5 years. New
    programs will not be initiated as originally envisioned, and
    the Army's science and technology enterprise will be challenged
    to better prepare for the programs and capabilities of the
    future.
        To ensure that we make the best choices for the future
    Army, we have established a comprehensive modernization
    strategy that facilitates, informs strategic decisions based on
    long-term objectives within a resource-constrained environment.
    This long-term look over 30 years was exceptionally powerful in
    facilitating the strategic decisions made within the Army as we
    built fiscal year 2015's President's budget. It allowed the
    Army leadership to make tough program decisions based on
    providing the most capability to the soldier, knowing that in
    some cases that meant delaying desired capabilities. This is
    essential as the Army looks at its S&T community to conduct
    more technology demonstration and prototyping initiatives that
    will focus on maturing technology, reducing program risk,
    defining realistic requirements, and conducting experimentation
    with soldiers to refine new capabilities and operational
    concepts. The S&T community will be challenged to bring forward
    not only new capabilities but capabilities that are affordable.
    They are up to this challenge.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        We remain an Army that is looking towards the future while
    taking care of our soldiers of today. I hope that we can
    continue to count on your support as we move forward. Thank you
    again for all that you do for our soldiers.
        [The statement follows:]
                      Prepared Statement of Mary J. Miller
        Chairman Durbin, Ranking Member Cochran, and distinguished members
    of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss the
    Army's Science and Technology (S&T) Program for fiscal year 2015.

        ``Over the past 12 years of conflict, our Army has proven itself in
            arguably the most difficult environment we have ever faced. Our
            leaders at every level have displayed unparalleled ingenuity,
            flexibility and adaptability. Our Soldiers have displayed
            mental and physical toughness and courage under fire. They have
            transformed the Army into the most versatile, agile, rapidly
            deployable and sustainable strategic land force in the world.''
            \1\ --Secretary John W. McHugh, General Raymond T. Odierno
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        \1\ The Posture of the United States Army, Committee on Armed
    Services, United States House of Representatives, April 23, 2013.

        After 13 years of persistent conflict, the United States finds
    itself in a familiar situation--facing a declining defense budget and a
    strategic landscape that continues to evolve. As our current large-
    scale military campaign draws down, the United States still faces a
    complex and growing array of security challenges across the globe as
    ``wars over ideology have given way to wars over religious, ethnic, and
    tribal identity; nuclear dangers have proliferated; inequality and
    economic instability have intensified; damage to our environment, food
    insecurity, and dangers to public health are increasingly shared; and
    the same tools that empower individuals to build enable them to
    destroy.'' \2\ Unlike past draw downs, where the threats we faced were
    going away, there remain a number of challenges that we still have to
    confront--challenges that call for a change in America's defense
    priorities. Despite these challenges, the United States Army is
    committed to remaining capable across the spectrum of operations. While
    the future force will become smaller and leaner, its great strength
    will lie in its increased agility, flexibility, and ability to deploy
    quickly, while remaining technologically advanced. We will continue to
    conduct a complex set of missions ranging from counterterrorism, to
    countering weapons of mass destruction, to maintaining a safe, secure
    and effective nuclear deterrent. We will remain fully prepared to
    protect our interests and defend our homeland.\3\
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        \2\ National Security Strategy, May 2010.
        \3\ ``The Posture of the United States Army,'' The Honorable John
    M. McHugh, Secretary of the Army and General Raymond T. Odierno, Chief
    of Staff, United States Army before the Senate Committee on
    Appropriations, Subcommittee on Defense, May 22, 2013.
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        The Army depends on its Science and Technology (S&T) program to
    help prepare for the future, mitigate the possibility of technical
    surprise and ensure that we remain dominant in any environment. The
    Army's S&T mission is to foster discovery, innovation, demonstration
    and transition of knowledge and materiel solutions that enable future
    force capabilities and/or enhance current force systems. The Army
    counts on the S&T Enterprise to be seers of the future--to make
    informed investments now, ensuring our success for the future.
        The Army is ending combat operations in Afghanistan and refocusing
    on the Asia-Pacific region with greater emphasis on responses to
    sophisticated, technologically proficient threats. We are at a pivotal
    juncture--one that requires us to relook the past 13 years of conflict
    and capitalize on all the lessons that we have learned, while we
    implement a strategic shift to prepare for a more capable enemy. As the
    Department of Defense prepares for the strategic shift, the Army will
    adapt--remaining an ever present land force--unparalleled throughout
    the World.
        We are grateful to the members of this Committee for your sustained
    support of our Soldiers, your support of our laboratories and centers
    and your continued commitment to ensure that funding is available to
    provide our current and future Soldiers with the technology that
    enables them to defend America's interests and those of our allies
    around the world.
    Strategic Landscape
        As we built the fiscal year 2015 President's Budget Request, the
    Army faced a number of significant challenges. While the Army has many
    priorities, the first and foremost priority is and always will be to
    support our Soldiers in the fight. We are pulling our troops and
    equipment out of Afghanistan by the end of this December, we are
    drawing down our force structure, we are resetting our equipment after
    13 plus years of war and we are trying to modernize. Given the budget
    downturn within the Department of Defense, the Army has been forced to
    face some difficult choices. The Army is in the midst of a significant
    force structure reduction--taking the Army to pre-World War II manning
    levels. The Chief of Staff of the Army has undertaken difficult
    decisions balancing force structure, operational readiness, and
    modernization to maintain a capable force able to prevent, shape and
    win in any engagement. As a result, over the next 5 years, we face a
    situation where modernization will be slowed, new programs will not be
    initiated as originally envisioned and the Army's S&T Enterprise will
    be challenged to better prepare for the programs and capabilities of
    the future. We will focus on maturing technology, reducing program
    risk, developing prototypes that can be used to better define
    requirements and conducting mission relevant experimentation with
    Soldiers to refine new operational concepts. The S&T community will be
    challenged to bring forward not only new capabilities, but capabilities
    that are affordable for the Army of the future.

        ``Going forward, we will be an Army in transition. An Army that
            will apply the lessons learned in recent combat as we
            transition to evolving threats and strategies. An Army that
            will remain the best manned, best equipped, best trained, and
            best led force as we transition to a leaner, more agile force
            that remains adaptive, innovative, versatile and ready as part
            of Joint Force 2020.'' \4\ --General Raymond T. Odierno, 38th
            Chief of Staff, Army
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        \4\ ``Marching Orders,'' General Raymond T. Odierno, 38th Chief of
    Staff, U.S. Army, January 2012.

    Goals and Commitments
        The emerging operational environment presents a diverse range of
    threats that vary from near-peer to minor actors, resulting in new
    challenges and opportunities. In this environment, it is likely that
    U.S. forces will be called upon to operate under a broad variety of
    conditions. This environment requires a force that can operate across
    the range of military operations with a myriad of partners,
    simultaneously helping friends and allies while being capable of
    undertaking independent action to defeat enemies, deter aggression, and
    shape the environment. At the same time, innovation and technology are
    reshaping this environment, multiplying and intensifying the effects
    that even minor actors are able to achieve.
        The Army's S&T investment is postured to address these emerging
    threats and capitalize on opportunities. The S&T investment continues
    to not only focus on developing more capable and affordable systems,
    but also on understanding the complexity of the future environment. We
    have focused on assessing technology and system vulnerabilities (from
    both a technical and operational perspective) to better effect future
    resilient designs and to prepare countermeasures that restore our
    capabilities when necessary.
        There are persistent (and challenging) areas where the Army invests
    its S&T resources to ensure that we remain the most lethal and
    effective Army in the world. As the Army defines its role in future
    conflicts, we are confident that these challenges will remain relevant
    to the Army and its ability to win the fight. The S&T community is
    committed to help enable the Army achieve its vision of an
    expeditionary, tailorable, scalable, self-sufficient, and leaner force,
    by addressing these challenges:
      --Enabling greater force protection for Soldiers, air and ground
            platforms, and bases (e.g., lighter and stronger body armor,
            helmets, pelvic protection, enhanced vehicle survivability,
            integrated base protection).
      --Easing overburdened Soldiers in small units (both cognitive and
            physical burden, e.g., lighter weight multi-functional
            materials).
      --Enabling timely mission command and tactical intelligence to
            provide situation awareness and communications in ALL
            environments (mountainous, forested, desert, urban, jamming,
            etc.).
      --Reducing logistic burden of storing, transporting, distributing and
            retrograding materials.
      --Creating operational overmatch (enhancing lethality and accuracy).
      --Achieving operational maneuverability in all environments and at
            high operational tempo (e.g., greater mobility, greater range,
            ability to operate in high/hot environments).
      --Enabling early detection and treatment for Traumatic Brain Injury
            (TBI) and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
      --Improving operational energy (e.g., power management, micro-grids,
            increased fuel efficiency engines, higher efficiency
            generators, etc.).
      --Improving individual and team training (e.g., live-virtual-
            constructive training).
      --Reducing lifecycle costs of future Army capabilities.
        In addition to these enduring challenges, the S&T community
    conducts research and technology development that impacts our ability
    to maintain an agile and ever ready force. This includes efforts such
    as establishing environmentally compatible installations and materiel
    without compromising readiness or training, creating leader selection
    methodologies, and new test tools that can save resources and reduce
    test time, and establishing methods and measures to improve Soldier and
    unit readiness and resilience.
        The Army S&T strategy acknowledges that we must respond to the new
    fiscal environment and changing technology playing field. Many critical
    technology breakthroughs are being driven principally by commercial and
    international concerns. We can no longer do business as if we dominate
    the technology landscape. We must find new ways of operating and
    partnering. We realize that we should invest where the Army must retain
    critical capabilities but reap the benefits of commercially driven
    technology development. No matter the source, we will ensure the Army
    is aware of the best and most capable technologies to enable a global,
    networked and full-spectrum joint force in the future. As the U.S.
    rebalances its focus by region and mission, it must continue to make
    important investments in emerging and proven capabilities. In a world
    where all have nearly equal access to open technology, innovation is
    the most important discriminator in assuring technology superiority.
        The Chief of Staff of the Army has made his vision clear.

        ``The All-Volunteer Army will remain the most highly trained and
            professional land force in the world. It is uniquely organized
            with the capability and capacity to provide expeditionary,
            decisive landpower to the Joint Force and ready to perform
            across the range of military operations to Prevent, Shape, and
            Win in support of Combatant Commanders to defend the Nation and
            its interests at home and abroad, both today and against
            emerging threats.'' \5\ --General Raymond T. Odierno, 38th
            Chief of Staff, Army
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        \5\ Gen Raymond Odierno, 38th Chief of Staff Army, ``CSA Strategic
    Priorities, Waypoint 2'', 2014.

        The Army is relying on its S&T community to carry out this vision
    for the Army of the future.
    Implementing New Processes
        Turning science into capability takes a continuum of effort
    including fundamental research, the development and demonstration of
    technology, the validation of that technology and its ultimate
    conversion into capability. From an S&T materiel perspective, this
    includes the laboratory confirmation of theory, the demonstration of
    technical performance, and the experimentation with new technologies to
    identify potential future capabilities and to help refine/improve
    system designs. But the S&T Enterprise is also charged with helping to
    conceptualize the future--to use our understanding of the laws of
    physics and an ability to envision a future environment to broaden the
    perspective of the requirements developers as well as the technology
    providers.
        As part of this continuum, the Army has adopted a 30 year planning
    perspective to help facilitate more informed program planning and
    budget decisions. A major part of the S&T strategy is to align S&T
    investments to support the acquisition Programs of Record (PoRs)
    throughout all phases of their lifecycle and across the full DOTMLPF
    (Doctrine, Organization, Training, Materiel, Leadership, Personnel, and
    Facilities) process. By expanding the perspective, we are able to
    identify areas where there are unaffordable alignments of activities
    (such as multiple major Engineering Change Proposals in the same
    portfolio within the same 2-3 year timeframe) or unrealistic alignments
    (such as planned technology upgrades to a system that has already
    transitioned into sustainment). With that information in mind, the Army
    has established ``tradespace'' to generate options that inform
    strategic decisions that allow the Army to stay within its fiscal top
    line while maximizing its capabilities for the Warfighter.
        This new and ongoing process, known as the Long Range Investment
    Requirements Analysis (LIRA), has put additional rigor into the
    development of the Army's budget submission and creates an environment
    where the communities who invest in all phases of the materiel
    lifecycle work together to maximize the Army's capabilities over time.
    From an S&T perspective, it clearly starts to inform the materiel
    community as to WHEN technology is needed for insertion as part of a
    planned upgrade. It also cues us as to when to start investing for
    replacement platforms. In addition, this long-range planning can
    introduce opportunities for convergence of capabilities such as the
    development of a single radar that can perform multiple functions for
    multiple platforms or the convergence of cyber and Electronic Warfare
    (EW) capabilities into one system. Aside from the obvious benefits
    achieved by laying out the Army's programs and seeing where we may have
    generated unrealizable fiscal challenges, it has reinvigorated the
    relationships and strengthened the ties between the S&T community and
    their Program Executive Office (PEO) partners. We are working together
    to identify technical opportunities and the potential insertion of new
    capabilities across this 30 year timeframe.
        The LIRA process was used to inform the development of the fiscal
    year 2015 President's Budget. As the Army faced a dramatic decline in
    its modernization accounts (a 40 percent decrement over the next 2
    years), we used the results of the LIRA to ensure that we had a
    fiscally sound strategy.
    The S&T Portfolio
        The nature of S&T is such that continuity and stability have great
    importance. Starting and stopping programs prevents momentum in
    research and lengthens the timelines for discovery and innovation.
    While the Army S&T portfolio gains valuable insight from the threat
    community, this only represents one input to the portfolio and likely
    describes the most probable future. To have a balanced outlook across
    all the possible futures requires that the portfolio also address the
    ``possible'' and ``unthinkable.'' The Army's S&T portfolio is postured
    to address these possible futures across the eight technology
    portfolios identified Figure 1.

        The efforts of the S&T Enterprise are managed by portfolio to
    ensure maximum synergy of efforts and reduction of unnecessary
    duplication. The S&T program is organized into eight investment
    portfolios that address challenges across six Army-wide capability
    areas (Soldier/Squad; Air; Ground Maneuver; Command, Control,
    Communications, and Intelligence (C3I); Lethality; and Medical) and two
    S&T enabling areas (Basic Research and Innovation Enablers).
        The 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) protects and prioritizes
    key investments in technology to maintain or increase capability while
    forces grow leaner. This is an opportunity to look at innovative
    applications of technology. As a result, in the fiscal year 2015
    President's budget request, the Army is maintaining, and shifting
    investments where necessary within portfolios as well at various stages
    of technology maturity, emphasizing on technology areas that enable the
    Army to be leaner, expeditionary, and more lethal. In fiscal year 2015,
    our Advanced Technology Development investments increase to 42 percent
    of our $2.2 billion budget. This is a deliberate increase from previous
    years as the Army looks to its S&T community to conduct more technology
    demonstration/prototyping initiatives that will inform future Programs
    of Record (PoRs).
        We are now in an era of declining acquisition budgets and are
    mindful of the challenges this brings to our S&T programs. We will have
    fewer opportunities for transition to Programs of Record in the next
    few years. This ``pause'' in acquisition does however afford us the
    opportunity to further develop and mature technologies, ensuring that
    when acquisition budgets do recover, S&T will be properly positioned to
    support the Army's next generation of capabilities. This year finds the
    Army beginning to rebalance its S&T funding between Basic Research,
    applied research and advanced technology development. We appreciate the
    flexibility that was provided to the DOD S&T executives to better align
    our funding to our Service/Agency needs after years of proscriptive
    direction.
        The Army is maintaining its level of investment in the S&T
    portfolio from fiscal year 2014 to fiscal year 2015, dedicating more
    than $2.2 billion to meeting the Army's needs and priorities for future
    capability: $424 million in Basic Research, $863 million in Applied
    Research, and $918 million in Advanced Technology Demonstrations.
    Specifically you will see the Army shifting or increasing emphasis on
    research areas that support the next generation of combat vehicles
    (including power and energy efficiency, mobility and survivability
    systems), Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) technologies such as assured
    Position Navigation and Timing (PNT) and austere entry capabilities,
    Soldier selection tools and training technologies, as well as long
    range fires. Two of these efforts, the Future Infantry Fighting Vehicle
    (FIFV) and the assured Position Navigation and Timing (PNT) efforts are
    being done in collaboration with the respective PEOs to ensure that the
    capability developed and demonstrated not only helps to refine the
    requirements for the future PoRs but establishes an effective link for
    transition. We are also increasing our investments in vulnerability
    assessments of both technology and systems as well as expanding our Red
    Teaming efforts to identify potential vulnerabilities in emerging
    technologies, systems and systems-of-systems, including performance
    degradation in contested environments, interoperability, adaptability,
    and training/ease of use. This year begins the re-alignment necessary
    to implement our strategy of investing in areas critical to the Army--
    areas where we have critical skills sets, and leveraging others (sister
    services, other government agencies, academia, industry, allies) for
    everything else.
        We anticipate a future where rapidly advancing technologies such as
    autonomous systems, high yield energetics, immersive training
    environments, alternative power and energy solutions, and the use of
    smart phones and social media will become critical to military
    effectiveness. The Army will continue to develop countermeasures to
    future threat capabilities and pursue technological opportunities.
    Enemies and adversaries however, will counter U.S. technological
    advantages through cover, concealment, camouflage, denial, deception,
    emulation, adaptation, or evasion. Finally, understanding how humans
    apply technology to gain capabilities and train will continue to be at
    least as important as the technologies themselves.
        We are mindful however that the Army will continue to be called on
    for missions around the globe. The Army is currently deployed in 160
    countries conducting missions that range from humanitarian support to
    stability operations to major theater warfare. As we have seen in the
    last few months, the world is an unpredictable place, and our Soldiers
    must have the capabilities to deal with an ever changing set of
    threats.
    S&T Portfolio Highlights
        I'd like to highlight a few of our new initiatives and remind you
    of some of our ongoing activities that will help frame the options for
    the Army of the future.
    Soldier/Squad Portfolio (Fiscal Year 2015 = $252 Million)
        One of the important initiatives currently underway that we
    anticipate will make major inroads into our efforts to lighten the
    Soldier's load is the development of a Soldier Systems Engineering
    Architecture, which has a $45 million investment in fiscal year 2015.
    This architecture, developed in concert with our acquisition and
    requirements community, is an analytical decision-based model through
    which changes in Soldier system inputs (loads, technology/equipment,
    physiological & cognitive state, stress levels, training, etc.) may be
    assessed to predict changes in performance outputs of the Soldier
    system in operationally relevant environments. By using a systems
    engineering approach, the model will result in a full system level
    analysis capable of predicting impacts of both materiel and non-
    materiel solutions on fully equipped Soldiers performing operational
    missions/tasks
        In keeping with the CSA's vision, our S&T efforts also support the
    Army's training modernization strategy by developing technologies for
    future training environments that sufficiently replicate the
    operational environment. We are also developing new training
    effectiveness measures and methods, ensuring that these new training
    technologies can rapidly and effectively transfer emerging warfighting
    experience and knowledge into robust capabilities. In addition, the
    need to reduce force structure has increased the importance of our
    research in the area of personnel selection and classification. This
    research will provide the Army with methods to acquire and retain
    candidates best suited for the Army--increasing our flexibility to
    adapt to changes in force size, structure and mission demands. Other
    important research includes developing scientifically valid measures
    and metrics to assess command climate and reduce conduct related
    incidences, including sexual harassment and assault in units to ensure
    the Army can maintain a climate of dignity, respect and inclusion.
    Air Portfolio (Fiscal Year 2015 = $176 Million)
        As the lead service for rotorcraft, owning and operating over 80
    percent of the Department of Defense's vertical lift aircraft, the
    preponderance of rotorcraft technology research and development takes
    place within the Army. Our key initiative, the Joint Multi-Role
    Technology Demonstrator (JMR TD) program which has a $54 million
    investment in fiscal year 2015, is focused on addressing the Anti-
    Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) need for longer range and more efficient
    combat profiles. As we shift to the Pacific Rim focus, future Areas of
    Operation (AO) may be sixteen times larger than those of our current
    AOs. The Army needs a faster, more efficient rotorcraft, capable of
    operating in high/hot environments (6,000 feet and 95 degrees) with
    significantly decreased operating costs and maintenance required. The
    new rotorcraft will also require improved survivability against current
    and future threats. The goal of the JMR TD effort is to reduce risk for
    the Future Vertical Lift planned PoR, the Department of Defense's next
    potential ``clean sheet'' design rotorcraft. The overall JMR TD effort
    will use integrated government/industry platform design teams and
    exercise agile prototyping approaches. At the same time, the Army is
    collaborating with DARPA on their x-plane effort. While the DARPA
    program is addressing far riskier technologies that are not constrained
    by requirements, we will look to leverage technology advancements
    developed under the DARPA effort where possible.
        Another initiative that we are beginning in fiscal year 2015, with
    an investment of $32 million, is addressing one of the biggest causes
    of aircraft loss--accidents that occur while operating in a Degraded
    Visual Environments (DVE). DVE is much more than operating while in
    brown out--this effort looks at mitigating all sources of visual
    impairment, either those caused by the aircraft itself (brownout,
    whiteout) or other ``natural'' sources (rain, fog, smoke, etc.). We are
    currently conducting a synchronized, collaborative effort with PEO
    Aviation to define control system, cueing, and pilotage sensor
    combinations which enable maximum operational mitigation of DVE. This
    S&T effort will result in a prioritized list of compatible, affordable
    DVE mitigation technologies, and operational specification development
    that will help inform future Army decisions. This program is tightly
    coupled with the PEO Aviation strategy and potential technology off-
    ramps will be transitioned to the acquisition community along the way,
    when feasible.
    Ground Maneuver Portfolio (Fiscal Year 2015 = $383 Million)
        The Ground Maneuver Portfolio is focused on maturing and
    demonstrating technologies to enable future combat vehicles, including
    the FIFV. The fiscal year 2015 S&T investment in FIFV is $131 million.
    In fiscal year 2015, you will see the beginning of a focused initiative
    done in collaboration with PEO Ground Combat Systems, to develop
    critical sub-system prototypes to inform the development and
    requirements for the Army's FIFV. These sub-system demonstrators focus
    on mobility (e.g., engine, transmission, suspension); survivability
    (e.g., ballistic protection, under-body blast mitigation, advanced
    materials); Active Protection Systems (APS); a medium caliber gun and
    turret; and an open vehicle power and data architecture that will
    provide industry with a standard interface for integrating
    communications and sensor components into ground vehicles.
        Armor remains an Army-unique challenge and we have persistent
    investments for combat and tactical vehicle armor, focusing not only on
    protection but also affordability and weight reduction. We continue to
    invest in advanced materials and armor technologies to inform the next
    generation of combat and tactical vehicles.
        In fiscal year 2015, this portfolio continues to shift its focus to
    address A2/AD challenges. We've increased efforts on technologies to
    enable stand-off evaluation of austere ports of entry and
    infrastructure to better enable our ability to enter areas of conflict.
    We are also maintaining technology investments in detection and
    neutralization of mines and improvised explosive devices to ensure
    freedom of maneuver.
    C3I Portfolio (Fiscal Year 2015 = $321 Million)
        The C3I portfolio provides enabling capability across many of the
    Army enduring challenges, but specifically seeks to provide responsive
    capabilities for the future in congested Electro-Magnetic environments.
    These capabilities are supported by sustained efforts in sensors,
    communications, electronic warfare and information adaptable in
    dynamic, congested and austere (disconnected, intermittent and limited)
    environments to support battlefield operations and non-kinetic warfare.
    Renewed efforts in the C3I portfolio include reinvigorating efforts in
    sensor protection. We continue to invest in EW vulnerability analysis
    to perform characterization and analysis of radio frequency devices to
    develop detection and characterization techniques, tactics, and
    technologies to mitigate the effects of contested environments (such as
    jamming) on Army C4ISR systems.
        Given the potential challenges that we face while operating in a
    more contested environment, we are placing additional emphasis on
    assured PNT, developing technologies that allow navigation in Global
    Positioning System (GPS) denied/degraded environments for mounted and
    dismounted Soldiers and unmanned vehicles such as exploiting signals of
    opportunity. The fiscal year 2015 investment in PNT is $24 million. We
    will study improvements for high sensitivity GPS receivers that could
    allow acquisition and tracking in challenging locations such as under
    triple canopy jungles, in urban areas, and inside buildings. We are
    developing Anti-Jam capabilities as well as supporting mission command
    with interference source detection and location and signal strength
    measurement, thereby enabling the Army to conduct its mission in
    challenging electromagnetic environments.
        The C3I Portfolio also includes efforts in cyber, both defensive
    and offensive at an investment level of $44.5 million. Defensive
    efforts in cyber security will investigate and develop software,
    algorithms and devices to protect wireless tactical networks against
    computer network attacks. We are developing sophisticated software
    assurance algorithms to differentiate between stealthy life cycle
    attacks and software coding errors, as well as investigating and
    assessing secure coding methodologies that can detect and self-correct
    against malicious code insertion. We will research and design
    sophisticated, optimized cyber maneuver capabilities that incorporate
    the use of reasoning, intuition, and perception while determining the
    optimal scenario on when to maneuver, as well as the ability to map and
    manage the network to determine probable attack paths and the
    likelihood of exploitation.
        On the offensive side of cyber operations, we will develop
    integrated electronic attack (EA) and computer network operations
    hardware and software to execute force protection, EA, electronic
    surveillance and signals intelligence missions in a dynamic,
    distributed and coordinated fashion.
        We will demonstrate protocol exploitation software and techniques
    that allow users to remotely coordinate, plan, control and manage
    tactical EW and cyber assets; develop techniques to exploit protocols
    of threat devices not conventionally viewed as cyber to expand total
    situational awareness by providing access to and control of adversary
    electronic devices in an area of operations.
    Lethality Portfolio (Fiscal Year 2015 = $230 Million)
        In fiscal year 2015, you will see continued emphasis on the
    development of A2/AD capabilities through Long Range Fires and Counter
    Unmanned Aircraft technologies. S&T is focusing on advanced seeker
    technologies to enable acquisition of low signature threats at extended
    ranges, along with dual pulse solid rocket motor propulsion to provide
    longer range rockets and extend the protected areas of air defense
    systems. To support these capabilities, we are conducting research in
    new energetic materials focused on both propulsive and explosive
    applications. These materials have significantly higher energetic yield
    than current materials and will increase the both effectiveness of our
    systems and reduce their size.
        We also continue to develop Solid State High Energy Lasers, at an
    investment level of $44.9 million in fiscal year 2015, to provide low
    cost defeat of rockets, artillery, mortars and unmanned aircraft. We
    have had multiple successes in High Energy Lasers, as we demonstrated
    successful tracking and defeat of mortars and unmanned aircraft in
    flight this year (fiscal year 2014) from our mobile demonstrator.
        Additionally, we are supporting the Ground Maneuver Portfolio in
    the demonstration of a medium caliber weapon system, at an investment
    level of $13.5 million in fiscal year 2015, to enable FIFV requirements
    for range and lethality including an airburst munition.
    Medical (Fiscal Year 2015 = $143 Million)
        The Medical portfolio addresses the wellness and fitness of our
    Soldiers from accession through training, deployment, treatment of
    injuries and return to duty or to civilian life. Ongoing efforts
    address multiple threats to our Soldiers' health and readiness. Medical
    research focuses on areas of physiological and psychological health
    that directly support the Chief of Staff of the Army Ready and
    Resilience Campaign and the Army Surgeon General's Performance Triad
    (Activity, Nutrition and Sleep). Research in these portfolios includes
    important areas such as Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Post Traumatic
    Stress Disorder (PTSD), totaling $41.5 million in fiscal year 2015. In
    fiscal year 2015, $47 million has gone into continued research to
    mitigate infectious diseases prevalent in the Far East as well as
    combat casualty care solutions at the point of injury that will extend
    Soldier's lives during the extended distances associated with
    conducting operations in the Pacific.
        TBI research efforts include furthering our understanding of cell
    death signals and neuroprotection mechanisms, as well as identifying
    critical thresholds for secondary injury comprising TBI. The Army is
    also evaluating other nontraditional therapies for TBI, and identifying
    ``combination'' therapeutics that substantially mitigate or reduce TBI-
    induced brain damage. Current Army funded research efforts in the area
    of PTSD are primarily focused upon development of pharmacologic
    solutions for the prevention and treatment of PTSD. A large-scale
    clinical trial is currently underway evaluating the effectiveness of
    Sertraline, one of two Selected Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs)
    approved for the treatment of civilian PTSD, but not combat-related
    PTSD. This study will evaluate Sertraline's effectiveness in the
    treatment of combat-related PTSD both alone and in combination with
    psychotherapy.
    Innovation Enablers (Fiscal Year 2015 = $275 Million)
        As the largest land-owner/user within the DOD, it is incumbent upon
    the Army to be good stewards in their protection of the environment. As
    such, the Army develops and validates lifecycle models for sustainable
    facilities, creates dynamic resource planning/management tools for
    contingency basing, develops decision tools for infrastructure
    protection and resiliency and assesses the impact of sustainable
    materials/systems on the environment.
        In addition, we conduct blast noise assessment and develop
    mitigation technologies to ensure that we remain ``good neighbors''
    within Army communities and work to protect endangered species while we
    ensure that the Army mission can continue.
        The High Performance Computing (HPC) Modernization Program, at an
    investment level of $181.6 million in fiscal year 2015, supports the
    requirements of the DOD's scientists and engineers by providing them
    with access to supercomputing resource centers, the Defense Research
    and Engineering Network (DREN) (a research network which matures and
    demonstrates state of the art computer network technologies), and
    support for software applications, including the experts that help to
    improve and optimize the performance of critical common DOD
    applications programs to run efficiently on advanced HPC systems
    maturing and demonstrating leading-edge computational technology.
        The Army's Technology Maturation Initiatives effort, established in
    fiscal year 2012 enables a strategic partnership between the S&T and
    acquisition communities. This effort, funded at $75 million in fiscal
    year 2015, has become especially important as the Army heads into a
    funding downturn. We plan to use these funds to prepare the Army to
    capitalize on S&T investments as we come out of the funding ``bathtub''
    near the end of the decade. We are using these Budget Activity 4
    resources to target areas where acquisition programs intended to
    provide necessary capabilities have been delayed, such as assured PNT,
    the FIFV, and APS. We are investing resources that will either provide
    capability or inform/refine requirements for the Army's future systems
    (all of which will be done via collaborative programs executed with our
    acquisition/PEO partners).
        This portfolio includes our ManTech efforts as well, funded at $76
    million in fiscal year 2015. Last month, President Obama announced the
    launch of the Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute
    (DMDI). Headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, and managed by the U.S.
    Army's Aviation and Missile Research Development and Engineering
    Center, the DMDI Institute spearheads a consortium of 73 companies,
    universities, nonprofits, and research labs. The president announced a
    government investment of $70 million and matching private investments
    totaling $250 million for the institute. DMDI is part of the
    president's National Network of Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI) and
    will focus on the development of novel model-based design
    methodologies, virtual manufacturing tools, and sensor and robotics
    based manufacturing networks that will accelerate the innovation in
    digital manufacturing and increase U.S. competitiveness.
    Basic Research (Fiscal Year 2015 = $424 Million)
        Underpinning all of our efforts and impacting all of the enduring
    Army challenges is a strong basic research program. Army Basic Research
    includes all scientific study and experimentation directed toward
    increasing fundamental knowledge and understanding in those fields of
    the physical, engineering, environmental, and life sciences related to
    long-term national security needs. The vision for Army Basic Research
    is to advance the frontiers of fundamental science and technology and
    drive long-term, game-changing capabilities for the Army through a
    multi-disciplinary portfolio teaming our in-house researchers with the
    global academic community to ensure overwhelming land-warfighting
    capabilities against any future adversary.
        While we have made some significant adjustments within the Basic
    Research investments within the Army, we will continue to emphasize
    several areas that we feel have a high payoff potential for the
    Warfighter. These areas include: Materials in Extreme Environments;
    Quantum Information and Sensing; Intelligent Autonomous Systems; and
    Human Sciences/Cybernetics.
        For centuries, the fabrication of solid materials has hinged
    largely on manipulating a narrow range of temperatures and pressures.
    Our Materials in Extreme Environments initiative invests in new
    revolutionary and targeted scientific opportunities to discover and
    exploit the fundamental interaction of matter under extreme static
    pressures and magnetic fields, controlled electromagnetic wave
    interactions (microwave, electrical) and acoustic waves (ultrasound) to
    dramatically enhance fabrication and create engineered materials with
    tailored microstructures and revolutionary functionalities.
    Additionally, we are in the midst of a second quantum revolution--
    moving from merely computing quantum properties of systems to
    exploiting them.
        To enable the Warfighter, animal-like intelligence is desired for
    simple autonomous platforms, such as robotic followers, and for aerial
    and ground sensor platforms. We are investing in research that will
    enable highly intelligent systems that allow platforms to set waypoints
    autonomously, increasing mission effectiveness; followers that
    recognize the actions of their unit, that can perceive when the unit is
    deviating from a previously prescribed plan and know enough to query
    why; and that recognize when the unit is resting and be capable of
    doing so without explicit instructions from the Soldier.
        Regardless of specific definition, human sciences are critical and
    can safely be predicted to become pervasive across all Army research
    activities. Cognitive predictions of social person-to-person
    communication based on observed gestures, eye movement, and body
    language are becoming possible. In addition, brain-to-brain interaction
    is emerging as a potential paradigm based on external sensors and brain
    stimulation. The Army will continue to study these and other possible
    techniques, to understand shared knowledge, social coordination,
    discourse comprehension, and detection and mitigation of conflict.
    Cognitive models combined with sensors also have the potential for
    dramatic breakthroughs in human-autonomy interaction, including aspects
    such as active learning algorithms, real-time crowd-sourcing with
    humans and machines in the cloud, and maximizing artificial
    intelligence (AI) prediction accuracy. Devices and sensors that are
    wearable or implantable (including biomarkers and drug therapy) have
    the potential to enhance performance dramatically and to augment
    sensory information through new human-sensor-machine interface designs.
        The role of Basic Research is to provide the knowledge, technology,
    and advanced concepts to enable the best equipped, trained and
    protected Army to successfully execute the national security strategy,
    cannot be understated. The key to success in Basic Research is picking
    the right research challenges, the right people to do the work, and
    providing the right level of resources to maximize the likelihood of
    success.
    Impact of Sequestration
        I am often asked what impact sequestration had on the Army's S&T
    portfolio, so I would like to address some of the impacts we have seen.
    The fiscal year 2013 application of sequestration targets (hitting
    every Program Element in the S&T portfolio by a set percentage) forced
    the Army into a scenario where we decremented programs that we would
    have protected, if given the opportunity. This lack of flexibility made
    for some very bad business and technical ramifications. Within the S&T
    community, we were able to balance our sequestration targets at the
    Program Element, vice Project level--giving us the ability to avoid
    civilian
        Reduction in Force (RIF) actions where possible. That said,
    sequestration did result in unfunded efforts and delays in applied
    research and technology development areas across the S&T portfolio.
    More generally, the sequestration cuts added unnecessary risk to
    acquisition programs and delayed the transition of critical
    capabilities to the Warfighter.
        However, by far the most serious consequence of sequestration (and
    the related pay freezes, shutdowns, conference restrictions, etc.) has
    been the impact on our personnel. Without a world-class cadre of
    scientists and engineers, the Army S&T enterprise would be unable to
    support the needs of the Army. The Army Labs and Research, Development
    and Engineering Centers have reported multiple personnel leaving for
    other job opportunities or early retirement. For example, the Night
    Vision and Electronic Sensors Directorate lost eight personnel in the 2
    months prior to the well-publicized DOD-wide furloughs, compared to an
    average annual loss of around 19 personnel. These losses include
    personnel across experience levels with specialized expertise critical
    to the Army. While the average attrition rate over the past 2 years is
    running at about 8 percent (similar to a typical attrition rate found
    in prior years), the concerning impact is that 60 percent of the
    personnel leaving the Army are NOT eligible for retirement. This is a
    big change. During our exit interviews, reasons cited included
    conference restrictions (impeding the ability to progress
    professionally) coupled with increasing job insecurity due to budget
    decrements and planned manpower reductions. Complicating this loss of
    technical expertise is the restriction on hiring replacements for the
    lost government civilians. We are on a replacement cycle that varies
    between 1 hire per every 3 losses at one lab, to 1 hire for every 20
    losses at another. This pattern of loss is unsustainable if we hope to
    maintain a premier technical workforce. Finally, as we address the 2013
    National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), Section 955 language which
    mandates a reduction in the civilian workforce commensurate with a
    reduction in the military, we must confront the impacts of any civilian
    reductions, which are implemented through a personnel process that
    tends to primarily impact those employees who have less tenure in the
    government. For the S&T community that typically impacts those areas of
    new technical emphasis within the DOD--key areas such as cyber research
    and systems biology.
        While the Bipartisan Budget Act has provided some relief and
    stability for fiscal year 2014 and fiscal year 2015, the uncertainty
    again looming on the horizon makes it even more difficult to recruit
    and retain the scientists and engineers the Army depends on. As you
    know, the key to any success within the Army lies with our people.
    The S&T Enterprise Infrastructure and Workforce
        Our laboratory infrastructure is aging, with an average approximate
    facility age of 50 years. Despite this, the S&T Enterprise manages to
    maximize the scarce sustainment, restoration, and modernization funding
    and the authorities for minor military construction using NDAA, Sec.
    219 funding to minimize the impact on the R&D functions with the
    Enterprise. However, we are only making improvements to our
    infrastructure at the margins, and where possible we have used MILCON,
    through your generous support and unspecified minor construction to
    modernize facilities and infrastructure. However, we do acknowledge
    that much of the Army is in a similar position. This is not a long-term
    solution. While the authorities that you have given us have been
    helpful, they alone are not enough, and we are still faced with the
    difficulty of competing within the Army for ever-scarcer military
    construction dollars at the levels needed to properly maintain world-
    class research facilities. This will be one of our major challenges in
    the years to come and I look forward to working with OSD and Congress
    to find a solution to this issue.
        The S&T community affords us the flexibility and agility to respond
    to the many challenges that the Army will face. Without the world-class
    cadre of over 12,000 Federal civilian scientists and engineers and the
    infrastructure that supports their work, the Army S&T Enterprise would
    be unable to support the needs of the Warfighter. To maintain
    technological superiority now and in the future, the Army must maintain
    an agile workforce. Despite this current environment of unease within
    the government civilian workforce, exacerbated by conference
    restrictions, budget uncertainty, furloughs, and near zero pay
    increases, we continue to have an exceptional workforce. But, as I
    mentioned earlier, attracting and retaining the best science and
    engineering talent into the Army Laboratories and Centers is becoming
    more and more challenging. Our laboratory personnel demonstrations give
    us the flexibility to enhance recruiting and afford the opportunity to
    reshape our workforce, and I appreciate Congress' continued support for
    these authorities to include the flexibilities given to the
    Laboratories and Centers in the 2014 NDAA, Section 1107 language. The
    flexibilities given to the laboratories and centers allow the
    laboratory directors the maximum management flexibility to shape their
    workforce and remain competitive with the private sector.
        The Army S&T Enterprise cannot survive without developing the next
    generation of scientists and engineers. We continue to have an amazing
    group of young scientists and engineers that serve as role models for
    the next generation. For example, last year Dr. Ronald Polcawich, a
    researcher at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL), was named by
    President Obama to receive a 2012 Presidential Early Career Award for
    Scientists and Engineers as one of the Nation's outstanding young
    scientists for his work in Piezoelectric-Micro Electro-Mechanical
    Systems (PiezoMEMS) Technology. Dr. Polcawich, is leading a team of
    researchers at the ARL in studying PiezoMEMS with a focus on developing
    solutions for RF systems and actuators for millimeter-scale robotics.
    These actuators combined/integrated with low power sensors are being
    developed to enable millimeter-scale mechanical insect-inspired robotic
    platforms.
        The need for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
    (STEM) literacy, the ability to understand and apply concepts from
    science, technology, engineering and mathematics in order to solve
    complex problems, goes well beyond the traditional STEM occupations of
    scientist, engineer or mathematician. The Army also has a growing need
    for highly qualified, STEM-literate technicians and skilled workers in
    advanced manufacturing, logistics, management and other technology-
    driven fields. Success and sustainment for the Army S&T Enterprise
    depends on a STEM-literate population to support innovation and the
    Army must contribute to building future generations of STEM-literate
    and agile talent.
        Through the Army Educational Outreach Program (AEOP), funded at $9
    million in fiscal year 2015, the Army makes a unique and valuable
    contribution to meet the national STEM challenge--a challenge which
    includes the growing demand for STEM competencies; the global
    competitiveness for STEM talent; an unbalanced representation of our
    Nation's demographics in STEM fields; and the critical need for an
    agile and resilient STEM workforce. AEOP offers a cohesive,
    collaborative portfolio of STEM programs that provides students, as
    well as teachers, access to our world-class Army technical
    professionals and research centers. Exposure to STEM fields and STEM
    professionals is critical to growing the next generation of STEM-
    literate young men and women who will form the Army's workforce of
    tomorrow.
        In the 2012-2013 academic year, AEOP directly engaged more than
    66,000 students and nearly 1,500 teachers in authentic research
    experiences. Almost 2,351 Army Scientists and Engineers (S&E's)
    provided mentorship, either from our in-house research laboratories or
    through our university partnerships. Additionally in fiscal year 2013,
    we initiated a comprehensive evaluation strategy (the first of its
    kind) that uses the government and a consortium of STEM organizations
    known for their nationwide education and outreach efforts to annually
    assess our program. Aligned with Federal guidance, AEOP requires the
    evaluation of all elements of the program based on specific, cohesive,
    metrics and evidence-based approaches to achieve key objectives of Army
    outreach; increased program efficiency and coherence; the ability to
    share and leverage best practices; as well as focus on Army priorities.
    The AEOP priorities are:
      --STEM Literate Citizenry: Broaden, deepen and diversify the pool of
            STEM talent in support of the Army and our defense industry
            base.
      --STEM Savvy Educators: Support and empower educators with unique
            Army research and technology resources.
      --Sustainable Infrastructure: Develop and implement a cohesive,
            coordinated and sustainable STEM education outreach
            infrastructure across the Army.
        For fiscal year 2015, we are concentrating on implementing
    evidence-based program improvements, strengthening additional joint
    service sponsored efforts, and identifying ways to expand the reach and
    influence of successful existing programs by leveraging partnerships
    and resources with other agencies, industry and academia.
    New Approaches to Enhance Innovation
        It is widely acknowledged that innovation depends on bringing
    multiple scientific disciplines together to engage in collaborative
    projects--often yielding unpredictable, yet highly productive results.
    Formal and informal interactions among scientists lead to knowledge-
    building and research breakthroughs. These types of collaborations are
    happening on a day-to-day basis across our labs and engineering centers
    to produce the superior technology that our Army needs today, tomorrow
    and beyond. With shrinking budgets and huge leaps in the pace of
    technological change, our Army S&T organizations must do more with less
    and faster than ever before to develop technology that will ensure
    mission success for the Army's first battle after next. To this end, we
    must more succinctly leverage scientific discovery from our academic
    and industry base by increasing the scientific engagement and flow of
    ideas that leads to ground breaking innovation.
        In 1945, Vannevar Bush`s concepts documented in ``Science--the
    Endless Frontier'' stressed the necessity of a robust/synergistic
    university, industry and government laboratory research system. Over
    the years, the rigid and insular nature of the defense laboratories
    have caused an erosion of that university/industry/government lab
    synergy that is critical to the discovery, innovation and transition of
    science and technology important to national security.
        In an effort to reenergize that synergy, the U.S. Army Research
    Laboratory (ARL) is working to extend their alliances through an Open
    Campus Concept that brings together under one roof the triad of
    industry, academia, and government. Leveraging the cutting-edge
    innovation of academia, the system development and transition expertise
    of industry and their own Army-focused fundamental research; ARL can
    harness the power of the triad to produce revolutionary science and
    technology more efficiently and effectively. The Open Campus Concept
    creates an ecosystem for academia, defense labs, and industry to share
    people, facilities and resources to develop and deliver transformative
    science oriented on solving complex Army problems. It will provide the
    means for our world-class scientific talent to work together in state-
    of-the-art facilities to provide innovation that allows rapid
    transition of technology to our Soldiers. ARL's Open Campus Concept
    could lead to a new business model that would transform the defense
    laboratory enterprise into an agile, efficient and effective laboratory
    system that supports the continuous flow of people and ideas to ensure
    transformative scientific discovery, innovation and transition critical
    to national security.
        Finally, we are increasingly mindful of the globalization of S&T
    capabilities and expertise. Our International S&T strategy provides a
    framework to leverage cutting edge foreign science and technology
    enabled capabilities and engages with allies through Global S&T Watch.
    Global S&T Watch is a systematic process for identifying, assessing,
    and documenting relevant foreign research and technology developments.
    The Research, Development and Engineering Command's (RDECOM)
    International Technology Centers (ITCs), Engineer Research and
    Development Center (ERDC) international research office and the Medical
    Research Materiel Command's OCONUS laboratories identify and document
    relevant foreign S&T developments. We have initiated a new process to
    strategically identify and selectively engage our allies when their
    technologies and materiel developments can contribute to Army needs and
    facilitate coalition interoperability. The resultant engagements will
    augment the existing bilateral leadership forums we currently maintain
    with the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, and Israel which provide both
    visibility of and management decisions on allied developments that
    merit follow-up for possible collaboration.
    Summary
        As the Army S&T program continues to identify and harvest
    technologies suitable for transition to our force, we aim to remain
    ever vigilant of potential and emerging threats. We are implementing a
    strategic approach to modernization that includes an awareness of
    existing and potential gaps; an understanding of emerging threats;
    knowledge of state-of-the-art commercial, academic, and government
    research; as well as a clear understanding of competing needs for
    limited resources. Army S&T will sharpen its research efforts to focus
    upon those core capabilities it needs to sustain while identifying
    promising or disruptive technologies able to change the existing
    paradigms of understanding. Ultimately, the focus remains upon
    Soldiers; Army S&T consistently seeks new avenues to increase the
    Soldier's capability and ensure their technological superiority today,
    tomorrow, and decades from now. The Army S&T mission is not complete
    until the right technologies provide superior, yet affordable,
    overmatch capability for our Soldiers. I will leave you with a last
    thought from the Secretary of the Army, the Honorable John McHugh.

        ``Our Strategic Vision is based on a decisive technological
            superiority to any potential adversary.'' \6\ --Honorable John
            W. McHugh, 21st Secretary of the Army
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \6\ Terms of Reference, fiscal year 2012 Army Science Board Summer
    Study, Secretary of the Army, John M. McHugh, October 28, 2011.

        This is an interesting, yet challenging, time to be in the Army.
    Despite this, we remain an Army that is looking towards the future
    while taking care of the Soldiers today. I hope that we can continue to
    count on your support as we move forward, and I would like to again
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    thank the members of the Committee for all you do for our Soldiers.

        Senator Durbin. Thank you, Ms. Miller.
        Dr. Walker.
    STATEMENT OF DR. DAVID WALKER, DEPUTY ASSISTANT
                SECRETARY OF THE AIR FORCE FOR SCIENCE,
                TECHNOLOGY, AND ENGINEERING
        Dr. Walker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Durbin,
    Senator Cochran, members of the subcommittee, I am pleased to
    have an opportunity today to provide testimony on the Air Force
    science and technology program.
        The globalization and the proliferation of technology means
    that we have a wide spectrum of threats that we have to face,
    which has led to competition across all domains that we operate
    in. As our Chief of Staff stated in his recent vision,
    ``Despite the best analysis and projection by national security
    experts, the time and place of the next crisis are never
    certain and rarely what we expect.''
        To guarantee our security in this dynamic environment
    requires that we learn lessons from the past couple of decades
    of war that we have been involved in but also be able to
    creatively visualize what our future will be and to develop a
    science and technology program to address that.
        In this space, we are really finding great opportunity. The
    Air Force scientists and engineers continue to evolve and
    advance innovative, game-changing technologies and enabling
    technologies that will transform the landscape of how the Air
    Force flies, flights, and wins in the airspace and cyberspace.
        In close coordination with the requirements, intelligence,
    and acquisition communities, we have structured our S&T program
    to address our highest priority needs of the Air Force, to
    execute a balanced and integrated program that is responsive to
    the Air Force core mission, and to advance critical technical
    competencies needed to address future research.
        The Air Force as a whole had to make difficult trades
    between force structure, readiness, and modernization in this
    year's President's budget submission. The Air Force S&T request
    is approximately $2.3 billion, which is about a 6.2-percent
    decrease over the fiscal year 2014 request. However, when you
    look at this compared to the overall Air Force RDT&E (research,
    development, testing, and evaluation) input in the fiscal year
    2015, that was a decrease of 9 percent. So S&T actually fared
    well versus the RDT&E as a whole.
        Our budget request has rebalanced our basic research
    spending as part of our overall portfolio to increase our
    emphasis on technology demonstrations. It also emphasized our
    game-changing technologies of hypersonics, autonomy, directed
    energy, and fuel-efficient propulsion technologies. All of
    these provide us a greater range, speed, and lethality for
    operations in highly contested environments described in our
    2014 QDR (Quadrennial Defense Review) report.
        As I stated earlier, our scientific opportunities lie
    between learning from the past and visualizing the future. The
    increased laboratory hiring and personnel management
    authorities and the flexibilities provided by Congress over the
    last several years have done much to improve our ability to
    attract the Nation's best talents and to explore these
    opportunities. However, we still have work to do to ensure that
    we sustain the quality of our laboratories and if we have long-
    term budget decreases, this will impact our ability to fund
    this. So funding uncertainties and the decreases in budget
    really lead to an uncertain future for our S&T, which leads to
    loss of opportunities for new discovery and for innovative
    technologies.
        As a result of sequestration in fiscal year 2013, we
    canceled or delayed or rescoped over 100 contracts, resulting
    in a cost and an extended technology development schedule,
    ultimately delaying improved capabilities for the warfighter.
    For example, the rescoping of work on a very sophisticated
    ground-based imaging of objects in extremely high altitude
    orbits is going to delay technology availability for at least a
    year for a transition into our Air Force Space Command.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        In closing, I firmly believe maintaining and even expanding
    our technological advantage is vital to ensuring assured access
    and freedom of action in the airspace and cyberspace. The
    focused and balanced investments of the Air Force fiscal year
    2015 S&T program are hedges against an unpredictable future and
    provide a pathway to a flexible, precise, and lethal force at a
    relatively low cost in relation to the return on investment.
        On behalf of the dedicated scientists and engineers of the
    Air Force S&T enterprise, I thank you again for the opportunity
    to testify today and look forward to your questions and thank
    you all for your support of the Air Force S&T community.
        [The statement follows:]
                   Prepared Statement of Dr. David E. Walker
                                  introduction
        Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran, and Members of the
    Subcommittee, I am pleased to have the opportunity to provide testimony
    on the fiscal year 2015 Air Force Science and Technology (S&T) Program,
    especially during this unprecedented time in our history.
        Our Nation is one of a vast array of actors in a complex, volatile,
    and unpredictable security environment. Globalization and the
    proliferation of technology mean we face threats across a wide spectrum
    and competition across all domains. We're confronted by ever-evolving
    adversaries ranging from one person with a single interconnected
    computer to sophisticated capable militaries and everything in between.
    We're also challenged by the shear pace of change among our adversaries
    fueled by profound information and technology diffusion worldwide. As
    stated by the Chief of Staff of the Air Force in the Global Vigilance,
    Global Reach and Global Power For Our Nation vision, ``despite the best
    analyses and projections by national security experts, the time and
    place of the next crisis are never certain and are rarely what we
    expect.'' Success and the guaranty of security in this dynamic
    environment require that we both take lessons learned from the last
    decade of conflict and creatively visualize the future strategic
    landscape. It's in this space, between learning from the past and
    keeping an open eye to the future, where we find opportunity.
        The focused and balanced investments of the Air Force fiscal year
    2015 S&T Program are hedges against the unpredictable future and
    provide pathways to a flexible, precise and lethal force at a
    relatively low cost in in relation to the return on investment. The
    Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics
    recently reminded us that complacency now and in the future is simply
    not an option. Maintaining, and even expanding, our technological
    advantage is vital to ensuring sustained freedom of access and action
    in air, space and cyberspace.
                     air force fiscal year 2015 s&t program
        The Air Force as a whole had to make difficult trades between force
    structure (capacity), readiness, and modernization (capability) in the
    Service's fiscal year 2015 President's Budget submission to recover
    from budget uncertainty over the two previous fiscal years. The Air
    Force fiscal year 2015 President's Budget request for S&T is
    approximately $2.1 billion, which includes nearly $178 million in
    support of devolved programs consisting of High Energy Laser efforts
    and the University Research Initiative. This year's Air Force S&T
    budget request represents a decrease of $141 million or a 6.2 percent
    decrease from the fiscal year 2014 President's Budget request, a
    slightly larger reduction as compared to the overall Air Force topline
    reduction. This budget request rebalances basic research spending as
    part of the overall portfolio to increase emphasis on conducting
    technology demonstrations. The Air Force was able to reduce funding in
    the aerospace systems and materials areas while still advancing
    capabilities for the Air Force and the Department of Defense (DOD) by
    smartly leveraging research being conducted by the Defense Advanced
    Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the hypersonics area.
        We've learned a great deal over the last decade. The dedicated
    scientists and engineers of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL)
    have successfully supported warfighters during conflicts in Iraq,
    Afghanistan, and North Africa through the rapid development of systems
    and capabilities including persistent intelligence, surveillance, and
    reconnaissance (ISR); data fusion and integration from multiple
    sensors; and near real-time monitoring of some orbiting U.S. and
    commercial spacecraft assets. With the pivot to the Pacific as outlined
    in the Defense Strategic Guidance, we must continue to evolve and
    advance ``game-changing'' and enabling technologies which can transform
    the landscape of how the Air Force flies, fights and wins against the
    high-end threats in contested environments envisioned in the future.
        In close coordination with the requirements, intelligence and
    acquisition communities, we have structured our Air Force fiscal year
    2015 S&T Program to address the highest priority needs of the Air Force
    across the near-, mid- and far-term; execute a balanced and integrated
    program that is responsive to Air Force core missions; and advance
    critical technical competencies needed to address the full range of
    product and support capabilities. The Air Force continues to focus
    efforts to deliberately align S&T planning, technology transition
    planning, development planning and early systems engineering. The
    linkages between these planning activities are critical to initiating
    acquisition programs with more mature technologies and credible cost
    estimates, and we are institutionalizing these linkages in Air Force
    policy. Air Force S&T provides critical inputs at several phases of the
    Chief of Staff of the Air Force's Air Force 2023 strategic planning
    effort including helping to shape the ``realm of the possible'' when
    envisioning long term strategy, offering technologies to expand the
    strategic viewpoint and identifying potential solutions to requirements
    and capability gaps. Our forthcoming updated Air Force S&T strategy
    focuses on investing in S&T for the future, as well as leverages our
    organic capacity, and the capacity of our partners (domestic and
    international), to integrate existing capabilities and mature
    technologies into innovative, affordable, and sustainable solutions.
    This flexible strategy provides us the technological agility to adapt
    our S&T Program to dynamic strategic, budgetary, and technology
    environments and will shape prioritized actionable S&T plans.
                        near term technology transition
        The Air Force continues to move our Flagship Capability Concept
    (FCC) projects toward transition to the warfighter. A well-defined
    scope and specific objectives desired by a Major Command (MAJCOM) are
    key factors in commissioning this type of an Air Force-level technology
    demonstration effort. The technologies are matured by the Air Force
    Research Laboratory with the intent to transition to the acquisition
    community for eventual deployment to an end user. These FCCs are
    sponsored by the using MAJCOM and are vetted through the S&T Governance
    Structure and Air Force Requirements Oversight Council to ensure they
    align with Air Force strategic priorities. In fiscal year 2014, the Air
    Force successfully completed and transitioned the Selective Cyber
    Operations Technology Integration (SCOTI) FCC and will continue work on
    the High Velocity Penetrating Weapon (HVPW) and Precision Airdrop (PAD)
    FCCs.
        AFRL delivered the SCOTI FCC to the Air Force Life Cycle Management
    Center (AFLCMC) in September 2013, on time, on budget and within
    specification. SCOTI consists of cyber technologies capable of
    affecting multiple nodes for the purposes of achieving a military
    objective and gaining cyberspace superiority. SCOTI's robust, modular
    architecture provides vital extensibility to allow cyber warriors to
    keep pace with rapidly evolving threats. AFLCMC is evaluating the
    delivered SCOTI architecture for integration with operational cyber
    mission software to directly meet the needs of a major capability area
    in the Air Force Cyberspace Superiority Core Function Master Plan. By
    successfully meeting the requirements of the stakeholder-approved
    Technology Transition Plan, SCOTI is the first FCC to transition and
    will serve as a baseline for current and future integrated cyber tools
    to provide needed effects for the warfighter.
        The HVPW FCC was established to demonstrate critical technologies
    to reduce the technical risk for a new generation of penetrating
    weapons to defeat difficult, hard targets. This FCC matures
    technologies that can be applied to the hard target munitions
    acquisition including guidance and control, terminal seeker, fuze,
    energetic materials and warhead case design. This effort develops
    improved penetration capability of hard, deep targets containing high
    strength concrete with up to 2,500 feet per second (boosted velocity)
    impact in a GPS-degraded environment. This technology will demonstrate
    penetration capability of a 5,000 pound-class gravity weapon with a
    2,000 pound weapon thus enabling increased loadout for bombers and
    fighters. Tests will demonstrate complete warhead functionality, and
    are scheduled to be completed the end of September 2014.
        The PAD FCC was commissioned in response to a request from the
    Commander of Air Mobility Command for technologies to improve airdrop
    accuracy and effectiveness while minimizing risk to our aircrews. To
    date, PAD FCC efforts have focused on: early systems engineering
    analysis to determine major error sources, data collection, flying with
    crews, wind profiling, bundle tracking, and designing modeling and
    simulation activities. The Air Force Research Laboratory completed the
    bundle tracker development in fiscal year 2013 and in fiscal year 2014
    began wind profile sensor development.
                           game-changing technologies
        The Air Force S&T Program provides technology options to enable
    operations in anti-access, area-denial environments and transform the
    way we fly, fight and win in air, space and cyberspace. To illustrate
    how, I will highlight some of our efforts in game-changing and enabling
    technology areas:
    Hypersonics
        Speed provides options for engagement of time sensitive targets in
    anti-access/area-denial environments, and improves the survivability of
    Air Force systems. Hypersonic speed weapons are also a force multiplier
    as fewer are required to defeat difficult targets and fewer platforms
    are required from greater standoff distances. The Air Force S&T
    community continues to execute the high speed technology roadmaps
    developed with industry over the last 3 years. We are also building on
    the success of the X-51A Waverider scramjet engine hypersonic
    demonstrator, which on 1 May 2013 reached an approximate Mach Number of
    5.1 during its fourth and final flight. The Air Force has focused
    multi-faceted, phased investments in game-changing technology for
    survivable, time-critical strike in the near term and a penetrating
    regional intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and
    strike aircraft in the far term.
        The near term strike effort is the High Speed Strike Weapon (HSSW)
    program. This effort will mature cruise missile technology to address
    many of those items necessary to realize a missile in the hypersonic
    speed regime including: modeling and simulation; ramjet/scramjet
    propulsion; high temperature materials; guidance, navigation, and
    control; seekers and their required apertures; warhead and subsystems;
    thermal protection and management; manufacturing technology; and
    compact energetic booster technologies.
        The Air Force conducts research and development in all aspects of
    hypersonic technologies in partnership with NASA, DARPA, and industry/
    academic sectors. The HSSW program will include two parallel integrated
    technology demonstration efforts to leverage DARPA's recent experience
    in hypersonic technologies that are relevant to reduce risk in key
    areas. One of the demonstrations will be a tactically-relevant
    demonstration of an air breathing missile technology that is compatible
    with Air Force 5th generation platforms including geometric and weight
    limits for internal B-2 Spirit bomber carriage and external F-35
    Lightening II fighter carriage. This demonstration will build on the X-
    51 success and will include a tactically compliant engine start
    capability and launch from a relevant altitude.
        For the other demonstration, the Air Force and DARPA will seek to
    develop technologies and demonstrate capabilities that will enable
    transformational changes in prompt, survivable, long-range strike
    against using the Tactical Boost Glide (TBG) concept. The objective of
    the TBG effort is to develop and demonstrate the critical technologies
    that will enable an air launched tactical range, hypersonic boost-glide
    missile. Both efforts will build upon experience gained through recent
    hypersonic vehicle development and demonstration efforts supported by
    DARPA and the Air Force. These demonstrations are traceable to an
    operationally relevant weapon that could be launched from existing
    aircraft. Technology and concepts from these efforts will provide
    options for an operational weapon system for rapidly and effectively
    prosecuting targets in highly contested environments.
    Autonomy
        Analysis of these future operating environments has also led the
    Air Force to invest in game-changing advances in autonomous systems.
    Autonomous systems can extend human reach by providing potentially
    unlimited persistent capabilities without degradation due to fatigue or
    lack of attention. The Air Force S&T Program is developing technologies
    that realize true autonomous capabilities including those that advance
    the state-of-the-art in machine intelligence, decisionmaking, and
    integration with the warfighter to form effective human-machine teams.
        The greater use of autonomous systems increases the capability of
    U.S. forces to execute well within the adversaries' decision loops.
    Human decision-makers intelligently integrated into autonomous systems
    enable the right balance of human and machine capability to meet Air
    Force challenges in the future. The Air Force S&T Program invests in
    the development of technologies to enable warfighters and machines to
    work together, with each understanding mission context, sharing
    understanding and situation awareness, and adapting to the needs and
    capabilities of the other. The keys to maximizing this human-machine
    interaction are: instilling confidence and trust among the team
    members; understanding of each member's tasks, intentions, capabilities
    and progress; and ensuring effective and timely communication. All of
    which must be provided within a flexible architecture for autonomy,
    facilitating different levels of authority, control and collaboration.
    Current research is focused on understanding human cognition and
    applying these concepts to machine learning. Efforts develop efficient
    interfaces for an operator to supervise multiple unmanned air systems
    (UAS) platforms and providing the ISR analyst with tools to assist
    identifying, tracking, targets of interest.
        Autonomy also allows machines to synchronize activity and
    information. Systems that coordinate location, status, mission intent,
    and intelligence and surveillance data can provide redundancy,
    increased coverage, decreased costs and/or increased capability.
    Research efforts are developing control software to enable multiple,
    small UASs to coordinate mission tasking with other air systems or with
    ground sensors. Other research efforts are developing munition sensors
    and guidance systems that will increase operator trust, validation, and
    flexibility while capitalizing on the growing ability of munitions to
    autonomously search a region of interest, provide additional
    situational awareness, plan optimum flight paths, de-conflict
    trajectories, optimize weapon-to-target orientation, and cooperate to
    achieve optimum effects.
        Finally, before any system is fielded, adequate testing must be
    conducted to demonstrate that it meets requirements and will operate as
    intended. As technologies with greater levels of autonomy mature, the
    number of test parameters will increase exponentially. Due to this
    increase, it will be impractical to verify and validate autonomous
    system performance, cost-effectively, using current methods. The Air
    Force is developing test techniques that verify the decisionmaking and
    logic of the system and validate the system's ability to appropriately
    handle unexpected situations. Efforts are focused at the software-level
    and build to overall system to verify codes are valid and trustworthy.
    The Air Force will demonstrate the tools needed to ensure autonomous
    systems operate safely and effectively in unanticipated and dynamic
    environments.
    Directed Energy
        With a uniquely focused directorate within AFRL, the Air Force is
    in a leading position in the game-changing area of directed energy.
    These technologies, including high powered microwave (HPM) and high
    energy lasers (HELs), can provide distinctive and revolutionary
    capabilities to several Air Force and joint mission areas. Laser
    technologies are rapidly evolving for infrared seeker jamming, secure
    communications in congested and jammed spectrum environments, space
    situational awareness, and vastly improved ISR and target
    identification capabilities at ever increasing ranges. To get HELs to a
    weapon system useful to the Air Force, our S&T program invests in
    research in laser sources from developing narrow line width fiber
    lasers to scaling large numbers of fiber lasers with DARPA and MDA.
    Since HEL devices are not sufficient for a weapon, the Air Force
    directed energy research also includes beam control, atmospheric
    compensation, acquisition, pointing, tracking, laser effects, and
    physics based end-to-end modeling and simulation. The Air Force also
    funds the High Energy Laser Joint Technology Office (HEL JTO) which
    supports all of the services by being the key motivator of high power
    laser devices such as the successful 100 kilowatt, lab-scale Joint High
    Power Solid State Laser (JHPSSL) and other funding many smaller
    successes. The current primer program, which is jointly funded with
    core Army and Air Force funds, is the Robust Electric Laser Initiative
    (RELI). The initiative funds efforts to develop designs for efficient
    and weaponizable solid state lasers with options leading to a 100
    kilowatt laser device.
        Our HPM S&T will complement kinetic weapons to engage multiple
    targets, neutralizing communication systems, computers, command and
    control nodes, and other electronics, with low collateral damage for
    counter-anti-access/area denial in future combat situations. The Air
    Force is using the results of from the highly successful Counter-
    Electronics High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP) Joint
    Capabilities Technology Demonstration (JCTD) to inform an effort known
    as Non-Kinetic Counter Electronics (NKCE). NKCE is currently in pre-
    Alternative of Alternatives (AoA) phase, with an AoA potentially
    starting in fiscal year 2015. The AoA will examine the cost and
    performances for kinetic, non-kinetic, and cyber options for air
    superiority and seeks to have a procured and operational weapon system
    to support the targets and requirements of the Combatant Commanders in
    the mid-2020 timeframe. In parallel, the Air Force S&T Program is
    continuing HPM research and development to provide a more capable and
    smaller counter-electronics system that can fit onto a variety of
    platforms.
        The DOD directed energy research community is highly integrated and
    the Air Force leverages the work of other agencies. For example, the
    Air Force is working with the Missile Defense Agency on integrated
    electro-optical/infrared pulsed-laser targeting to enhance situational
    awareness and increase survivability by enabling the use of legacy
    weapons in the 2016 timeframe. In addition, the Air Force is partnering
    with DARPA on the Demonstrator Laser Weapon System, a ground-based
    fully integrated laser weapon system demonstration over the next 2
    fiscal years and an Air-to-Air Defensive Weapon Concept.
    Fuel Efficiency Technologies
        For the longer term reduction in energy demand, the Air Force is
    investing in the development of adaptive turbine engine technologies
    which have the potential to reduce fuel consumption while also
    increasing capability in anti-access/area denial environments through
    increased range and time-on-station. The Air Force has several priority
    efforts as part of the DOD's Versatile Advanced Affordable Turbine
    Engine (VAATE) technology program. VAATE is a coordinated Army, Navy,
    and Air Force plan initiated in 2003 to develop revolutionary advances
    in propulsion system performance, fuel efficiency and affordability for
    the DOD's turbine engine powered air platforms.
        The initial effort, Adaptive Versatile Engine Technology (ADVENT),
    began in fiscal year 2007 and is set to complete this year. General
    Electric is currently in final testing of the ADVENT engine
    technologies which include a next generation high pressure ratio core
    and an adaptive fan in a third stream engine architecture.
        The Adaptive Engine Technology Development (AETD) program, our
    accelerated follow-on adaptive engine effort for the combat Air Force,
    is progressing very well. The objective of AETD is to fully mature
    adaptive engine technologies for low risk transition to multiple combat
    aircraft alternatives ready for fielding as soon as the early 2020's.
    The effort will deliver a preliminary prototype engine design,
    substantiated by major hardware demonstrations that can be tailored to
    specific applications when the DOD is ready to launch new development
    programs. The overarching goal of AETD is to mature adaptive engine
    technologies so that these programs can launch with significantly lower
    risk than previous propulsion development programs.
        The High Energy Efficient Turbine Engine (HEETE) S&T effort is our
    flagship large engine effort under the VAATE technology program. The
    HEETE effort's primary objective is to demonstrate engine technologies
    that enable a 35 percent fuel efficiency improvement versus the VAATE
    year 2000 baseline, or at least 10 percent beyond current VAATE
    technology capabilities being demonstrated in the ADVENT program.
        The Air Force Research Laboratory and industry have conducted a
    number of HEETE payoff studies that show significant potential benefits
    to future transport and ISR aircraft (e.g., 18 percent to 30 percent
    increase in strategic transport range, 45 percent to 60 percent
    increase in tactical transport radius, and 37 percent to 75 percent
    increase in ISR UAV loiter time). A study of Air Force's fleet fuel
    usage showed that introduction of HEETE-derived engines into the
    mobility and the tanker fleet would enable fuel savings of
    approximately 203 million gallons per year by the mid-2030's.
        Investments in these efforts help us reduce energy demand, bridge
    the ``valley of death'' between S&T and potential acquisition programs,
    and help maintain the U.S. industrial technological edge and lead in
    turbine engines.
                             enabling technologies
        In addition to these game-changing technologies, the Air Force S&T
    Program also invests in many enabling technologies to facilitate major
    advances and ensure maximum effectiveness in the near-, mid-, and far
    term:
    Cyber
        Operations in cyberspace magnify military effects by increasing the
    efficiency and effectiveness of air and space operations and by helping
    to integrate capabilities across all domains. However, the cyberspace
    domain is increasingly contested and/or denied and the Air Force faces
    risks from malicious insiders, insecure supply chains, and increasingly
    sophisticated adversaries. Fortunately, cyberspace S&T can provide
    assurance, resilience, affordability, and empowerment to enable the Air
    Force's assured cyber advantage.
        In 2012, the Air Force developed Cyber Vision 2025 which described
    the Air Force vision and blueprint for cyber S&T spanning cyberspace,
    air, space, command and control, intelligence, and mission support.
    Cyber Vision 2025 provides a long-range vision for cyberspace to
    identify and analyze current and forecasted capabilities, threats,
    vulnerabilities and consequences across core Air Force missions in
    order to identify key S&T gaps and opportunities. The Air Force's cyber
    S&T investments for fiscal year 2015 are aligned to the four themes
    identified in Cyber Vision 2025: Mission Assurance, Agility and
    Resilience, Optimized Human-Machine Systems, and Foundations of Trust.
        Air Force S&T efforts in Mission Assurance seek to ensure
    survivability and freedom of action in contested and denied
    environments through enhanced cyber situational awareness for air,
    space, and cyber commanders. Current research efforts seek to provide
    dynamic, real-time mapping and analysis of critical mission functions
    onto cyberspace. This analysis includes the cyber situation awareness
    functions of monitoring the health and status of cyber assets, and
    extends to capture how missions flow through cyberspace. This work
    seeks to provide commanders with the ability to recognize attacks and
    prioritize defensive actions to protect assets supporting critical
    missions. Other research efforts develop techniques to measure and
    assess the effects of cyber operations and integrate them with cross-
    domain effects to achieve military objectives.
        Research in Agility and Survivability develops rapid and
    unpredictable maneuver capabilities to disrupt the adversaries' cyber
    ``kill chain'' along with their planning and decisionmaking processes
    and hardening cyber elements to improve the ability to fight through,
    survive, and rapidly recover from attacks. Air Force S&T efforts are
    creating dynamic, randomizable, reconfigurable architectures capable of
    autonomously detecting compromises, repairing and recovering from
    damage, and evading threats in real-time. Cyber resiliency is enhanced
    through an effective mix of redundancy, diversity, and distributed
    functionality that leverages advances in virtualization and cloud
    technologies.
        The Air Force works to maximize the human and machine potential
    through the measurement of physiological, perceptual, and cognitive
    states to enable personnel selection, customized training, and (user,
    mission, and environment) tailored augmented cognition. S&T efforts
    develop visualization technologies to enable a global common
    operational picture (COP) of complex cyber capabilities that can be
    readily manipulated to support Air Force mission-essential functions
    (MEFs). Other efforts seek to identify the critical human skills and
    abilities that are the foundation for superior cyber warriors and
    develop a realistic distributed network training environment integrated
    with new individualized and continuous learning technologies.
        The Air Force is developing secure foundations of computing to
    provide operator trust in Air Force weapon systems that include a mix
    of embedded systems, customized and militarized commercial systems,
    commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) equipment, and unverified hardware and
    software that is developed outside the United States. Research into
    formal verification and validation of complex, large scale,
    interdependent systems as well as vulnerability analysis, automated
    reverse engineering, and real-time forensics tools will enable
    designers to quantify the level of trust in various components of the
    infrastructure and to understand the risk these components pose to the
    execution of critical mission functions. Efforts to design and build
    secure hardware will provide a secure root-of-trust and enable a more
    intelligent mixing of government off-the-shelf (GOTS) and COTS
    components based on the systems' security requirements.
    Cognitive Electronic Warfare
        With the highly contested future EW environment, we have focused
    S&T efforts on creating the ability to rapidly respond to threats. This
    is accomplished by developing the analytic ability to understand a
    complex threat environment and determine the best combination of
    techniques across all available platforms. In addition, leveraging
    cognitive and autonomy concepts improve the cycle time between
    emergence of a threat and development of an effective response. This
    system-of-systems solution approach is implemented in a physics based
    interactive simulation capability to evaluate novel concepts. The Air
    Force is also developing technologies to enhance survivability and
    improve situational awareness in the electro-optical (EO)/infrared (IR)
    and radio frequency (RF) warning and countermeasures area. New
    electronic components (antennas, amplifiers, processors) will improve
    the ability to detect threats with emphasis on advanced processing and
    software to assess threats in a crowded RF environment. This includes
    solutions to detect and defeat infrared and optical threats. These will
    enable protection against autonomous seekers using multi-spectral
    tracking.
    Space Situational Awareness/Space Control
        The ability to counter threats, intentional or unintentional, in
    the increasingly congested and contested space domain begins with Space
    Situational Awareness (SSA). The SSA S&T investments needed to maintain
    our core Space Superiority and Command and Control missions in such an
    environment are substantial and include research in Assured Recognition
    and Persistent Tracking of Space Objects, Characterization of Space
    Objects and Events, Timely and Actionable Threat Warning and
    Assessment, and Effective Decision Support through Data Integration and
    Exploitation. The Air Force works across these areas in cooperation
    with the DOD, intelligence community, and industry.
        To help build a holistic national SSA capability, the Air Force's
    S&T investment is designed to exploit our in-house expertise to
    innovate in areas with short-, mid- and long-term impact that are not
    already being addressed by others. Examples include working with
    federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) and academia
    to attack the deep space uncorrelated target association problem to
    improve custody of space objects and reduce the burden on the space
    surveillance network; better conjunction assessment and re-entry
    estimation algorithms to reduce collision probabilities and unnecessary
    maneuvers; and infrared star catalog improvement to ease observation
    calibrations. These products have recently transitioned to national SSA
    capabilities. Advanced component technologies developed with industry
    include visible focal plane arrays, deployable baffles and lenses to
    meet performance, and cost and weight requirements for future space-
    based surveillance systems.
        As part of the Air Force Research Laboratory's long history of
    proving new technologies in relevant environments, the Automated
    Navigation and Guidance Experiment for Local Space (ANGELS) program
    examines techniques to provide a clearer picture of the environment
    around our vital space assets through safe, automated spacecraft
    operations above Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO). Equipped with
    significant detection, tracking and characterization technology, ANGELS
    will launch in 2014. It will maneuver around its booster's upper stage
    and explore increased levels of automation in mission planning and
    execution, enabling more timely and complex operations with reduced
    footprint. Additional indications and warning work focuses on change
    detection and characterization technologies to provide key observables
    that improve response time and efficacy.
    Satellite Resilience
        Our Nation and our military are heavily dependent on space
    capabilities. With an operational space domain that is becoming
    increasingly congested, competitive and contested, the Air Force has
    seen the need for development of technologies to increase resilience of
    our space capabilities. The satellites upon which we rely so heavily
    must be able to avoid or survive threats, both man-made and natural,
    and to operate through and subsequently quickly recover should threat
    or environmental effects manifest. To this end, the Air Force S&T
    Program has increased technological investment in tactical sensing and
    threat warning, reactive satellite control, and hardening.
        Satellites today are equipped with a wide range of sensors, that,
    if exploited in new ways and/or coupled with new hosted threat sensing
    technologies could yield significant increases to tactical sensing and
    threat warning. The Air Force pursues a range of internally-focused
    health and status sensing (e.g. structural integrity, thermal, cyber)
    and externally focused object or phenomena sensing (e.g. space
    environment, threat sensing, directed energy detection) technologies,
    and a range of data fusion approaches to maximize the timeliness and
    confidence of that warning. While tactical warning is vital, it is only
    immediately helpful when a satellite is able to tactically respond in
    some way to avoid a threat or minimize its effects. Any choice of a
    response requires some means of reconciling warning with viable courses
    of action available. The Air Force focuses on efforts specifically
    dedicated to tailoring satellite control based on tactical warning
    inputs. Finally, hardening technologies refers to a range of both
    passive and active capabilities that, when selected and executed, could
    result in threat avoidance, lessening their effects or recovering lost
    capability more quickly. For example, for particular types of threats,
    dynamic configuration changes, optical protection, cyber quarantine,
    dynamic thermal management or possibly maneuvers might achieve the
    desired protection.
    Precision Navigation and Timing
        Most U.S. weapon systems rely on the Global Positioning System
    (GPS) satellites to provide the required position navigation and timing
    (PNT) to function properly. This reliance has created a vulnerability
    which is being exploited by our adversaries through development of
    jammers to degrade access to the GPS signals. For success in the long
    term, Air Force S&T is improving the robustness of military GPS
    receivers and also developing several non-GPS based alternative
    capabilities including exploitation of other satellite navigation
    constellations, use of new signals of opportunity, and incorporation of
    additional sensors such as star trackers and terrain viewing optical
    systems. These receivers provide new navigation options with different
    accuracy depending on available sensors and computational power. Rapid
    progress is being made on advanced Inertial Measurement Units based on
    cold atom technologies. These units have the potential to provide
    accurate PNT for extended periods without any external update.
    Together, these approaches will provide future options to enable the
    Air Force mission to continue in contested and denied environments.
    Assured Communications
        Assured communications are critical to the warfighter in all
    aspects of the Air Force core missions. The Air Force S&T Program is
    developing technologies to counter threats to mission performance, such
    as spectrum congestion and jamming, and to maintain or increase
    available bandwidth through access to new portions of the radio
    frequency spectrum, alleviating pressure on DOD spectrum allocations.
    Future ability to use new spectrum will increase DOD communications
    architecture capacity and affordability, by requiring fewer expensive,
    high capacity gateways. Additional bandwidth will allow improved anti-
    jam communications performance and higher frequency communications,
    which will reduce scintillation losses for nuclear command and control
    (C2). The performance enhancements would directly improve the ability
    of remotely-piloted aircraft to transmit images and data (ISR) and
    improve command and control assurance.
        Efforts in Assured Communications include the Future Space
    Communications effort which includes research to characterize and
    provide new spectrum for future military space communications through
    the W/V-band Space Communications Experiment (WSCE). WSCE will
    characterize and model the atmospheric effects of upper V-band and W-
    band (71-76 GHz and 81-86 GHz) signal transmission. Space-based data
    collection and atmospheric attenuation model development is necessary
    to provide the statistics necessary to design a future satellite
    communications architecture that will allow use of the currently empty
    V- and W-band spectrum.
    Long Range Sensing
        For the past decade the Air Force has provided near persistent ISR
    for Combatant Commanders conducting operations in the uncontested air
    environments of Iraq and Afghanistan. We do not see the appetite for
    ISR waning in the future. However, the ability to perform effective
    sensing in anti-access/area denial and contested environments is
    threatened by many new and different challenges rarely seen during the
    past 10 years of permissive environment operations. In the past,
    airborne collection platforms conducted airborne ISR outside of the
    lethal range of air defense systems. Today, however, the modern and
    evolving foreign Integrated Air Defense Systems (IADS) of our
    adversaries have increased lethality and significantly improved
    engagement capabilities which will force ISR aircraft to fly at longer
    stand-off distances. The effectiveness of current precision weapons
    will be reduced with distance limiting the ability to accurately
    detect, identify and geo-locate targets.
        The Air Force S&T Program is focused on significantly improving our
    sensing ability to adequately address the challenges of extended range
    ISR collection. The efforts include: 1) next generation RF sensing for
    contested spectrum environments in which long stand-off sensing is
    primarily focused on all-weather ISR using traditional active radar
    modes at ranges of greater than 100 miles; 2) passive RF Sensing in
    which signals of opportunity are exploited to detect, identify and
    locate targets through the use of passive multi-mode and distributed
    multi-static techniques; 3) laser radar sensing focused on enhancing
    target identification through the use of synthetic aperture laser radar
    and also addressing high resolution wide-area three dimensional imaging
    through advancements in direct detection radar; and 4) passive EO/IR
    sensing to enhance capabilities to detect and track difficult targets,
    improve target identification at long standoff ranges and perform
    material identification through advancing hyperspectral and stand-off
    high resolution imaging technology.
    Live, Virtual, and Constructive
        The Air Force continues to develop and demonstrate technologies for
    Live, Virtual, and Constructive (LVC) operations to maintain combat
    readiness. The training need for LVC is real while training costs are
    increasing and threat environments are complex. In particular,
    realistic training for anti-access/area-denial environments is not
    available. During a recent demonstration of LVC capability for tactical
    forces at Shaw AFB, South Carolina, AFRL LVC research capability was
    integrated in operations with an F-16 Unit Training Device (a virtual
    simulator) to simultaneously interoperate with a mix of live F-16
    aircraft, other virtual simulations, and high fidelity computer-
    generated constructive players. This mix of players enabled the real
    time and realistic portrayal and interaction of other strike package
    assets and aggressor aircraft with a level of complexity that could not
    be achieved if limited to live assets, given the expense and
    availability of them to support the scenarios. LVC S&T has the
    capability to provide greater focused training for our warfighters
    across a range of operational domains such as tactical air, special
    operations, cyber, ISR, and C2. The Air Force is exploring a 5th
    generation LVC Proof of Concept set of demonstrations that would
    validate the requirements for a formal program of record for LVC.
    Basic Research
        The development of revolutionary capabilities requires the careful
    investment in foundational science to generate new knowledge. Our
    scientists discover the potential military utility of these new ideas
    and concepts, develop this understanding to change the art-of-the-
    possible and then transition the S&T for further use. Air Force basic
    research sits at the center of an innovation network that tracks the
    best S&T in the DOD, with our partners in the Army, the Navy, DARPA,
    and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), while monitoring the
    investments and breakthroughs of the NSF, NASA, NIST, and the
    Department of Energy. Air Force scientists and engineers watch and
    collaborate with the best universities and research centers from around
    the world in open, publishable research that cuts across multiple
    scientific disciplines aligned to military needs.
        For example, Air Force basic research played a role in the Air
    Force's successful CHAMP technology demonstration discussed earlier.
    While the CHAMP demonstration required extensive applied research and
    advanced technology development, fundamental basic research investment
    in both supercomputers and computational mathematics provided a virtual
    prototyping capability called Improved Concurrent Electromagnetic
    Particle-In-Cell (ICEPIC) for directed energy concepts to Air Force
    researchers. This allowed new ideas to be studied effectively and
    affordably on the computer without costly manufacture for every
    iteration of the technology. Virtual prototyping was a critical
    enabling technology, and resulted from nearly two decades of steady,
    targeted investments in fundamental algorithms that then transitioned
    to a capability driving technology development in Air Force
    laboratories and in industry.
    Manufacturing Technologies
        A key cross-cutting enabling technology area is in developing
    materials, processes, and advanced manufacturing technologies for all
    systems including aircraft, spacecraft, missiles, rockets, ground-based
    systems and their structural, electronic and optical components. The
    fiscal year 2015 Air Force S&T Program emphasizes materials work from
    improved design and manufacturing processes to risk reduction through
    assessing manufacturing readiness.
        The Air Force's investment in additive manufacturing technologies
    offers new and innovative approaches to the design and manufacture of
    Air Force and DOD systems. Additive manufacturing, or the process of
    joining materials to make objects from 3D model data layer by layer,
    changes the conventional approach to design, enabling a more direct
    design to requirements. As opposed to subtractive processes like
    machining, additive manufacturing offers a whole new design realm in
    which geometric complexity is not a constraint and material properties
    can be specifically located where needed. As with the insertion of all
    advanced materials and processes, the Air Force strives to ensure
    appropriate application and proper qualification of additive
    manufacturing for warfighter safety and system performance.
        Currently, the Air Force is invested in more than a dozen programs
    ranging from assisting in major high-Technology Readiness Level (TRL)
    qualification programs to mid-TRL process improvement programs, to low-
    TRL process modeling and simulation programs. Overall, we have
    established a strategic program to quantify risk for implementation and
    to advance the understanding of processing capabilities. We have
    identified multiple technical areas that require Air Force investment
    and are developing an initiative that integrates pervasive additive
    manufacturing technologies across Air Force sectors, spanning multiple
    material classes from structural, metallic applications to functional,
    electronic needs.
        The Air Force leverages its additive manufacturing resources and
    interests with the Administration's National Network for Manufacturing
    Innovation (NNMI) to support the acceleration of additive manufacturing
    technologies to the U.S. manufacturing sector to increase domestic
    competitiveness. In fiscal year 2013, the Air Force played a key role
    in supporting the NNMI National Additive Manufacturing Innovation
    Institute called ``America Makes.'' The Air Force, on behalf of the
    Office of the Secretary of Defense, led an interagency effort, which
    included DOD, DOE, DOC/NIST, NASA, and NSF, to launch a $69 million
    public-private partnership in Additive Manufacturing.
        Cooperatively working with the private partner team lead, the Air
    Force helped ``America Makes'' achieve significant accomplishments in
    its first year. After opening it headquarters in Youngstown, Ohio in
    September 2012, the ``America Makes'' consortium has grown to
    approximately 80 member organizations consisting of manufacturing
    companies, universities, community colleges, and non-profit
    organizations. A shared public-private leadership governance structure,
    organizational charter, and intellectual property strategy were
    implemented and two project calls were launched in Additive
    Manufacturing and 3D printing technology research, discovery, creation,
    and innovation. So far, more than 20 projects totaling approximately
    $29 million and involving more than 75 partners have been started
    covering a broad set of priorities including advances in materials,
    design and manufacturing processes, equipment, qualification and
    certification, and knowledge base development. ``America Makes'' serves
    as an example for future NNMI institutes and the Air Force has provided
    support to establish two additional DOD sponsored institutes of
    manufacturing innovation.
        The Air Force Manufacturing Technology program continues to lead
    the way in developing methods and tools for Manufacturing Readiness
    Assessments and continues to lead assessments on new technology,
    components, processes, and subsystems to identify manufacturing
    maturity and associated risk. Increasing numbers of weapon system prime
    contractors and suppliers have integrated Manufacturing Readiness into
    their culture which aids in product and process transition and
    implementation, resulting in reduced cost, schedule and performance
    risk. Benefits from the advanced manufacturing propulsion initiative
    continue to accrue in the form of reduced turbine engine cost and
    weight through advanced manufacturing of light weight castings and
    ceramic composites and improved airfoil processing. Advanced next
    generation radar and coatings affordability projects continue to reduce
    cost and manufacturing risk to systems such as the F-22 and F-35
    aircraft. The Air Force Manufacturing Technology investment continues
    to make a significant impact on the F-35 program in particular, driving
    down life cycle costs by over $3 billion, with a number of ongoing
    projects that will benefit multiple F-35 program Integrated Product
    Teams.
        The Air Force is also leveraging basic research efforts to improve
    sustainment of legacy systems. The ``Digital Twin'' concept combines
    the state-of-the-art in computational tools, advanced sensors, and
    novel algorithms to create a digital model of every platform in the
    fleet. Imagine a world where instead of using fleet averages for the
    maintenance and sustainment of an airframe, there is a computer model
    of each plane that records all the data from each flight, integrates
    the stress of the flights into the history of the actual materials on
    the platform, and continually checks the health of vital components.
    Thus, the computer model mimics all the missions of the physical asset,
    thereby allowing us to do maintenance exactly when required. This is
    the airplane equivalent of individualized medicine, making sure that
    each individual asset of the Air Force is set to operate at peak
    performance. Interdisciplinary basic research in material science,
    fundamental studies in new sensors and novel inquiry into new,
    transformational computer architecture enable the Digital Twin
    concepts. These foundational studies are tightly integrated with
    applied research, both in the Air Force Research Laboratory as well as
    efforts in NASA, to drive forward the S&T to permit breakthroughs in
    affordable sustainment.
        rapid innovation program and small business innovation research
        The Air Force recognizes small businesses are critical to our
    defense industrial base and essential to our Nation's economy. The U.S.
    relies heavily on innovation through research and development as the
    small businesses continue to be a major driver of high-technology
    innovation and economic growth in the U.S. We continue to engage small
    businesses through the Rapid Innovation Program, and the Small Business
    Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer
    (STTR) programs.
        The Rapid Innovation Program has been an excellent means for the
    Air Force to communicate critical needs and solicit vendors to respond
    with innovative technology solutions. The program provides a vehicle
    for businesses, especially small businesses, to easily submit their
    innovative technologies where they feel it will best meet military
    needs. The Air Force benefits from the ability to evaluate proposed
    innovative technologies against critical needs, and selecting the most
    compelling for contract award. The response to the program has been
    overwhelming, and instrumental to the transition of capability by small
    businesses. Over the last 3 years, the Air Force has received over
    2,200 white paper submissions from vendors offering solutions to
    critical Air Force needs. We have awarded over 60 projects directly to
    small businesses and anticipate awarding another 25 by the end of this
    fiscal year.
        Projects from the fiscal year 2011 Rapid Innovation Program are now
    maturing and showing great promise. For example, one project developed
    a handheld instrument for quality assurance of surface preparation
    processes used in manufacturing of the F-35 aircraft. Current F-35
    aircraft manufacturing processes require manual testing of 30,000 nut
    plates on each plane to ensure correct bonding of materials. The
    current failure rate is averaging 1 percent or 300 nut plates. Each
    failure requires individual re-preparation and re-bonding with
    supervisory oversight. The Rapid Innovation Program project handheld
    device will significantly reduce the failure rate of adhesively bonded
    nut plates. In turn, this will reduce rework and inspection costs,
    increase aircraft availability, assist Lockheed Martin in achieving its
    target production rate, and reduce repetitive injury claims from
    employees. Lockheed Martin has been very closely monitoring this
    technology and will be completing a return-on-investment review in the
    coming months following prototype evaluation.
        The Air Force continues to collaborate with other Federal agencies
    and Air Force acquisition programs to streamline our SBIR and STTR
    processes. We are also collaborating with the Air Force's Small
    Business office (SAF/SB) to implement the provisions of the
    reauthorization and to assist in maximizing small business
    opportunities in government contracts while enhancing the impact and
    value of small businesses.
        For example, to improve the effectiveness of SBIR investments, the
    Air Force Research Laboratory has started to strategically bundle,
    coordinate, and align Air Force SBIR topics against top Air Force
    priorities identified by Air Force Program Executive Officers (PEO). In
    the Fall of 2013, the Laboratory began a pilot effort with the Air
    Force Program Executive Officer for Space to focus the combined
    investments of approximately 45 SBIR Phase I awards and 15 Phase II
    SBIR awards on the identified, top priority challenge of transforming
    our military space-based PNT capabilities.
        In conjunction with this strategic initiative, the Air Force is
    also energizing efforts to seek out and attract non-traditional
    participants, which are small businesses with skills, knowledge and
    abilities relevant to the bundled topics, in SBIR awards but who, for
    various reasons, do not routinely participate in the SBIR proposal
    process. This strategic concentration of small business innovation
    against top priorities will ultimately enhance the transitioning of
    small business innovation, raise the visibility and importance of those
    investments, and take advantage of the Nation's small business
    innovation. If proven successful, the Air Force will begin to
    institutionalize it as a model for organizing and aligning SBIR topics
    against other top priority issues.
        One recent SBIR project developed innovative low profile and
    conformal antennas to allow air platforms, including small Remotely
    Piloted Aircraft (RPA), to operate more aerodynamically and ground
    vehicles to operate more covertly in areas where Improvised Explosive
    Devices (IEDs) are a threat. The wideband low profile antenna assembly
    for vehicle Counter Radio Controlled IED Electronic Warfare (CREW)
    systems operates efficiently from VHF to S-band, and at a height of
    less than 3 inches, greatly reduces visual signature. The wideband
    conformal antenna technologies developed for RPA systems operate from
    UHF through S-band and minimize the number of required antennas,
    significantly reducing weight and aerodynamic drag.
                             world class workforce
        Maintaining our U.S. military's decisive technological edge
    requires an agile, capable workforce that leads cutting-edge research,
    explores emerging technology areas, and promotes innovation across
    government, industry and academia. Nurturing our current world class
    workforce and the next generations of science, technology, engineering,
    and mathematics (STEM) professionals is an Air Force, DOD and national
    concern. We must be able to recruit, retain and develop a capable STEM
    workforce in the face of worldwide competition for the same talent.
        The Air Force continues to focus on developing technical experts
    and leaders who can provide the very best research and technical advice
    across the entire lifecycle of our systems, from acquisition, test,
    deployment and sustainment. After yielding success since 2011, the
    original Bright Horizons, the Air Force STEM Workforce Strategic
    Roadmap, is currently being updated with new goals and objectives to
    reflect the current environment. The Air Force has also developed a
    soon-to-be-released Engineering Enterprise Strategic Plan aimed at
    recruiting, developing and retaining the scientist and engineer talent
    to meet the future need of the Air Force.
        The increased Laboratory hiring and personnel management
    authorities and flexibilities provided by the Congress over the last
    several years have done much to improve our ability to attract the
    Nation's best talent. The Air Force is currently developing
    implementation plans for the authorities most recently provided in the
    fiscal year 2014 National Defense Authorization Act. The ability to
    manage Laboratory personnel levels according to budget will allow us to
    be more agile and targeted in hiring for new and emerging research
    areas. The Air Force Research Laboratory recruits up-and-coming, as
    well as seasoned, scientists and engineers, including continuing a
    vibrant relationship with Historically Black Colleges and Universities
    and Minority Serving Institutions (HBCU/MI), who conduct research
    projects, improve infrastructure, and intern with the Air Force
    Research Laboratory in support of the Air Force mission.
        The Air Force also leverages the National Defense Education Program
    (NDEP) Science Mathematics and Research for Transformation (SMART)
    Program that supports U.S. undergraduate and graduate students pursuing
    degrees in 19 STEM disciplines. The Air Force provides advisors for the
    SMART scholars, summer internships, and post-graduation employment
    opportunities. The Air Force has sponsored 523 SMART scholars during
    the past 8 years, and of the 315 scholars that have completed the
    program, 88 percent are still working for the Air Force, 9 percent are
    getting advanced degrees, and 3 percent have left due to various
    reasons including furlough and government funding uncertainty. The Air
    Force identified 110 Key Technology Areas essential for current and
    future support to the war fighter, which we used for selecting academic
    specialties for SMART scholars. SMART Scholars are an essential
    recruitment source of employees to enable key technology advances and
    future STEM leaders.
        Sequestration and fiscal uncertainty in fiscal year 2013 caused the
    Air Force to significantly curtail travel expenses and severely limit
    conference attendance. It is essential for our scientists and engineers
    to be fully engaged within the national and international community so
    this curtailment disproportionately impacted the S&T community. We have
    worked with Air Force leadership to solve these issues and establish
    policies allowing greater flexibility for this mission imperative in
    2014 and beyond. We can recover from the 1 year (2013) of non-
    participation in the greater S&T national and international community.
    However, severe travel restrictions over the long term could undermine
    the Air Force's ability retain top talent.
        The Air Force has effectively used the authority provided by
    Section 219 of the Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act not
    only to increase the rate of innovation and accelerate the development
    and fielding of needed military capabilities but also to grow and
    develop the workforce and provide premier Laboratory infrastructure.
    For example, the Information Directorate of the Air Force Research
    Laboratory located in Rome, New York used funding made available by
    Section 219 to develop curriculum at Clarkson University. The
    curriculum is aligned to the Information Directorate's command,
    control, communications, cyber and intelligence (C4I) technology
    mission and provides training and development programs to Laboratory
    personnel. To fully utilize the new Section 219 authorities from the
    fiscal year 2014 National Defense Authorization Act, the Laboratory is
    now developing a targeted infrastructure plan to provide its scientist
    and engineer workforce premier laboratory facilities in its locations
    nationwide. Recent success in the infrastructure area includes the
    opening of two state-of-the-art fuze laboratories at Eglin AFB,
    Florida, which are enabling enhanced research and development into
    hardened penetration and point burst fuzing.
                                   conclusion
        The threats our Nation faces today and those forecast in the future
    leave the U.S. military with one imperative. We must maintain decisive
    technological advantage. We must take lessons from the last decade of
    conflict and creatively visualize the future strategic landscape. We
    must capitalize on the opportunities found within this space.
        The focused and balanced investments of the Air Force fiscal year
    2015 S&T Program are hedges against the unpredictable future and
    provide pathways to this flexible, precise and lethal force at a
    relatively low cost in in relation to the return on investment. We
    recognize that fiscal challenges will not disappear tomorrow, and that
    is why we have continued to improve our processes to make better
    investment decisions and efficiently deliver capability to our
    warfighters.
        Chairman Durbin, Vice Chairman Cochran, and Members of the
    Subcommittee, thank you again for the opportunity to testify today and
    thank you for your continuing support of the U.S. Air Force's S&T
    Program.

        Senator Durbin. Thanks, Dr. Walker.
        Admiral Klunder.
    STATEMENT OF REAR ADMIRAL MATTHEW L. KLUNDER, CHIEF OF
                NAVAL RESEARCH
        Admiral Klunder. Good morning, Chairman Durbin, Vice
    Chairman Cochran, and other distinguished subcommittee members.
    It is an honor to report on science and technology efforts in
    the Department of the Navy and discuss how the President's 2015
    budget request supports the Navy and Marine Corps.
        We use S&T to enable your Navy and Marine Corps team to
    maintain the technological edge necessary to prevail in any
    environment where we are called to defend U.S. interests. We
    work with the Secretary of the Navy, the Chief of Naval
    Operations, and the Commandant of the Marine Corps to balance
    the allocation of resources between near-term innovation and
    long-term leap-ahead research. Our goal is to improve our
    warfighting capability to encounter increasingly complex
    threats in uncertain environments while, at the same time,
    addressing affordability in a serious way with our systems.
        Beginning with the evolution of current systems,
    incremental spiral development of current technology, we move
    toward exploiting yet-to-be-discovered, disruptive game-
    changing technologies. The Naval S&T strategic plan guides our
    investments and it is regularly updated by Navy and Marine
    Corps leadership to validate the alignment of S&T with the
    current and future missions, priorities and requirements when
    they come about. It ensures S&T has long-term focus, meets
    near-term objectives, and makes what we do clear to
    decisionmakers, partners, customers, and performers. The S&T
    plan is currently under review and will be updated in the very
    near future.
        We fully understand that anti-access and area denial
    threats continue to increase. The cyber war challenge, my
    colleagues have noted already, will also increase and become
    more complex. These are problems that are not easy to solve,
    but we are making progress. As I said before, we also want to
    get away from using $3 million weapons to defeat a $50,000
    threat. We have weapons in development and being fielded that
    will allow us to reverse that asymmetrical cost advantage
    currently held by some of our adversaries. And here is really
    what is important to me. At the end of the day, I never want to
    see a sailor or a marine in a fair fight, and we are confident
    that we can do that in an affordable way.
        These are not pie-in-the-sky science projects. They are
    being tested. They work. I invite you and your staffs to get
    hands-on experience and see them for yourselves. A number of
    your colleagues and your staff have already been down to
    Dahlgren, Virginia, the Naval Research Lab here in Anacostia
    where world-class scientists and civilian employees are making
    that happen.
        The bottom line is we are constantly transitioning the
    results of discovery and invention and applied research into
    fielding prototypes, weapons, and acquisition programs of
    record. We were commended for the way we do that by the 2013
    Government Accountability Office report cited in my testimony.
        But it is not enough to build transition-effective systems.
    They need to be extremely affordable. An ongoing example of our
    success in this venue is the laser weapon system I think I have
    briefed some of you on before. It is part of our solid state
    maturation program that we have ongoing. Energy weapons,
    specifically directed energy weapons, offer the Navy and Marine
    Corps game-changing capabilities and speed-of-light
    engagements, deep magazines, multimission functionality, and
    affordable missions. Laser weapons have very low engagement
    costs. Right now, today, the one we are going to put on the USS
    Ponce is under a dollar, under a U.S. dollar for one round of
    pulsed energy. We think that is critical in our current fiscal
    environment. We really do. They are capable of defeating
    adversarial threats, including fast boats, UAV's, low-cost
    widely available weapons. Our laser weapon system that you are
    going to see this summer on the ship out in the gulf leverages
    advancements in commercial technology for use in a rugged,
    robust, prototype laser weapon capable of identifying,
    illuminating, tracking, and lasing the enemy's surface and air
    threats. The Navy is installing the LaWS system on the Ponce
    in the Arabian Gulf this year. That harsh operationally
    important environment we think will provide a real ideal
    opportunity for us to evaluate long-term system performance.
    The LaWS has every potential for extraordinary success. We have
    never missed yet on all of our targets, and in terms of
    fielding an effective and affordable system for our marines and
    sailors, we think it is an ideal concept.
        There is also another one. The electromagnetic railgun is
    similarly poised to provide game-changing, disruptive
    capabilities for our long-range land attack, ballistic and
    cruise missile defense, and anti-surface warfare against ships
    and small boats. Fired by an electric pulse, no gunpowder, that
    railgun has the potential to launch a projectile over 110
    nautical miles at a speed of over Mach 7. The projectile itself
    development is currently well underway, and the barrel life
    that we have for these guns is well on its path for over 1,000
    shots for each barrel. Current research is focused on improving
    and increasing the repetition rate of that fire and that
    capability for multiple rounds per minute, and those
    developments are certainly available to your staffs.
        We also think the pulse power that comes to feed that gun
    is also well on its way and it is making tremendous progress
    also.
        The development tests that are ongoing right now at the
    Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren that I alluded to
    earlier is also at NRL, nearby in Anacostia. And along with
    those evaluations and the test results we have performed and
    saw thus far, we see this as an integration into some of our
    new and existing naval vessels and platforms. As a matter of
    fact, we are so confident, we are going to put that on one of
    our joint high speed vessels here in 2016 for just checking out
    integration.

                               PREPARED STATEMENT

        We will continue to duplicate these kinds of successes in
    other S&T areas with our innovative research and disrupted
    thinking, always trying to make our existing systems more
    effective and affordable while improving acquisition programs.
    Our research is both exhilarating and unpredictable. We balance
    a range of complementary but competing research initiatives and
    coordinate with my colleagues and support advances in
    established operational areas while also sustaining far-
    reaching, long-term efforts that may prove disruptive to
    traditional operational concepts.
        I thank you again for your support and look forward to
    answering any questions. Thank you.
        [The statement follows:]
             Prepared Statement of Rear Admiral Matthew L. Klunder
                                  introduction
        It is an honor to report on Department of the Navy (DoN) Science
    and Technology (S&T) and discuss how the President's fiscal year 2015
    Budget supports the Navy and Marine Corps (USMC). The fiscal year 2015
    Budget requests approximately $2 billion for Naval S&T. The Navy and
    Marine Corps use S&T to enable the Fleet/Force to maintain the
    technological edge necessary to prevail in any environment where we may
    be called to defend U.S. interests. We work with the Secretary of the
    Navy (SECNAV), Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) and Commandant of the
    Marine Corps (CMC) to balance the allocation of resources between near-
    term technology development and long-term research. We strive to
    improve affordability, communication with the acquisition community,
    and engage with stakeholders.
                     science and technology strategic plan
        The Naval S&T Strategic Plan guides our investments and is
    regularly updated by Navy and USMC leadership to validate alignment of
    S&T with current missions, leadership priorities, and future
    requirements. It ensures S&T has long-term focus, meets near-term
    objectives, and makes what we do clear to decision makers, partners,
    customers and performers. The Plan identifies nine areas that help to
    focus S&T to meet Navy/USMC needs: (1) Assure Access to Maritime
    Battlespace, (2) Autonomy and Unmanned Systems, (3) Expeditionary and
    Irregular Warfare, (4) Information Dominance, (5) Platform Design and
    Survivability, (6) Power and Energy, (7) Power Projection and
    Integrated Defense, (8) Total Ownership Cost, and (9) Warfighter
    Performance. Our goal is to move from existing systems and concepts of
    operations toward a warfighting capability to counter predicted threats
    in an increasingly complex and uncertain environment. Beginning with
    the evolution of current systems through incremental improvement and
    spiral development of known technology, we move toward exploiting yet-
    to-be-discovered, disruptive, game-changing technologies. The S&T
    Strategic Plan and focus areas are currently under review and will be
    updated in the near future.
                           implementing the strategy
        Based on time-to-delivery and specification of need, Naval S&T can
    be viewed as fitting into four primary areas--Discovery and Invention
    (D&I), Leap Ahead Innovations (Innovative Naval Prototypes/INP),
    Acquisition Enablers (Future Naval Capabilities/FNC), and a Quick
    Reaction capability to respond to emerging requirements. Our S&T
    portfolio balances a range of complementary but competing initiatives
    by supporting advances in established operational areas--while
    sustaining long-term research that may prove disruptive to traditional
    operational concepts.
                            discovery and invention
        Discovery and Invention (D&I) includes basic research (6.1) and
    early applied research (6.2) in areas essential to Naval missions, as
    well as emerging areas with promise for future application. D&I
    develops fundamental knowledge, provides a basis for future Navy/Marine
    Corps systems, and sustains our Scientist/Engineer workforce. D&I
    develops knowledge from which INP, FNC, and Quick Reaction efforts are
    generated and is the foundation for advanced technology.
        Approximately 45 percent of ONR investments are in D&I, with
    roughly 60 percent of that total executed by academic and non-profit
    performers. D&I is peer reviewed by outside experts who independently
    assess scientific merit--and overseen by ONR program officers and
    senior leadership. Investment decisions are guided by risk, impact,
    significance, originality, principal investigator, and budget
    resources.
        ONR's University Research Initiative (URI) includes the
    Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI), the Defense
    University Research Implementation Program (DURIP), and the
    Presidential Early Career Award for Scientist and Engineers (PECASE).
    MURI supports teams of researchers investigating topics that intersect
    multiple technical disciplines. DURIP provides grants for the purchase
    of instrumentation necessary to perform research essential to the Navy.
    PECASE recognizes achievements of young scientists/engineers and
    encourages them to explore professions in academia and Naval
    laboratories. The Basic Research Challenge funds promising research not
    addressed by ONR's core program. The Young Investigator Program
    supports scientists and engineers with exceptional promise for Naval
    research. Research opportunities for undergraduate and grad students,
    fellows, and future faculty members are provided by the Naval Research
    Enterprise Internship Program (NREIP), where participants work at Naval
    laboratories and warfare centers. The In-House Laboratory Independent
    Research (ILIR) and Independent Applied Research (IAR) programs sponsor
    critical research, while furthering the education of scientists and
    engineers at warfare centers. ONR also brings Historically Black
    Colleges and Universities and Minority Institutions (HBCU/MI) together
    with Naval laboratories and warfare centers to give students hands-on
    experience in the Naval research environment.
        Supporting warfighters depends on our Science, Technology,
    Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) workforce--but that workforce is
    aging. With half of Navy science and engineering professionals
    retirement eligible by 2020, we face an acute shortfall in our Naval
    engineering, computer science and ocean engineering workforce.
    Production of engineers has been flat for two decades, and less in
    specialty fields. A complicating factor is that DoN must rely on U.S.
    citizens for classified work; the number of U.S. citizen STEM graduates
    will not keep up with domestic or international competition for the
    same talent. ONR evaluates STEM investments with metrics tailored to
    measure numbers of students and teachers, overall impact, and overall
    ability to achieve Naval requirements in coordination with other
    Federal STEM programs.
              leap ahead innovations (innovative naval prototypes)
        Innovative Naval Prototypes (INP) total about 12 percent of the S&T
    budget. INPs are high-risk/high-payoff opportunities from D&I that are
    discontinuous, disruptive departures from established requirements and
    operational concepts that can dramatically change the way Naval forces
    fight, while reducing acquisition risk. Overseen by the Naval Research,
    Development, Testing and Evaluation (RTD&E) Corporate Board
    (Undersecretary of the Navy; Assistant Secretary of the Navy for
    Research, Development and Acquisition (ASN-RDA); Vice CNO; Assistant
    CMC; Director of Innovation, Test, and Evaluation and Technology
    Requirements; Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for RDT&E; and
    Deputy Under Secretary of the Navy for Plans, Policy, Oversight and
    Integration), the goal is to prove concepts and mature technology in 4-
    7 years, allowing informed decisions about risk reduction and
    transition to acquisition programs. INP Program Managers and Deputies
    are from ONR and the acquisition community.
        INPs include:

        Integrated Topside (InTop) will enable the Navy to operate freely
            in the electromagnetic spectrum while denying adversaries'
            ability to do the same through development of multi-beam,
            multi-function ultra-wideband apertures and Radio Frequency
            (RF) equipment for all ship classes. We are developing
            Electronic Warfare, Information Operations, Radar, Satellite,
            and Line of Sight Communications using: (1) open architecture
            RF hardware/software to enable a broad industrial base to
            contribute to development of affordable systems, and (2)
            modular systems to enable technology to be scalable across Navy
            platforms and reduce logistics, training, and maintenance
            costs. We continue prototype tests/demonstrations with testing
            by the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) for submarine
            Satellite Communications (SATCOM) and by the Naval Research
            Laboratory (NRL) for the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement
            Program (SEWIP). Accomplishments include over the air testing
            of the Submarine Wideband SATCOM Antenna transmitter,
            integration of all antennas and electronics for the Electronic
            Warfare/Information Operations/Line of Sight Communications
            Advanced Development Model, building the Low Level Resource
            Allocation Manager, and award of the Flexible Distributed Array
            Radar contract.

        The Large Displacement Unmanned Undersea Vehicle (LDUUV) program is
            developing a reliable, fully autonomous, long endurance UUV
            capable of extended operation (60+ days) in cluttered littoral
            environments. The program has already built three vehicles and
            is developing the energy, autonomy and core systems to operate
            in a complex ocean environment near harbors, shorelines, and
            other high traffic locations. Key goals include doubling
            current air-independent UUV energy density, using open
            architecture to lower cost, and enabling full pier to pier
            autonomy in over-the-horizon operations. Achieving these goals
            will reduce platform vulnerability, enhance warfighter
            capability and safety, and close gaps in critical and complex
            mission areas by extending the reach of the Navy into denied
            areas.

        The Autonomous Aerial Cargo/Utility System (AACUS) is developing
            intelligent, autonomous capabilities for rapid, affordable,
            reliable rotorcraft supply in permissive, hostile and GPS-
            denied settings. AACUS-enabled aircraft will be supervised by
            field personnel from a handheld device. Challenges include
            dynamic mission management and contingency planning, as well as
            landing execution and obstacle avoidance. AACUS has already
            demonstrated numerous successful flights and is designed for
            open system architecture to promote modularity and
            affordability. It could be used in logistics missions, Casualty
            Evacuation (CASEVAC), combat rescue, and humanitarian aid
            missions. S&T partners include the Air Force, Army, USMC,
            National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Naval Air
            Systems Command (NAVAIR), and other academic, private sector,
            and government organizations.

        The Electromagnetic Railgun (EMRG) has multi-mission potential for
            long-range land-attack, ballistic and cruise missile defense,
            and anti-surface warfare against ships and small boats. Fired
            by electric pulse, Railgun eliminates gun propellant from
            magazines resulting in greater resistance to battle damage.
            Since 2005, launch energy has advanced by a factor of 5 (to 32
            mega joules) with potential to launch projectiles 110 nautical
            miles. Projectile design is underway, with early prototype
            testing, component development, and modeling and simulation.

        Barrel life has increased from tens of shots to over 400, with a
            program path to achieve 1000 shots. Advanced composite
            launchers have been strength tested to operational levels.
            Physical size of the pulsed power system was reduced by a
            factor of 2.5 through increased energy density so the system
            will fit in current and future surface combatants. Current
            research is focused on a rep-rate capability of multiple rounds
            per minute which entails development of a tactical prototype
            gun barrel and pulsed power systems incorporating advanced
            cooling techniques. Components are designed to transition
            directly into prototype systems now being conceptualized. ONR
            is working with Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) and the
            Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Strategic Capabilities
            Office to ensure commonality and reduce the need for expensive
            redesign. Developmental tests are ongoing at Naval Surface
            Warfare Center, Dahlgren and NRL, along with evaluations of
            integration into new and existing Naval platforms.

        Electromagnetic Railgun testing aboard a Joint High Speed Vessel
            (JHSV) will begin in 2016 and utilize components largely in
            common with those developed and demonstrated at Dahlgren. At-
            sea testing is one of the critical events planned in coming
            years to demonstrate multi-mission capability. At-sea tests
            capture lessons learned for incorporation into a full future
            tactical design and allow us to understand any potential
            modifications before fully integrating the technology on our
            ships. Further, it will gather data to support design for
            reliability and sustainability related to Railgun operation in
            a marine environment.

        Finally, although similarly high-risk and disruptive, SwampWorks
            programs are smaller than INPs and intended to produce quick
            results in 1-3 years. SwampWorks efforts have substantial
            flexibility in planning and execution, with a streamlined
            approval process. Formal transition agreements are not
            required, but SwampWorks programs have advocates outside ONR,
            either from the acquisition community or Fleet/Force.
            SwampWorks products are frequently inserted into Fleet/Force
            experimentation.
                            directed energy roadmap
        Development and ship integration of energy-intensive systems such
    as Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) (e.g. high-energy lasers (HEL) and
    High Powered Radio Frequency (HPRF)) and EMRG requires careful
    engineering. Shipboard integration considerations include space,
    weight, power, cooling, stability, impact on combat systems, fire
    control, and interfaces. Technical maturity and integration will be
    accomplished through a measured approach to allocation of ship services
    and interface with ship systems.
        Navy's near-term focus is on a Solid State Laser Quick Reaction
    Capability (SSL-QRC), which will field a prototype system based on the
    Laser Weapon System (LaWS), and the Solid State Laser Technology
    Maturation (SSL-TM) program. The Navy plans to deploy SSL-QRC (LaWS) to
    the Persian Gulf aboard USS PONCE in 2014 to demonstrate the ability to
    meet gaps in ship self-defense against armed fast boats and unmanned
    aerial vehicle threats. Navy is also investigating the use of non-
    lethal HPRF technologies for vessel stopping and counter UAS.
    Development continues on Free Electron Laser technologies for long-term
    solutions requiring power levels beyond that which Solid State Lasers
    can deliver.
        SSL-TM will help determine the load capacity and most effective
    means to integrate a HEL on surface ships such as DDG-51 and the
    Littoral Combat Ship. The SSL-TM goal is to demonstrate a 100-150
    kilowatt Advanced Development Model (ADM) by 2016. The program will
    address technical challenges in rugged laser subsystems, optics
    suitable for maritime environments, and capability to propagate lethal
    power levels in the maritime atmosphere. The SSL-TM prototype will be
    sufficiently mature to commence an acquisition program of record.
        Progress on technologies covered in the Naval DE Roadmap efforts
    (HEL, HPRF) and EMRG are projected to result in capabilities that meet
    future requirements. As part of the Navy's Two-Pass Six-Gate review
    process for major acquisition programs, a Gate 6 Configuration Steering
    Board (CSB) is conducted annually for each ship class. Once a DEW
    achieves maturity, the CSB reviews technology, requirements, and cost
    to determine if transitioning to acquisition program and incorporation
    in a ship class is warranted. If warranted, the CSB determines on which
    hull the technology will be incorporated. For technology that provides
    significant capability but also significant installation impact to a
    ship, cost/benefit will be weighed against installation during new
    construction. If the installation impact is less, the technology could
    be included as part of a back fit or post-delivery installation.
        In 2013, NAVSEA developed the Naval Power Systems Technology
    Development Roadmap (NPS TDR). NPS TDR aligns power system developments
    with warfighter needs, including DEWs and energy-intensive weapons and
    sensors for shipboard use, to ensure that future ships are capable of
    accepting power and cooling loads of such systems as they are
    developed. The roadmap addresses new construction integration and back
    fit of technologies for ships in service. NPS TDR is adapted to
    evolving requirements from weapons and sensor system developments, as
    well as changes in the Navy's 30-year shipbuilding plan, and will be
    updated every 2 years. NPS TDR introduced the concept of an Energy
    Magazine to provide the required power from the ship's electrical
    system and interface with high powered weapons and sensors. The Energy
    Magazine will initially support near-term applications, such as HEL, on
    a legacy platform. As new systems become available, the Energy Magazine
    can be expanded to accommodate multiple loads by providing the
    appropriate power conversion and energy storage.
        The Naval Directed Energy Steering Group is currently drafting a
    Naval DE roadmap based on the Naval DE Vision and Strategy to establish
    goals, principles, priorities, roles, responsibilities, and objectives
    regarding acquisition and fielding of DEWs by the Navy and Marine
    Corps. This roadmap will address the way ahead for platform
    requirements, as well as power and cooling necessary to support these
    systems.
                acquisition enablers (future naval capabilities)
        Acquisition Enablers (AE) are the critical component of our
    transition strategy. AE consists of our Future Naval Capabilities (FNC)
    program, USMC Advanced Technology Development (6.3) funds, Joint Non-
    Lethal Weapons Directorate (6.3) funds, the Manufacturing Technology
    (ManTech) program, and Low Observable, Counter Low Observable funds.
        FNCs are near-term (2-4 year), requirements-driven, delivery-
    oriented S&T projects. FNCs deliver mature technologies to acquisition
    sponsors for incorporation into systems that provide new capabilities.
    FNCs use a collaborative process involving requirements, research,
    acquisition, and Fleet/Force communities to align this part of the S&T
    portfolio with Naval Capability Gaps identified by the Office of the
    Chief of Naval Operations (OPNAV) and the Marine Corps Combat
    Development Command (MCCDC). A gap is any capability required to
    achieve Naval objectives that is not achievable with current platforms,
    weapon systems, doctrine, organizational structure, training,
    materials, leadership, personnel or facilities and requires S&T
    investment to solve or overcome. Capability Gaps define the
    requirement, not how to meet it.
        FNCs are aligned to functional areas called ``Pillars'': Sea
    Shield, Sea Strike, Sea Basing, FORCEnet, Naval Expeditionary Maneuver
    Warfare, Capable Manpower, Force Health Protection, Enterprise and
    Platform Enablers, and Power and Energy. FNC projects address specific
    gaps in each of those areas, with final prioritization approved by a 3-
    Star Technology Oversight Group (TOG) representing OPNAV, Marine Corps,
    U.S. Fleet Forces Command, ASN-RDA, and ONR. FNCs are based on D&I
    investments where technology can be matured from Technology Readiness
    Level (TRL) 3 to TRL 6 in 3-5 years. Selection takes account of related
    work in the Department of Defense (DOD), government agencies, industry
    and Naval centers of excellence. Our investments focus on the most
    pressing gaps, with funding changes based on successful transitions,
    reprioritization, new starts, and evolving Naval needs. As FNC products
    mature, Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) change, moving products from
    6.2 to 6.3 PEs. Year one is mostly 6.2; the final year mostly 6.3--with
    a mix of 6.2/6.3 between. As FNC products transition from S&T to
    Advanced Component Development and Prototypes (6.4) and Engineering and
    Manufacturing Development (6.5), responsibility for continued
    development shifts from ONR to acquisition commands.
        Approved FNC products have Technology Transition Agreements to
    document the commitment of the resource sponsor, acquisition program,
    and ONR to develop, deliver and integrate products into new or upgraded
    systems. Every product is measured by technical and financial
    milestones. All products must meet required transition commitment
    levels for S&T development to continue. Products that no longer have
    viable transition paths are terminated with residual funding used to
    solve problems with existing projects, or start new projects in
    compliance with Navy priorities, charters, business rules and
    development guidelines. The measure of success is whether projects meet
    technology requirements and exit criteria, and whether acquisition
    sponsors have transition funds in programs to accept and integrate FNC
    products. The transition status of FNC products is actively monitored
    on an annual basis, with products terminated if the S&T is failing or
    the transition plan is no longer viable. Through the end of fiscal year
    2013, 216 FNC products completed S&T development (a success rate of 84
    percent), with 41 FNC products terminated before completion.
        Results are evaluated by a Transition Review Board (TRB) consisting
    of Naval Reserve Officers representing Requirements, Acquisition and
    S&T communities. The TRB provides an objective, independent assessment
    of FNC products after successful transition or termination, analyzing
    the causes and residual value of unsuccessful transitions and
    deployments. Even in case of products which do not deploy, there is
    significant residual value in technology that can be leveraged for
    follow-on S&T efforts and made available for future transitions.
    Nothing goes to waste.
                               quick reaction s&t
        ONR maintains quick-reaction capability for projects lasting 12-24
    months that respond to immediate requirements identified by Fleet/Force
    or Naval leadership. TechSolutions provides short-term solutions to
    immediate operational and tactical requirements. Accessible via
    Internet and SIPRnet, TechSolutions accepts recommendations from
    Sailors and Marines about ways to improve mission effectiveness through
    the application of technology. TechSolutions uses rapid prototyping to
    meet specific requirements, with each project structured around
    definable metrics, and appropriate acquisition/test systems by
    integrated product teams. While neither a substitute for the
    acquisition process, nor a replacement for systems commands,
    TechSolutions prototypes deliver solutions to address immediate needs
    that can be easily transitioned to the Fleet/Force.
        Technology development often occurs faster than DOD Planning,
    Programming, Budgeting and Execution (PPBE) can respond. Our Technology
    Insertion for Program Savings (TIPS) program provides current-year
    funding (inside the PPBE process), eliminating time lag in the PPBE
    cycle. TIPS provides up to $2 million for development efforts taking no
    more than 2 years, coupled with Fleet/Force support and resource
    sponsor commitment to fund moving the technology into the acquisition
    Program of Record (POR) or operating system. TIPS focuses on
    improvements that substantially reduce operating and support costs for
    warfighting systems.
        In partnership with ONR, Naval Warfare Development Command (NWDC),
    Naval Postgraduate School, Naval War College and Marine Corps
    Warfighting Lab (MCWL) assess new warfighting concepts and
    technologies. Initiatives in support of our maritime strategy are
    applied, tested, analyzed and refined through war games, exercises,
    experiments and operational lessons learned.
     government accountability office (gao) report on technology transition
        In the March 2013 Government Accountability Office Report,
    ``DEFENSE TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT: Technology Transition Programs
    Support Military Users, but Opportunities Exist to Improve Measurement
    of Outcomes (GAO-13-286),'' GAO reported:

        ``. . . the Office of Naval Research (ONR) has a well-established
            technology transition focus. ONR's Office of Transition manages
            the Future Naval Capabilities (FNC) portfolio, which is the
            Navy's largest transition program--for which nearly $450
            million was budgeted in fiscal year 2013. The program, which
            was initiated in 1999, seeks to provide the best technology
            solutions to address operational requirements, delivering
            technology products to acquisition programs that enhance
            capabilities within a 5-year timeframe. ONR's Offices of
            Transition and Innovation also support rapid technology
            transition to the fleet, force, and acquisition communities via
            the Rapid Technology Transition (RTT), Technology Insertion
            Program for Savings (TIPS), TechSolutions (TS), and SwampWorks
            and Experimentation (SW/Exp) programs.'' (p. 9)

        GAO said, ``The Navy uses a Transition Review Board to monitor
            completed projects from the Future Naval Capabilities, Rapid
            Technology Transition, and Technology Insertion Program for
            Savings programs. The board determines and reports on whether
            transitioned projects are utilized in systems that support Navy
            warfighters. The Navy determined, for example, that of the 155
            technology products the Future Naval Capabilities program
            delivered to acquisition programs between fiscal years 2006-
            2011, 21 percent were subsequently deployed to fleet forces, 35
            percent were still with the acquisition programs, and 44
            percent failed to deploy. For projects that do not successfully
            deploy, the board assesses whether there are other benefits
            achieved, such as technologies leveraged for follow-on S&T
            work. The board also identifies obstacles to transition, such
            as loss of interest by the user or inadequacy of funding. These
            findings, along with a detailed one-page summary for each
            project, are then used to inform the Navy's annual review
            process. We found that by maintaining this level of tracking,
            the Navy is better aware of the benefits and obstacles
            associated with a substantial portion of their S&T portfolio,
            which may better inform decisions made by Navy leadership.''
            (pp. 21-22)

        GAO continued, ``At the program level, many program officials
            indicated that senior leadership engagement, particularly in
            providing oversight for projects through to transition, is
            essential to having an effective program. We found the Future
            Naval Capabilities program provides a good example of senior
            leadership positively affecting project management activities.
            Specifically, due to funding constraints in its fiscal year
            2013 S&T budget, Navy senior leadership supported the
            termination of ongoing Future Naval Capabilities projects that
            were determined to be lower priorities so that new, higher
            priority projects could be pursued. Navy officials stated that
            this type of awareness and understanding at senior levels
            enables the Future Naval Capabilities program to make efficient
            decisions that are less likely to meet resistance and that
            support the highest priority projects being developed for
            transition opportunities. (p. 25)

        ``Several transition programs also emphasized the relationship
            between ``working-level'' stakeholders--S&T developers and
            acquisition programs or warfighters in the field--when
            discussing the keys to technology transition. These
            stakeholders manage expectations throughout a project and
            ensure it will meet user needs. This reduces the risk of
            completed projects languishing because funding is not available
            or because user requirements have changed, or both. Some
            programs that we reviewed use integrated product teams, which
            may be composed of individuals representing the requirements,
            acquisition, operational, and S&T communities, among others, to
            facilitate continuous communication with stakeholders and
            ensure that transition planning is on track. In the case of the
            Navy, integrated product teams identify capability gaps,
            provide input on which S&T projects may address those gaps,
            assess project progress, make sure transition strategies remain
            valid, and confirm funding is aligned to support transition.
            According to Navy officials, the results of integrated product
            team efforts also support information sharing across senior-
            and working-level stakeholders to validate development status
            and transition planning activities.'' (pp. 25-26)

        GAO concluded, ``We found the Future Naval Capabilities program
            uses technology transition agreements as management tools to
            increase the level of documented commitment as a project
            progresses over time. To accomplish this, the program has three
            levels for agreements that reflect the requisite knowledge
            available at different phases of a project. Key elements of an
            initial agreement include a basic project description,
            identification of initial exit criteria, a high-level
            integration strategy, and a likely transition funding source.
            As a project progresses, the other two levels of agreement
            require increasing commitment and specificity of requirements
            from stakeholders to develop, deliver, and integrate a Future
            Naval Capabilities project into an acquisition program or other
            form of deployment. Key elements of the second and third tier
            agreements involve refining and finalizing project
            descriptions, detailing exit criteria, providing greater
            specificity about the integration strategy, and providing
            estimates for transition costs and eventually executing
            transition funding. Stakeholders review the agreements annually
            to revalidate the commitments laid out within the document.
            (p.27)

        ``We also found Transition Commitment Level (TCL) assessment tools
            . . . offer another means of validating that transition
            programs are investing in projects that have a firm transition
            commitment from prospective users. These tools provide
            scorecards that chart how well-defined the fundamental
            characteristics that support a strong commitment to transition
            projects are at a given point in time. The Future Naval
            Capabilities program uses a single TCL tool that documents
            level of transition commitment from project start to
            completion.'' (p.27)
                                 s&t highlights
        The Naval S&T portfolio includes a range of projects and programs
    entering or about to enter the Fleet/Force. Examples follow.
             expeditionary maneuver warfare and combating terrorism
        Marine expeditionary forces are forward-deployed and forward-based,
    right-sized to respond to missions across the range of military
    operations from combat to Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief
    (HADR). This is best achieved by a Middleweight Force which can launch
    from the sea and project power in sophisticated anti-access, area-
    denial (A2/AD) environments. The imperative to lighten the load for
    every Marine and the Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTAF) is critical,
    requiring research in technologies that increase speed, agility and
    range, develop advanced materials for lighter body armor, helmets and
    eye protection, while reducing fuel consumption and vulnerability to
    Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and mines. We develop over-horizon,
    beyond line-of-sight, restricted environment communications, and
    adaptable sensor systems to detect, classify, identify, locate and
    track low level entities in urban clutter, improve situational
    awareness, and enhance real time tactical decisionmaking.
        Improving resilience of Marines enables them to more effectively,
    efficiently observe, orient, decide and act (OODA) in complex,
    stressful conditions. We explore technologies to provide autonomous
    logistics, and enhance fuel, water and maintenance self-sufficiency.
    On-demand, reduced logistics enable a high operational tempo, and allow
    the Corps to out-maneuver and dominate any enemy. Marines out-perform
    and out-think enemies by understanding battlespace in greater detail,
    making decisions with greater understanding of enemy intent, and
    getting inside the enemy decision cycle. To achieve this, ONR created a
    small unit leader training framework based on codified learning models
    and theories to deliver technology and knowledge products for the USMC
    Training and Education Command (TECOM) that maximizes learning and
    skill acquisition at minimal cost. We invest in S&T to improve training
    efficiency based on cutting-edge, neuro-cognitive, psychologically-
    driven instructional strategies that enable Sailors and Marines to
    survive the brutal environment of combat, as well as retain emotional
    and mental health after they leave the traumatic environment.
        Current S&T investments include projects to improve On-Board
    Vehicle Power, Advanced Remanufacturing and Sustainment Technologies,
    and Internally Transportable Vehicle Autonomy Conversion. Force
    Protection projects include development of Personal Protection
    Technologies, On-The-Move Detection-of-Threat Optics, the Modular
    Explosive Hazard Defeat System (MEHDS), and Ground Based Air Defense
    (On-the-Move). Fires projects (Advanced Ammunition and Energetics)
    include an Integrated Day-Night Sight, the High Reliability DPICM (Dual
    Purpose Improved Conventional Munition) Replacement Program, and High
    Performance Alloys for Weapons. Logistics applications will improve
    Pallet Handling and Packaging, a JP-8 Solid Oxide Fuel Cell, and
    Autonomous Resupply technology. Human Performance, Training and
    Education investments will provide an Advanced Training System for
    Small Unit Decision-Making, and Training to Optimize Use of Resilience
    Skills (TOURS). Finally, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance
    projects include Night Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), Entity
    Disambiguation, and Semantic Web enablement to enhance mission-centric
    knowledge generation and delivery. Our S&T efforts are undertaken hand-
    in-glove with the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory at Quantico,
    Virginia, whose mission is to rigorously explore and assess Marine
    Corps concepts using an integral combination of war-gaming, concept-
    based experimentation, technology assessments, and analysis to
    validate, modify or reject the concept's viability, and identify
    opportunities for future force development.
    command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance
                           and reconnaissance (c4isr)
        The proliferation of anti-access, area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities
    among potential adversaries drives the need for technologies that
    assure access for Naval forces. Our challenges include the requirement
    to project power despite A2/AD challenges and to provide information
    dominance to the warfighter.
        Improved decisionmaking is central to the Navy's S&T plan to
    provide information dominance to the warfighter. One goal is to develop
    a highly flexible, open architecture, information and decisionmaking
    capability with applications enabling operational and tactical forces
    to function with the same distributed information base across all
    warfare and mission areas. Information gathering and analysis will be
    largely automated and autonomously controlled so warfighters can have
    more time to make decisions and execute plans. A key aspect of this is
    our use of the electromagnetic spectrum for dominance, while denying
    the same to our adversaries. To this end ONR, Navy, and the other
    services are working to deliver hardware and software to support
    electromagnetic spectrum dominance in the near and far term.
    Capabilities are in various stages of maturity and deployment.
        ONR developed software to evaluate effectiveness of new Electronic
    Warfare countermeasures. When the Fleet identified a requirement to
    improve threat awareness and assess vulnerability to anti-ship cruise
    missiles using organic Electronics Support Measures (ESM) sensors and
    radar, ONR used the same software to address the new requirement by
    developing a Human-Machine Interface (HMI), installing it on ships, and
    deploying scientists to make the new HMI sailor friendly. This gave the
    Task Force a clearer picture of ESM effectiveness and vulnerabilities
    relative to current sensors, weather, and threats--allowing them to
    reassign sensor coverage and move platforms to reduce vulnerabilities.
        The Joint Counter Radio Controlled Improvised Explosive Device
    Electronic Warfare (JCREW) effort is developing flexible, dynamic
    system architecture to detect IED signals across the entire spectrum
    and provide automated responses. Unlike current technology, JCREW is
    designed to allow detection and communication systems to operate
    simultaneously.
                           ocean battlespace sensing
        To continue to dominate in the maritime environment Naval forces
    must be able to accurately predict and adapt to ocean, air, littoral
    and riverine environments on both tactical and strategic levels. Recent
    changes in climate conditions and extremes have created an emerging
    need for more accurate and longer range forecasts for DOD and Naval
    operations. In support of the Navy's Task Force Climate Change, the
    National Oceanographic Partnership Program, and in partnership with the
    Air Force, Department of Energy, National Aeronautics and Space
    Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and
    National Science Foundation (NSF), we invest in S&T to provide mobile
    autonomous environment sensing, match predictive capability to tactical
    requirements, develop systems that adapt to environmental variability,
    and integrate atmospheric and ocean models to enable better
    forecasting. Additional investments will provide a better understanding
    of surface wind impact on upper ocean dynamics and energy fluxes across
    ocean boundary layers, increase knowledge of high latitude Arctic
    environments, and enhance our ability to forecast operational
    conditions with longer lead times. The payoff is safer, more efficient
    Naval operations in maritime environments through improved immediate,
    seasonal and longer range forecasts.
        ONR's environmental research is heavily field-oriented, employing
    oceanographic ships, aircraft, and autonomous air and undersea
    vehicles. For example, the Navy owns six University-National
    Oceanographic Laboratory System (UNOLS) Ocean Class Research Vessels
    that ONR schedules and supports in partnership with NSF. Construction
    of two replacement vessels is underway, with Auxiliary General
    Oceanographic Research Ship (AGOR) 27--Research Vessel (R/V) Neil
    Armstrong assigned to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and AGOR
    28--R/V Sally Ride assigned to Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
    Both are expected to begin research operations in fiscal year 2015.
        In addition, we are developing rapid, standoff mine countermeasures
    to support unencumbered maneuver of combatants, assure access, ensure
    strategic mobility and sustainment, decrease mine countermeasure (MCM)
    hazards, and increase the standoff range of combatants from minefields.
    ONR experiments with sensing and autonomy technologies help small
    vessels to operate at night, in all weather, at higher speeds, and with
    less risk over large, poorly mapped riverine systems. Our Advanced
    Undersea Weapon System (AUWS) will deliver targeting sensors and
    remotely controllable or autonomous weapons into chokepoints or
    channels to neutralize maritime threats. ONR's Advanced Sonar
    Technology for High Clearance Rate MCM in the surf and autonomous
    minehunting payloads for Unmanned Surface Vehicles (USV), reduce
    timelines for detecting, identifying and clearing floating, drifting,
    moored and bottom mines in shallow water.
        ONR supports research in acoustic propagation and scattering to
    improve anti-submarine wide area surveillance, detection, localization,
    tracking, and attack capabilities against adversary submarines in
    noisy, cluttered shallow water environments. We provide S&T to mitigate
    effects of acoustic systems on marine mammals, to improve probability
    of kill for undersea weapons, and to enable new undersea weapon
    concepts of operation. Projects include the Remote Aerial Sonar and
    Communications Laser (RASCL), Affordable Compact Bow Sonar for large
    deck surface ships, holding threat submarines at risk in forward areas,
    screening transiting battle groups, and providing torpedo defense for
    ships.
                            sea warfare and weapons
        ONR's major focus in this area is to improve surface, submarine,
    ground, and air platforms, as well as undersea weapon performance. S&T
    investments provide options for advanced electrical systems and
    components, and for survivable, agile, mobile, sustainable, manned and
    unmanned, surface and sub-surface sea platforms, and undersea weapons.
    Significant investments provide S&T to improve performance and
    affordability of the Nation's strategic submarine assets under the Ohio
    Replacement Program (ORP), as well as Virginia-class submarines. Our
    Electric Ship Research and Development Consortium enlists academic
    institutions to develop electric power architectures and technologies
    to enable use of next generation high power sensors and weapons,
    including directed energy weapons (DEW) systems described earlier.
    Investments encompass projects to transition S&T necessary to improve
    performance and capabilities of our current fleet of torpedoes,
    undersea weapons and vehicles, as well as effective countermeasures and
    defensive weapons to protect against undersea weapon threats. Undersea
    vehicle S&T includes research, development and deployment of long-
    endurance, air-independent power systems for unmanned undersea vehicles
    (UUVs). Additionally, we utilize extensive experience in surface craft
    design and autonomy to provide the Fleet with unmanned surface vessels
    (USVs) capable of operating effectively in a range of marine
    environments.
        A key enabler of these Sea Warfare and other capabilities is S&T
    investment in naval materials. These investments focus on performance
    and affordability of advanced materials for applications such as
    lightweight structures, corrosion and biofouling mitigation,
    maintenance cost-reduction, undersea acoustics, and energy- and power-
    dense electrical energy conversion and storage. These efforts explore
    and apply fundamental materials physics to discover and engineer future
    materials meeting warfighting platform demands now and in the future.
    Consistent with this approach, our investment in Integrated
    Computational Materials Engineering is a key contributor to the
    recently established Lightweight and Modern Metals Manufacturing
    Initiative (LM3I).
                             warfighter performance
        Warfighter Performance S&T addresses the full range of research
    issues involving human system interactions, medical and biological
    systems, and supports the SECNAV mission of protecting the safety and
    privacy rights of human research subjects.
        Human system research helps the DoN recruit the right people,
    assign them to the right jobs, while ensuring they have the right
    skills in safe systems that are designed to support effective
    decisionmaking and collaboration. Our S&T investments in this area
    helps improve small team, platform, task force, and battle group
    operations by developing training technology and decision support
    systems that accommodate human capabilities and limits. ONR initiatives
    include simulation-based approaches to fleet integrated, multi-
    platform, multi-mission training and experimentation that enable near-
    real time collaboration, decisionmaking and planning across platforms
    and organizations.
        Warfighter performance goals are to enhance performance, improve
    the timeliness and quality of decisionmaking, develop strategies to
    mitigate workload, resolve ambiguity, and reduce workload and manning,
    while improving situational awareness and speed of command. Training
    technology S&T designs virtual networked learning environments that
    exploit live assets, virtual simulators and artificially intelligent
    constructive (Live, Virtual, Constructive/LVC) entities in distributed
    training environments to increase individual and team skill, knowledge,
    expertise and experience in warfighting tasks. S&T enables the Navy and
    Marine Corps to effectively and affordably train in classrooms,
    simulated environments, and on deployment.
        Medical S&T improves the health, well-being, protection and
    survival of personnel in undersea, shipboard and expeditionary
    settings. ONR develops medical equipment, diagnostic capabilities, and
    treatments to improve warfighter performance and resilience. ONR
    develops solutions for point of injury care and casualty evacuation,
    new approaches to mitigate risks associated with operations in extreme
    environments such as dive medicine, and continues to address noise
    induced hearing loss by reducing noise at the source, limiting
    exposure, and developing protective technologies.
        ONR's biological research program exploits principles from nature
    to design, control and power autonomous systems; improve processes,
    materials and sensors; and develop synthetic biology tools to support
    the Fleet/Force. Biocentric technologies offer a variety of enabling
    capabilities, including bio-inspired autonomous vehicles, acoustic/
    seismic discrimination systems, microbial fuel cells for sustainable
    power, engineered plants that produce energetic material precursors,
    and diagnostic tools to assess the health of marine mammals.
        Human subject research is critical to support the Navy and Marine
    Corps warfighter, training and operational capability, and Navy
    Medicine. Many RDT&E activities designed to respond to Fleet/Force
    requirements necessitate human subject participation. As part of the
    DoN Human Research Protection Program, ONR is responsible for
    implementation of human subject protections in the Navy's systems
    commands, operational forces, training units, and at Navy-sponsored
    extramural institutions. ONR reconciles the competing priorities of
    conducting potentially risky research involving human subjects and
    compliance with Federal, DOD, and DoN human protection policies.
                         naval air warfare and weapons
        ONR's Naval Air Warfare goal is to develop, demonstrate and
    transition technologies to expand Naval weapon system stand-off ranges
    and reduce engagement timelines to enable rapid, precise, assured
    defeat of moving land, sea and air targets. We invest in S&T to develop
    propulsion for high speed weapons requiring technologies associated
    with high acceleration, high temperature, and high strength materials.
    We develop advanced structural materials and corrosion protection for
    aircraft, improvements that enhance operational characteristics such as
    improved lift, and to address other requirements driven by operations
    in the unique maritime environment. These include kinematic and
    lethality enhancements to increase range and effectiveness of tactical
    weapons, and aided target recognition to provide the F/A-18 with
    advanced target identification capabilities.
                        naval research laboratory (nrl)
        ONR supports the DoN corporate lab, the Naval Research Laboratory
    (NRL). The NRL base program develops S&T to meet needs identified in
    the Naval S&T Strategic Plan and sustains world class skills and
    innovation in our in-house laboratory. Research at NRL is the
    foundation that can focus on any area to develop technology from
    concept to operation when high-priority, short-term needs arise. NRL is
    the lead Navy lab for space systems, firefighting, tactical electronic
    warfare, advanced electronics and artificial intelligence. Among our
    greatest challenges is to recapitalize NRL infrastructure. I invite you
    to visit this facility and learn more about research undertaken there
    by our world-class scientists and engineers.
                                   onr global
        ONR has offices in London, Prague, Singapore, Tokyo and Santiago--
    and closely coordinates activities with the other services and
    Assistant Secretary of Defense (Research and Engineering). We search
    for emerging research and technologies to help address current Naval
    needs, as well as requirements for future capabilities. ONR Global
    establishes contacts with international S&T leaders, giving us new
    perspectives and helping identify trends and forecast threats. It
    enables us to recruit the world's scientists and engineers in
    partnerships to benefit the U.S. and our allies. Global includes
    Science Advisors who communicate Fleet/Force needs to the Naval
    Research Enterprise (primarily Navy labs, warfare centers, affiliated
    universities) to facilitate development of solutions to transition to
    the Fleet/Force. Participants include Naval engineers who coordinate
    experimentation, develop prototypes, define transition options, and
    collaborate with Fleet/Force to define S&T investments. Our
    International Science Program gives scientists from academia,
    government and industry opportunities to engage leading international
    scientists and innovators. Our technical staff helps establish
    collaboration between Naval scientists and their foreign counterparts,
    and identifies centers of excellence for Naval S&T.
                                   conclusion
        The fiscal year 2015 President's budget request will enable us to
    continue moving toward enhanced capabilities, more effective
    partnership between research and acquisition, and strengthened
    partnerships with the Army, Air Force, DARPA and other DOD research
    organizations--as well as performers outside the Naval R&D system. We
    strive to tap into the full spectrum of discovery and accelerate the
    transition of appropriate technologies to civilian use. Our S&T
    investments represent careful stewardship of taxpayer dollars that will
    achieve these goals and significantly enhance the safety and
    performance of warfighters as they serve in defense of the United
    States. Thank you for your support.

        Senator Durbin. Thanks, Admiral.
        I have three questions for the panel. I am going to state
    all three of them and anyone who feels inclined can jump in.
        First question: When I go to the NIH and ask Dr. Collins,
    he tells me that there is a dramatic decline in NIH
    researchers, that they are seeing in 1982 19 percent of their
    researchers were under the age of 36. Today it is 3 percent. He
    believes that our failure to fund his agency on a regular basis
    has created a crisis of confidence in those who are scientists
    and engineers who might otherwise go into biomedical research.
        I would like to know if you have seen this phenomenon in
    the work that you are doing.
        Secondly, I would like to address an issue that is timely
    because it is on the floor of the Senate. We are now
    contemplating extending the R&D tax credit under our tax code
    for private companies to invest in research and development. We
    believe that that work is so valuable that we ought to create a
    tax incentive for it, and I have always voted for it because I
    agree with that conclusion.
        However, we are running into an interesting political
    dilemma. There are some who say that because it is a tax cut,
    you do not have to pay for it. However, if you took tax dollars
    and spent them at your agencies or the National Institutes of
    Health, you have to cut spending somewhere else. I do not
    understand the difference.
        And the basic question is this: Do you believe that the R&D
    tax credit is enough to sustain America's superiority when it
    comes to basic research or developmental research, or do you
    believe the Government plays a unique role or a different role
    that ought to be served as well by adequately funding research
    efforts. I think I know the answer to that question.
        The third issue relates to the coordination of effort. This
    worries me. I have put in this budget more money, I believe,
    than in past years for medical research. I really intensely
    believe in it, and I believe the Department of Defense has
    proven that the money they receive can be well spent in medical
    research. I am interested in the coordination of medical
    research. I want to make sure, for example, when we have a
    BRAIN (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative
    Neurotechnologies) initiative that is shared by DARPA and NIH
    and other agencies, they are actually, at the beginning of this
    conversation, sitting down and establishing parameters and
    goals and methods of funding so we are not tripping over one
    another and wasting these precious medical research resources.
        Jump ball. Dr. Prabhakar.
        Dr. Prabhakar. Mr. Chairman, let me dive in because you
    talked about things that I want to discuss. I think they are
    very much on point.
        Let me try to attack the first two questions from the
    following perspective. I am now at a point where I have spent
    half of my professional life in the public sector and half in
    the private sector. When I returned to Washington about a year
    and a half ago, I came from 15 years in Silicon Valley, most of
    that in venture capital. And from that perspective, let me
    comment on the issue of the research community in the United
    States, who the people are that are engaged in this enterprise,
    and the R&D tax credit question.
        On the people issue, one of the things that really struck
    me, when I returned to the national security community after
    serving on the boards of small private companies as venture
    capitalists, is it was such a stark reminder that in the
    national security work, we really have migrated to where we
    connect with a very narrow part of the broader technical
    community. A lot of that has to do with the backgrounds of a
    lot who constitutes our technology community today. Over half
    of the Ph.D. engineers who practice in the United States today
    are foreign-born. The DOD does not have great ways of reaching
    into those communities, and I think without active efforts to
    reach into the research community to make those connections,
    recognizing that there are real security issues that have to be
    dealt with, we need, I think, to continue the kinds of work
    that all of us are doing that reach into research institutions
    and reach beyond just the defense community, the classic
    defense industrial base and the classic research labs in DOD,
    if we are to tap that broader human capital that is so vital to
    our national security needs. Number one.
        On the issue of the different kinds of funding, many others
    have much more knowledge, and obviously, I will leave it to you
    all to sort out tax policy. The point I really want to
    underscore, though, is the question of whether private
    companies' access to R&D tax credits or any investments that
    private companies make--how those contrast to the kind of work
    that happens with publicly supported R&D, particularly in the
    Defense Department. And again, I have seen both sides of that
    story.
        This is a national R&D ecosystem, and in an ecosystem, all
    the portions have to be healthy. So, yes, absolutely it matters
    that our companies continue to make the R&D investments which
    they make in order to build the next products and services that
    they can sell at a profit. That is what they do. That is how
    the economy works. Very important but different than the public
    R&D investment that is made. In our cases, of course, we are
    making that R&D investment for national security purposes, and
    our portfolios are chock full of the kinds of research that
    simply is not going to get invested in by private companies.
        Now, often we end up laying a research base. Sometimes we
    lay a research base that leads to much bigger private
    investment and then leads to, for example, all the technologies
    in the cell phone that you described earlier. But the reason
    all of us are making these investments is because it is simply
    not going to happen any other way, and it is vital to our
    Nation's needs.
        Mr. Shaffer. Sir, I would like to follow on to Arati's
    comments. I fully support what she said. I would like to add a
    little bit of data to some of that.
        For the first question on researchers, across our
    laboratories, we have basically a bimodal distribution with a
    larger number of researchers around 35 to 45, a large number of
    researchers 55 to 65, a bathtub from the last Government
    drawdown. I am concerned about the future because last year
    across the Department we hired under 1,000 new scientists into
    our laboratories, compared to a normal 3,000. Furthermore,
    right now what we are seeing across the board is about for
    every three who leave, we can hire one coming back in. That is
    just because of the budget crisis. So I am concerned. We are
    gathering across the panel that you see here better metrics,
    but there is a problem.
        The other thing I would like to comment on are the R&D tax
    credits. I am not going to get into taxes and tax policy, but I
    will tell you we are trying to make the industrial research
    part of what we are thinking about every day in the Department.
    We have made a strong emphasis on IR&D (independent research
    and development), but we are seeing data coming out of the
    industrial sector. In fact, CSIS (Center for Strategic and
    International Studies) issued a report yesterday that showed,
    with one notable exception--I am not going to get into which
    company--the amount of industrial IR&D over the last decade has
    declined fairly dramatically to the point where some of our
    major defense contractors are not putting much money back into
    R&D. And that is a concern because they are part, as Arati
    said, of the entire ecosystem.
        Senator Durbin. Senator Cochran.
        Senator Cochran. Mr. Chairman, it is a pleasure to join you
    and other members of the committee in reviewing the testimony
    or presentations being made by this distinguished panel of
    witnesses today.
        Ms. Miller, I understand coincidentally you visited the
    Army Corps of Engineers Research and Development Center
    laboratories in Vicksburg earlier this week. I would be
    interested in hearing your impressions of that visit. And to
    the extent that it is not classified, tell us what your
    impressions were.
        Ms. Miller. Thank you for the opportunity.
        It was a great visit. I have, obviously, been working with
    the Corps of Engineers for a long time as my role here as DASA
    R&T (Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Research and
    Technology), but this was the first time I had actually made it
    down to Vicksburg. I have had a number of trips scheduled and
    been called off, and this time, even though they knew I was
    testifying on Wednesday, I said I was coming anyway. So I am
    here on 3 hours of sleep because we had a little bit of weather
    coming back into DC last night. So I apologize for that.
        The Corps is very impressive. The Engineer Research and
    Development Center is very impressive. While I was there, they
    took me through a number of their major activities. They have
    been looking at climate change and its impact not only on the
    environment but on the Army in particular, how we can utilize
    training ranges, how it might impact BRAC (base realignment and
    closure), not that we want one, but if BRAC happens again, we
    want to be prepared to understand the impacts on the Army areas
    that we might choose to relocate, how it affects operations in
    the Army as we go forward in the future and the upsetness that
    might happen in the world as we see it. We talked about
    environmental work. We talked about nanotechnology and the
    fundamentals that they do there to understand the impact of new
    materials that the Army is looking at using before they become
    a problem to the environment and to the soldiers that will be
    using them. All that is foundational and informs the rest of
    our weapons development and our material development.
        We also talked about high performance computing. They are
    the executive agent on behalf of all of the services for
    executing that program, which was divested from OSD (Office of
    the Secretary of Defense) to us 4 years ago, some very
    significant work there and something that I believe will
    underpin what we go forward with in the future.
        Senator Cochran. Thank you very much for that overview and
    for the contributions that we are making across previously
    established boundaries in this missile defense area. There is a
    great deal of collaboration going on, and I commend all of the
    panel for the work you are doing to make sure we have the most
    modern capabilities to protect the security interests of our
    country and for your sharing of that information from time to
    time as we visit with you and review the budget request for the
    next fiscal year.
        We are constrained because of the allocations, but your
    testimony helps us make the best choices in my view, and we
    should pay very careful attention to what you say to us about
    these very serious and important issues.
        Thank you for your good work.
        Senator Durbin. Senator Shelby.
        Senator Shelby. Thank you.
        We all have this chart, which Senator Durbin mentioned in
    his opening statement, at the hearing that Senator Mikulski
    called the other day, and a lot of us were there. It is
    disturbing the trend line going in the wrong direction on
    biomedical research, but it is also going the wrong direction
    in basic research.
        For the record, could you translate that into real dollars?
    The trend line is bad. And China and what they are doing in
    investing in the future will bode well for them, maybe not for
    the rest of the world. But if you could translate this into
    dollars, that would be good for the committee, I believe,
    rather than just percentages.
        I would like to direct my first question to Dr. Prabhakar.
    DARPA's involvement in the creation of the Internet is well
    known and well documented. Thank goodness. Thus, it comes as
    little surprise that the birthplace of the Internet is also
    leading the way in developing innovative mechanisms to protect
    that domain from cyber warfare attacks, which is a big concern
    of the business community, of the Pentagon, everything in
    today's world.
        It is my understanding, Doctor, that DARPA is currently
    working to develop a cyber warfare program, which would allow
    DOD to create platforms to plan for and counter cyber warfare
    just as it would for kinetic warfare. Whatever you can talk
    about here in open session, would you please update this
    Committee on Appropriations on the status of Plan X and, more
    broadly speaking, how important is sustained funding for
    DARPA's cybersecurity efforts to this country?
        Dr. Prabhakar. Thank you, Senator Shelby.
        As I mentioned in my opening remarks, cybersecurity I think
    is one of the core foundations as we become increasingly
    reliant on information. I think we are all familiar with the
    challenges that our businesses and our national security
    enterprise face because of cyber attacks that are happening on
    a constant basis, some driven by nation states, some driven by
    organizations, and some just individuals because so many
    individuals around the world have at their fingertips now the
    ability to participate in this domain, for better or for worse,
    often for better, but sometimes unfortunately for worse.
        We think that that cyber environment in which we are in a
    conflict today, that that is going to continue to escalate.
    Much of the conversation has been about computers and networks.
    Those are important to keep secure. But, of course, all of our
    embedded systems are also highly vulnerable. One of our
    researchers a couple years ago showed that they could hack the
    speedometer on a car. So if a speedometer on a car is
    vulnerable, then I think it is a good thing to realize that all
    of our embedded military systems are also vulnerable.
    Everything has a computer in it today.
        So Plan X is a foundational cyber warfare program that we
    are building to allow us to have the visibility and the
    understanding of cyberspace so that we can start to deal with
    how cyber warfare is happening today and where it will be in
    the future. We think it is going to become integral to the
    kinetic warfighting of the future.
        We want to give our senior decision-makers the ability to
    see what is happening in cyberspace, to plan actions, to be
    able to predict collateral effects, to avoid affects that they
    want to make sure do not happen, and then to do battle damage
    assessment. Those are the core capabilities.
        Senator Shelby. Is this one of DARPA's top priorities?
        Dr. Prabhakar. Across our portfolio, it is a high priority.
    As you know, what we do at DARPA needs to be a balanced
    portfolio. Maintaining the security of our information systems
    is one of those high priorities.
        Senator Shelby. Doctor, it is my understanding that I am
    getting into the long-range anti-ship missile. It is my
    understanding that on April 22, a few weeks ago, DARPA
    demonstrated five key technologies to the Secretary of Defense
    at the Pentagon. Among the five technologies exhibited was
    DARPA's long-range anti-ship missile which seeks to pierce
    through advance air defense systems and engage enemy warships
    from a long range, which is smart.
        Could you discuss the importance of continuing to fully
    fund development of the long-range anti-ship missile? And what
    is the capability as far as leaping ahead here?
        Dr. Prabhakar. This was a project that DARPA began about 5
    years ago in response to what we heard from the Pacific Fleet,
    basically their concern about being out-sticked, not having the
    range for anti-ship missile capabilities, particularly in the
    Pacific theater. We rapidly put together a program that
    culminated with successful flight tests for the DARPA stage of
    the research. Those flight tests were last fall. And the work
    that is now going on with DARPA's funding is in fact wrapped up
    for that program because we have successfully shown those
    flight tests.
        What is happening now is a joint DARPA and Navy effort to
    try to get from that flight test to operational capability as
    rapidly as we can. Because it is an urgent known requirement
    for the Navy, it is something that we are hoping that the Navy
    will be able to get across the finish line very quickly.
        Senator Shelby. Ms. Miller, could you just for a moment,
    for the record here today, speak to the importance of providing
    adequate funding--and that is part of what this hearing is
    about--to field new weapon technologies like the Army's missile
    and rocket advanced technology, how important that is to the
    service that is down the road, the Army particularly?
        Ms. Miller. Obviously, I believe it is very important for
    the Army to have robust funding in our air and missile defense
    capabilities at AMRDEC (Aviation and Missile Research,
    Development, and Engineering Center) down in Huntsville, also
    PEO (Program Executive Office) Missiles and Space. We have a
    pretty solid program in the Army's science and technology
    portfolio. We have taken a slight dip in that particular
    technology area, but that is not a deliberate decision not to
    fund that. That was the completion of a successful program in
    our extended area protection system, a missile development
    capability. And so we have completed that. And as we go into
    the next 2015 through 2019, we start to pick up with counter
    UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) capability development.
        Senator Shelby. Could you also speak to the proposed high
    energy laser demonstrator and what this potentially could do?
        Ms. Miller. Absolutely. For the Army, the Space and Missile
    Defense Command is leading all research in high energy lasers.
    This is a capability that all of the services co-funded--the
    development of solid state laser capability under the High
    Energy Laser Joint Technology Office. And then each one of us
    has taken that capability and is demonstrating it in an
    operational context.
        For the Army, we have been working out at WSMR (White Sands
    Missile Range) and doing some tests there. We have just
    recently gone with the Navy to test this at Eglin and see how
    the laser operates in that kind of environment because the Army
    pretty much is anywhere in the world and we need to make sure
    that it works in our capacity. It has been very successful
    against mortars and UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicle). It is
    slated to go into a program of record, our integrated fire
    protection system, in the 2022 timeframe.
        Senator Shelby. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Senator Durbin. Senator Collins.
        Senator Collins. Thank you.

                                MALARIA VACCINES

        Dr. Rauch, I agree with the chairman's observation about
    the important contributions the Department of Defense has made
    to medical research. Oftentimes we think of traumatic brain
    injury where the Department has played such an important role.
        But the Department has gone beyond that and contributed in
    important ways in other areas such as infectious diseases. I
    was interested to read that the military infectious disease
    research program states that infectious diseases such as
    malaria historically cause more casualties when our troops are
    deployed to tropical regions than does enemy fire.
        Could you give us an update on efforts by the Department of
    Defense to develop a vaccine that would be effective against
    malaria?
        Dr. Rauch. Yes, ma'am.
        First of all, you are quite correct in that in the deployed
    force, there is a lot of morbidity associated with infectious
    diseases. Very true. And that is why we have an infectious
    disease research program that is dedicated to actually
    protecting our forces as they go into an endemic infectious
    disease area. Most concerning are infectious diseases such as
    malaria, dengue fever, and the diarrheal diseases. These are
    things that we really focus on.

                            VACCINE RESEARCH EFFORTS

        With respect to malaria, we partner with the Gates
    Foundation and also with private industry to mature these
    products along. There is one product that was really developed
    and the preclinical work was done at Walter Reed Army Institute
    of Research. It came out of that tech base, was picked up then
    by GlaxoSmithKline. And those are phase III trials that are
    being conducted, and it is really showing about 50 percent
    efficacy in protection.
        Now, you may say, oh, 50 percent. Can we do better than
    that? Malaria is a very, very challenging parasite. It is very
    agile. It is very flexible. You think you have it one time, and
    it changes. It is very agile. And so it is very much a
    challenge to come up with an efficacious medical countermeasure
    or vaccine. But those results from the phase III trial are
    very, very promising.
        There is also a candidate that is coming out of the Navy
    lab that is also very promising. So partnering with NIH in this
    area shows a lot of Federal leverage to tackle this problem.
        Senator Collins. Thank you.
        Admiral Klunder, oftentimes it is small businesses that
    come up with the truly innovative products, and I can see Ms.
    Miller nodding in agreement as I say that. But it can be very
    difficult for a small business to comply with the cost of
    submitting a bid, with changing specifications, with rescoping
    of projects. And I want to give you an example from my home
    State.

                          SMALL BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES

        A small Maine shipyard built a prototype vessel for the
    Navy and for Special Forces and ultimately won a contract to
    build an advanced rescue craft for the military. And one of the
    challenges--the greatest challenge for this small business--was
    not building the high-tech vessel. It knew how to do that. But
    it was dealing with the expense of recurring costs associated
    with dealing with a very complex procurement process. What
    happened in this case is this small business submitted a bid at
    great cost to the business in response to the Navy's RFP
    (request for proposal) to supplement or replace the Mark V
    Special Operations Craft, only to watch the Navy change its
    mind, rescope the project, and publish a second new RFP. And
    for a big company, that would not be a problem. For a small
    company, it forced this firm to abandon the project due to the
    complexity, difficulty, and expense of completely redoing its
    bid.
        So what has happened is the Navy has now lost a competitor
    for a project despite the fact that this small firm
    demonstrated in building a prototype that it could perform
    exactly the kind of work that the Navy wants.
        So my question for you is how does the Navy ensure that you
    do not inadvertently exclude small businesses that do not have
    the kind of resources that a large defense contractor has to
    rebid on a contract when the Navy changes its mind.
        Admiral Klunder. Thank you, Senator Collins.
        I am not 100 percent involved in the details of that
    acquisition process, but I am familiar with it. And I offer two
    thoughts.
        One is we absolutely love the innovation that comes out of
    small businesses. As a matter of fact, on the railgun system
    that I have down at Dahlgren we developed, 80 separate
    companies were involved in the development of that. That is big
    and small. So I promise you I love working with small
    businesses. As a matter of fact, in 3 weeks here in the
    beginning of June, we are having our Navy Opportunity Forum to
    address specifically small businesses, and that is here in DC.
    So I will reach out.
        But on this specific company, because I do know about the
    issue at hand, I would like to offer that what I have done is,
    even though I know that process may have had some holes in it
    in terms of the complications and complexity you described, I
    have gone back and looked at that technology because there may
    be things we are going to do in the future, not necessarily a
    spec ops Mark V, but maybe connectors as we work with the
    Marine Corps, getting from sea to shore. I am looking at some
    of those technologies, I am going to reach out to that company,
    ma'am.
        Senator Collins. Thank you.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Senator Durbin. Senator Murkowski.
        Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        And thank you to all of you this morning. Very interesting.
        I wanted to ask a couple questions here about HAARP, the
    High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program. Several of you
    at the table have a little bit of a piece here. As you know,
    this is located up in Alaska. It is currently funded by the Air
    Force research lab. It was formerly funded by the Office of
    Naval Research. One of the prime customers is DARPA, which is
    currently running experiments at the facilities there. So
    questions to several of you this morning.
        I am told by the president of the University of Alaska that
    the Air Force has pulled its support for the facility and they
    are taking steps to demolish it or take it down this summer. He
    is making the argument that there are other opportunities for
    us, and he is trying to find a path where the university might
    be able to take title to the facility.
        I would like to start with you, Dr. Prabhakar. I understand
    that a lot of folks here on the committee probably do not
    understand what HAARP does. I think most Alaskans do not really
    know what HAARP does or why the agency is involved in it. So a
    very brief explanation and then a more direct question. Would
    you be disappointed or would you lose something if HAARP were
    to go away?
        Dr. Prabhakar. Senator Murkowski, as I think you know, one
    of our programs has been using the HAARP facility for the
    research that it is pursuing, and my understanding is that we
    did get value out of that interaction.
        The ``P'' in DARPA is projects, and we are not in the
    business of doing the same thing forever. So very naturally as
    we conclude that work, we are going to move on to other topics.
    So it is not an ongoing need for DARPA despite the fact that we
    had actually gotten some good value out of that infrastructure
    in the past.
        Senator Murkowski. Understood.
        Then to Dr. Walker and Mr. Shaffer--Dr. Walker, your agency
    is currently running the facility. I have mentioned that it is
    our understanding through the president of UAF that the plans
    are to move forward and demolish the facility this summer. So
    the question to you is, is that accurate? Can you explain why?
        And then perhaps to both you and Mr. Shaffer, is there any
    benefit in exploring a potential relationship with the
    University of Alaska to perhaps take over the HAARP?
        Dr. Walker. Thank you, Senator.
        The Air Force has gotten great value out of HAARP in the
    past. We took it over from the Navy and managed it and actually
    did a number of experiment campaigns up there and have finished
    our work that we are interested in doing up there. We are
    moving on to other ways of managing the ionosphere, which the
    HAARP was really designed to do, was to inject energy into the
    ionosphere to be able to actually control it. But that work has
    been completed.
        The Air Force has maintained the site for other Government
    agencies to use for several years now, and with DARPA
    completing their project, that is our last Government customer
    that we have in the site.
        We have put out a call Governmentwide for other agencies
    that had interest in managing the site or taking it over,
    including going out to academia and seeing if there was an
    interest there. And we have gotten interest from the university
    in Fairbanks. However, the interest that we have is that they
    will run it if we fund it, which is unfortunately in this
    fiscal environment we are in right now, this is not an area
    that we have any need for in the future and do not see that it
    would be a good use of Air Force S&T funds in the future. So
    our position has been that if there is not somebody who wants
    to take over the management and the funding of the site, then
    the Air Force has no future need, and that we do plan to do a
    dismantle of the system in the future after we make appropriate
    notifications.
        Senator Murkowski. When you say in the future, do you
    anticipate that it would be this summer then? Or would there
    perhaps be more time for the university to try to figure
    something out?
        Dr. Walker. We would prefer to start this summer. We would
    like to get the critical equipment out of the site before the
    winter. The harsh winter in Alaska does lead to a very costly
    winterization to maintain the site, and we would like to avoid
    that if we can.
        Senator Murkowski. Mr. Shaffer, if you have any comments on
    that.
        Mr. Shaffer. Yes, ma'am.
        So I am torn on this because my background is as an
    atmospheric scientist, and I think the facility is just a
    world-class facility.
        That said, we have worked very hard with the Air Force,
    with the Office of Science and Technology Policy over the last
    18 to 24 months to find another sponsor for this because, as
    you have heard the other people at the table, we, the
    Department, have gotten the research value out that we need for
    the facility. We have also worked with the University of Alaska
    Fairbanks to get some other person to pick up the long-term,
    just pure scientific research that HAARP offers the promise of.
    But with all the other issues and problems and challenges
    facing the Department at this time, we just do not see that
    that investment over a long-term period is where we would
    prioritize our investments.
        So we have been working with other agencies, trying to get
    agencies like the National Science Foundation, Department of
    Commerce who runs the National Ocean and Atmospheric
    Administration, to pick up the HAARP facility. No one else
    wants to step up to the bill, ma'am.
        Senator Murkowski. Let me ask you one final question here,
    Mr. Shaffer, and this is regarding small modular reactors. In
    the report language with the National Defense Authorization Act
    last year, DOD was directed to carry out an assessment of small
    modular reactors of 10 megawatts or less. As energy sources for
    our forward operations, I have always thought that this made a
    lot of sense, particularly in some of our remote areas. We have
    got Eielson Air Force Base up north that could clearly benefit
    from a reliable energy security that nuclear power could
    provide. But you need it on that smaller scale.
        Are you considering such domestic deployment operations for
    SMRs?
        Mr. Shaffer. We have been in discussion with the folks who
    are selling that particular technology. What we cannot get
    over, ma'am, is the sticker shock. There are a lot of other
    issues, but the sticker shock of the initial investment. So by
    the time you would do environmental impact statements and all
    the rest, even to put in a small nuclear reactor, every time I
    have looked at it, the bill has been around $1 billion. That is
    a lot of money in the current fiscal environment.
        I think I would speak for everybody at the table. As
    technologists, we think the technology offers tremendous
    promise, but getting past all the regulatory and all the other
    things that would constrict us to putting in a new nuclear
    reactor just makes it a very, very hard thing to work our way
    through.
        I was in Eielson last summer. I understand exactly the need
    for that type of capability, but we will need some help. And
    frankly, it is kind of the Department of Energy's ball to carry
    in many ways.
        Senator Murkowski. Well, and it is something that I think
    many of us are involved with here, trying to figure out how you
    can expedite that permitting process, how we can work to reduce
    those costs. But you are correct. We are probably still a ways
    away. I appreciate your perspective on it.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Senator Durbin. Thanks, Senator.
        The last question, I know I asked too many for a short
    period of time, was about the coordination of different
    agencies in areas like biomedical research. It is my
    understanding that the NIH and DARPA and others are doing the
    BRAIN Initiative. What I am trying to get is some assurance,
    and I think I am going to get it that at the outset, there is a
    coordination of effort and resources so that we do not waste
    any time or money.
        Dr. Prabhakar. Yes. Sorry. Let me just speak specifically
    to the BRAIN Initiative, and then, Terry, please dive in.
        Absolutely, yes. We have had a lot of very good dialogue
    with NSF and NIH in particular on the BRAIN Initiative.
        Here is how we think about it, if this is useful to you.
    NSF and particularly NIH have built this phenomenal research
    foundation through the investments that they have made in
    biomedical research over many, many years. What we want to do
    at DARPA and our programs are doing today is building real
    technology capabilities out of some specific areas of new
    insights in brain function research. And it is a very good
    interplay. Our investment is very small compared to the
    neuroscience investment over many decades at NIH, but I think
    it is a time when there is a huge opportunity to build real
    technical capability.
        Senator Durbin. Is the same thing true of other areas in
    our appropriations bill where we are kind of specifying a line
    item different areas of medical research? Can the same be said,
    Dr. Rauch?
        Mr. Shaffer. Senator, let me take this and then I will let
    Terry talk about his specific area.
        We have been concerned for a number of years about better
    coordination of the programs. As you see here, we have three
    services, a number of agencies doing research in every area.
    Over the last 18 months, we have put in place a structure that
    took the best of what we had previously to coordinate our
    activity in 17 areas. That process is called Reliance 21,
    Communities of Interest. So in 17 areas where multiple agencies
    have an investment, we have the senior executive or senior
    leader who is responsible for investment of money coordinate
    their program with the other components because everybody wants
    to get the maximum out of their ability.
        One of these 17 areas--we actually adopted a body that was
    there before called ASBREM (Armed Services Biomedical Research
    Evaluation and Management), and I will turn it over to Terry
    because Terry is one of the co-chairs of ASBREM with my
    director for biomedical sciences. They actually do the
    coordination of the biomedical research area.
        Terry.
        Senator Durbin. I want to thank you for a new acronym.
        Go ahead.

                BIOMEDICAL RESEARCH, EVALUATION, AND MANAGEMENT

        Dr. Rauch. Well, sir, it is not a new acronym. It has been
    around for a while, but we continue to refine it.
        The ASBREM is really a mechanism to assure coordination
    across the Department. It is one mechanism to assure
    coordination of medical research across the Department. We
    actually have a liaison officer from Health Affairs that is
    actually assigned over to DARPA to make sure that DARPA and DHP
    programs are coordinated. I mean, that is an investment on our
    part.
        You know, the National Research Action Plan really sets the
    foundation particularly in the area of mental health research
    to assure coordination. There is hardly a day that goes by that
    I am not talking or emailing with my colleague over at the VA,
    Tim O'Leary, or with Tom Insel at NIH or his staff about the
    different projects that we have ongoing in mental health
    research.
        Every year for the last 4 years, we have held joint
    portfolio R&As, review and analyses, where the DOD program is
    presented in combat casualty care research and TBI and psych
    health research and infectious diseases and operational
    medicine and rehabilitation. The VA presents their program at
    the R&A. The NIH presents their program at the R&A. It is fully
    transparent. It enables us to see in a coordinated fashion the
    state of science that we are funding with our Federal dollars.
    And it enables us to determine where the gaps are, Federal
    gaps, and how we can correct those gaps or invest in those
    gaps. It informs our next upcoming investments.
        One last thing, sir, and I have to make a point. What comes
    out of these, in addition to what comes out of these portfolio
    reviews, is joint initiatives. Last year, the DOD and the VA
    co-funded two major consortia, one for PTSD and one for
    traumatic brain injury. When I say co-funded, I mean the VA put
    up their intramural program dollars that went to the awardee on
    the VA side, and we put up DHP (Defense Health Program) R&D
    dollars that went to the awardee on the academic side. Their
    consortia is at the University of Texas Health Science Center
    in San Antonio. That is the one for PTSD. The co-investigator
    is Terry Keane up at Boston VA. The one for traumatic brain
    injury is David Sifu down at VCU (Virginia Commonwealth
    University) who also has an appointment with the VA in
    Richmond. These are 5-year consortia, a 5-year period of
    performance. The first time we have ever done this together
    with the VA.
        We do something very similar with NIDA (National Institute
    on Drug Abuse) in terms of putting out joint program
    announcements where DOD will fund research on drug abuse, as
    well as NIDA.
        So we cost share. You can see that in combat casualty. I
    mean, I can go on and on and on.
        Senator Durbin. Thank you for that.
        Dr. Rauch. Your time is precious.
        Senator Durbin. Thank you.
        Do any of my colleagues have any follow-up questions?
    Senator Shelby.
        Senator Shelby. I have a couple of questions for Admiral
    Klunder.

                    HIGH-POWER DENSITY WATER JET DEVELOPMENT

        Admiral, in the area of Office of Naval Research, it is my
    understanding that ONR delivered a new high-power density water
    jets to the Freedom variant of a littoral combat ship, LCS.
    Could you please provide an update of that testing, and what
    that will do?
        Admiral Klunder. Yes, Senator, thank you.
        And again, I offer that that work was done from a
    consortium of larger and small businesses. So that is very
    important to us.
        Senator Shelby. Why is it important to you?
        Admiral Klunder. We feel that if we are going to stimulate
    the economy and the industrial base----
        Senator Shelby. No. I mean why the water jet----
        Admiral Klunder. Oh, the water jet, certainly. Well, not
    only the ship itself but the fuel efficiency that we derive was
    incredibly impressive. We are not talking about one or two
    extra percentages. We are talking almost around 10 percent of
    fuel efficiencies we get out of this water jet. And again, I am
    a physicist. So there is a little bit of flow dynamics. But the
    point is we were able to test that, fabricate it with help in
    your great State. And then when we implemented that on the
    ship, it is now working.
        I would offer manufacturing, industrial base. We have a
    problem. How can we make it better, more fuel efficient? We
    injected with the industrial partners--performers and we will
    deliver that I think in a reasonably fair amount of time, which
    is on our ships now.

                    JOINT HIGH SPEED VESSEL RAMP DEVELOPMENT

        Senator Shelby. This came about, as you mentioned, by some
    broad research working with others. Right? And businesses.
        Admiral Klunder. Yes, sir. And again, I think that was a
    great partnership from funding from ONR but also with local
    businesses.
        Senator Shelby. In another area, the joint high speed
    vessel ramp you are familiar with the Office of Naval Research
    completed a demonstration of a new lightweight ramp for the
    Navy's joint high speed vessel earlier this month. Could you
    discuss that and how you are going to implement this? And what
    will it do for you--do for us?
        Admiral Klunder. Sure. And again, I think for those that
    are not familiar with the joint high speed vessel, this is a
    very affordable, high speed vessel. It has lots of modular
    space in it. And why do I emphasize that? Because that vessel
    can now be used for multiple, multiple missions. We could use
    it to connect marines to go inland. We could use it potentially
    to put other kind of systems on there that may be spur of the
    moment, new threats as they come about.
        But to do that and to make sure it is truly multimission,
    we needed it to have a very effective ramp. And that ramp has
    been tested quite well. As I represent not only the Navy but
    the Marine Corps, the Marine Corps is very interested in that
    ramp and how it may be implemented on JHSV or other modular
    ships we are building as MLP. I think you are familiar with
    that ship also, Senator.

                       JOINT HIGH SPEED VESSEL ATTRIBUTES

        Senator Shelby. Admiral, can you explain briefly what the
    joint high speed vessel will mean for us in the Navy?
        Admiral Klunder. Thank you, Senator.
        Well, not only will it be a ship that can move very fast
    and very efficient on fuel, but again, it can carry a number of
    marines. It could actually put potentially a new weapons
    system----
        Senator Shelby. And be heavily armed too, could it not?
        Admiral Klunder. Yes, sir.
        And we can put it anywhere in the world quite quickly.
        Right now we have built--there is a number of those through
    the acquisition process that are being built and fielded. And
    as a matter of fact, this July we are going to bring one into
    San Diego and put the railgun on it to show the public.
        What I think really is important, as we continue to work
    with this ship and figure out different missions, it can really
    be used around the globe. It is not particular to one part of
    the globe. We could put it anywhere in the world and that is
    really part of its----
        Senator Shelby. So the Navy and Marine Corps are very
    pleased with what----
        Admiral Klunder. I would say we are fully embracing it,
    Senator. Thank you.
        Senator Shelby. Thank you.
        Admiral Klunder. Yes, sir.
        Senator Cochran. Mr. Chairman, could I ask unanimous
    consent to submit two questions to Dr. Walker and Admiral
    Klunder for the record?
        Senator Durbin. Without objection.
        Senator Murkowski.

                           ARCTIC SENSOR DEVELOPMENT

        Senator Murkowski. Mr. Chairman, very briefly. I know we
    have got a vote that has just started.
        But I wanted to just bring up very quickly with you, Dr.
    Prabhakar, I have mentioned, as cabinet members have come
    before different panels before us, my interest in making sure
    that this administration is advancing our national interests in
    the Arctic. And I have been somewhat disappointed with some
    lackluster implementation plans, but I have been very
    encouraged by DARPA's Assured Arctic Awareness initiative. I
    know that you have got some data that is coming back that you
    have been collecting out in the region. I am hoping that you
    are getting some early indication of good value coming out of
    that and, again, that you are really committed in moving
    forward in this initiative that I think is critically important
    not just for the State of Alaska, not at all, but truly for the
    entire Nation. So, first of all, I thank you for what DARPA is
    doing, but I would just encourage you to push a little harder
    on it.
        Dr. Prabhakar. Thank you very much for the comment, Senator
    Murkowski. And you are right. This is a national issue. The
    Navy has got its hands full with the oceans that we already
    know and a whole new ocean is appearing before our eyes in the
    Arctic, and the conditions there are very interesting, dynamic,
    and challenging. I too am looking forward to seeing what we are
    going to learn from our initiative.
        Senator Murkowski. Do you know when that might be coming
    out?
        Dr. Prabhakar. I know that we are still in the process of
    getting the data back.

                         ADDITIONAL COMMITTEE QUESTIONS

        Senator Murkowski. I will look forward to----
        Dr. Prabhakar. Yes, same here.
        Senator Murkowski [continuing]. Having some collaboration
    on that. Thank you.
        Admiral Klunder. Senator, could I just--since I am in the
    Navy and the Arctic means a lot to us. And thank you, working
    with DARPA. I am not sure if we are all aware of it. Just this
    March we put another level of sensors off the Beaufort Sea off
    your great coast, and that was done in March. And we are going
    to measure that summer retreat of the marginal sea ice, and we
    are actually going to come up to Deadhorse Bay and Prudhoe Bay
    here in July to add some more sea gliders and wave gliders to
    complement that exercise.
        Senator Murkowski. Great.
        Admiral Klunder. So we are doing a fair amount of research
    and development up there to truly understand the environment
    because we think it is so important, Senator.
        Senator Murkowski. We appreciate that. Thank you, Admiral.
        Senator Durbin. Thank you, Senator Murkowski.
        [The following questions were not asked at the hearing, but
    were submitted to the Department for response subsequent to the
    hearing:]
                      Questions Submitted to Alan Shaffer
                  Questions Submitted by Senator Daniel Coats
        Question. Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Crane has become
    widely recognized across the Department of Defense, and within the
    Federal Lab System for re-thinking and pioneering Technology Transfer.
    Currently, the Research Directorate within Assistant Secretary of
    Defense--Research & Engineering (ASD-R&E) and the State of Indiana are
    collaborating around Crane's successes to demonstrate how a lab's
    innovation can be used to increase the lab's mission effectiveness. Is
    this model something that can be shared and exported?
        Answer. Yes. Leadership of NSWC Crane designated Technology
    Transfer (T2) as a command priority in 2005 and invested in their
    Office of Research & Technology Applications (ORTA), the group
    responsible for leading and implementing the local T2 program. Crane's
    ORTA, recognized as one of the best within the Department of Defense,
    initiated a strategic effort to work as appropriate with Indiana's
    academic and business communities as well as local and state government
    organizations. The best example of T2 success is found in the creation
    of the Battery Innovation Center located near NSWC Crane. This is a
    nexus for new power technologies needed by the military while
    concurrently developing products for the commercial marketplace.
        Question. Are there any future structure changes required and
    strategy alterations to leverage what has been demonstrated in Indiana?
        Answer. Congress has provided all of the needed authorities for an
    effective Department of Defense Technology Transfer (T2) Program; no
    additional authorities are required at this time. A number of Defense
    laboratories, with support from the Assistant Secretary of Defense
    (Research and Engineering) (ASD(R&E)) Defense Laboratories Office, have
    accelerated their local T2 programs.
        Question. What is DOD's strategy for leveraging intellectual
    capital for enhanced mission effectiveness and economic development?
        Answer. The ASD(R&E) Defense Laboratories Office participates in
    the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy (OSTP) Lab-to-
    Market initiative as well as the Federal Laboratory Consortium (FLC) to
    broaden the government-academia-industry T2 network. Lessons learned
    and opportunities for DOD's labs to participate in a national T2
    environment are promulgated to the Defense labs' ORTAs for
    consideration and implementation. A T2 guidebook has been written and
    distributed to the defense labs. When ASD(R&E) learns of other
    laboratory's T2 successes, the experiences and processes are shared
    across the entire Department lab system.
                                     ______

                   Questions Submitted to Dr. Arati Prabhakar
                Questions Submitted by Senator Dianne Feinstein
        Question. Is DARPA planning to continue development of robotic arms
    and associated robotics capabilities for the advancement of in-space
    satellite servicing and to conduct an in-orbit demonstration of these
    capabilities?
        Answer. Yes. DARPA recognizes the strategic importance and the
    commercial potential of in-space satellite servicing and is developing
    the required capabilities on a priority basis. DARPA is developing
    robotic arms and associated robotics capabilities developed under
    DARPA's Phoenix program into an in-orbit demonstration program with
    multiple capabilities. The in-orbit program will validate capabilities
    in geostationary earth orbit of high strategic importance for new
    Department of Defense (DOD) concepts as well as high commercial
    potential (e.g., satellite inspection, repair, and in-orbit assembly).
    The multimission demonstration spacecraft would be designed for an
    extended mission lifetime, enabling follow-on operations by a
    commercial space contractor after successful completion of a test and
    demonstration phase by DOD.
        Question. Is DARPA planning to continue the advancement of the
    ``Payload Orbital Delivery System'' and to demonstrate this capability?
        Answer. Yes. MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates and Space Systems
    Loral are currently under contract to continue engineering and
    integration planning in order to deliver a flight-qualified unit to
    host a Payload Orbital Delivery (POD) System on a commercial satellite.
    This capability will provide an alternative low-cost and high-tempo
    delivery of mass to geostationary orbit for DOD. During the ongoing
    technical development of the flight hardware, DARPA will continue to
    evaluate future opportunities to host and fly the POD concept on a
    commercial satellite.
        Question. Without having a DOD office for satellite servicing, what
    approaches is DARPA considering for the transition of these critical
    capabilities to ensure their availability to our DOD stakeholders?
        Answer. DARPA embraces opportunities for transition. While
    transition is most directly accomplished through the Services, it can
    also be accomplished by advancing the technologies through our
    performers. Proof of the technology coupled with the push to industry
    often results in benefits to the DOD in the future.
                                     ______

                  Questions Submitted by Senator Daniel Coats
        Question. With the growth of emerging threats to the
    microelectronics supply chain, some of which have recently been
    discovered by NSWC Crane, what is DARPA doing to ensure that its
    advanced technical assessment capability such as the DARPA IRIS
    (Integrity and Reliability of Integrated Circuits) Program is being
    transitioned to labs such as Crane?
        Answer. In order to ensure that the advanced technical counterfeit
    component mitigation capabilities developed at DARPA are transitioned
    to the most effective labs at the completion of these programs, DARPA
    engages likely transition partners as government team members during
    their actual execution. Personnel from the transition partners,
    including Crane, actively work on this program, even to the point of
    having badge access to the DARPA facility. In this way, critical
    informed feedback and required application boundary conditions may be
    incorporated into the required deliverables from the outset of the
    program.
        In the case of NSWC Crane, the Indiana lab's hardware assurance
    team is widely recognized as a national center of expertise, one of the
    only two or three true centers of competence in the country for
    mitigating threats to DOD's supply chain. DARPA MTO and its program
    managers involved in hardware assurance are fortunate to have access to
    the experience and insight which NSWC Crane, Indiana brings to the
    programs it helps support. Specifically, Brett Hamilton, an expert in
    anti-counterfeit technology from Crane, is intimately involved in the
    program, has DARPA badge access, and works hand in hand with the
    program manager in execution of the program. The technology developed
    by DARPA performers is frequently transitioned to Crane. Examples
    include chip imaging techniques for electrically probing and
    visualizing the behavior of unknown circuits.
        Question. NSWC Crane is part of a ``Virtual Lab'' consortium
    providing support to DARPA's IRIS (Integrity and Reliability of
    Integrated Circuits) Program. What are the benefits to this type of
    arrangement? How can this ``Virtual Lab'' be leveraged to provide a
    more proactive approach to dealing with emerging threats to
    microelectronics and the supply chain? Do you have any plans to visit
    NSWC Crane?
        Answer. The ``Virtual Lab'' concept conceived by DARPA in
    collaboration with government sponsors benefits the Nation and its
    hardware assurance research by leveraging the unique, powerful know-how
    that each lab such as NSWC Crane, Indiana has developed. By offering
    these skills under the support of a single organization, the practice
    of multiple critical capabilities is drawn into a single community.
    Providing a unified access to these centers of competence allows the
    community to focus on extending its prowess and eliminating costly
    duplication of effort. The equipment is highly specialized and
    therefore impossible to replicate across the country everywhere it
    would be needed. By forming the virtual organization, we are able to
    multiply the impact of the transition of each of these outputs.
        The Virtual Lab will continue to be leveraged, as the Senator
    indicates, by proactively anticipating new threat space and developing
    the means to detect and mitigate these new concerns. Core competencies
    transitioned to lead Virtual Lab partners such as Crane will continue
    to be used to detect and collect counterfeit components for study,
    identifying new modes of hardware compromise being attempted. Examples
    of items transitioned include powerful laser-based imaging capabilities
    which allow the community to reveal electronic device characteristics
    which up to now were not accessible for reverse engineering.
        DARPA's program manager for assuring hardware integrity visits NSWC
    Crane often, and briefs his agency leadership on emerging trends and
    the prowess we have responded with. The critical work for this program
    is performed as a close engagement between the program manager and the
    engineers at Crane. DARPA also hosted a DARPA young faculty awardee
    meeting at Crane where faculty and designers from across the country
    came to see their facilities including the anti-counterfeit related
    work. The Director of the Microsystems Technology Office, which runs
    the TRUST, IRIS and SHIELD programs is on loan from Purdue University
    as an IPA and gets back to Indiana regularly to meet with current and
    former students, many of which are at NSWC Crane.
                                     ______

                    Questions Submitted to Dr. David Walker
                  Questions Submitted by Senator Mark L. Pryor
        Question. Congress included language in the Fiscal Year 2014
    Defense Appropriations Report encouraging the Air Force to invest in
    next generation free space optical communications technologies for
    secure, high-speed and high-bandwidth data transfer. How does the Air
    Force plan to develop and demonstrate free space optical communication
    technology for applications such as UAV-to-ground and other air-to-
    ground and air-to-air applications?
        Answer. The Air Force must exploit emerging technologies to improve
    our ability to transmit the ever-increasing volume of Intelligence,
    Surveillance and Reconnaissance data for processing, exploitation, and
    dissemination. However, the fiscal constraints directed by the Budget
    Control Act of 2013 limits our ability to invest in free space optical
    communication technologies. The Air Force will continue to seek
    opportunities for investment in promising technologies that will enable
    us to maintain a decisive advantage in air, space and cyberspace.
        Question. Recently, a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)
    award was made concerning free space optical communication technology
    by the Air Force. What is needed beyond the SBIR to advance this
    capability?
        Answer. The SBIR is focused on free space optical communications
    systems suited to fixed, geostationary satellite-to-ground and
    building-to-building terrestrial communications capabilities. Further
    development is needed to reduce the size, weight, and power of these
    systems, particularly for remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) applications.
    Utilizing free space optical communications for air-to-air links
    requires a higher fidelity pointing, acquisition, tracking system.
    Further research is also needed to expand the capabilities of current
    point-to-point apertures to support multiple, simultaneous links for
    networked configurations from a single aperture. Finally, single-
    aperture, adaptive beam control is required to support dynamic aerial
    mission execution at rapid, tactical operations tempos. The SBIR will
    demonstrate a basic laser communications link suitable for static
    applications, but these additional technology advancements are required
    in order to support highly dynamic missions such as those conducted by
    RPAs.
                                     ______

                   Question Submitted by Senator Daniel Coats
        Question. Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane is the largest
    multiservice, multidomain facility within the Department of Defense
    (DOD) for Electronic Warfare (EW), EW sensors and electronics. What
    plans does the Air Force's Science & Technology program have in fiscal
    year 2015 to partner with NSWC Crane in the area of electronic warfare
    to maximize the limited amount of EW resources? Do you have any plans
    to visit NSWC Crane in the near future?
        Answer. The Air Force Science and Technology program has a strong
    and ongoing relationship with various elements at Naval Surface Warfare
    Center Crane (NSWC-Crane). Both establishments recognize the importance
    of collaboration in order to avoid duplication, to make efficient use
    of funding, and to leverage the technology advancements each
    organization develops.
        The Air Force Science and Technology program encompass four main
    areas of aircraft protections: Radio Frequency Electronic Warfare (RF-
    EW); Electro-Optical/Infrared Countermeasure (EO/IRCM); Avionics
    Vulnerability Assessments, Mitigations and Protections (AVAMP); and
    Position, Navigation and Timing in Contested/Denied Environments.
        The Air Force Science and Technology program interacts with NSWC-
    Crane in three areas: RF-EW, EO/IRCM and AVAMP.
        In the area of RF-EW, The Air Force and NSWC-Crane have worked
    together on the Airborne Electronic Attack Analysis of Alternatives,
    maturation of Next-Generation Jammer technology, and collaborative
    development of the early generation of Digital Radio Frequency Memory
    (DRFM) cards used for EW.
        This collaboration is continuing in several forms today beginning
    with miniaturized DRFM cards. For fiscal year 2015 NSWC-Crane will
    fabricate these cards for Air Force to support ongoing research in
    electronic attack and electronic support areas.
        Cognitive EW is a growing interest area for the Air Force as we
    address modern air defense threats that are software defined and
    adaptive. The Air Force recently hosted a 6-month study on Cognitive EW
    in Anti-Access/Area Denied (A2/AD) environments. NSWC-Crane (along with
    other services) was a partner in this study to help develop a roadmap
    for future research activities. Further, NSWC-Crane has invited the Air
    Force to participate in the upcoming January 15, 2015 kick-off of their
    Reactive Electronic Attack Measures (REAM) FNC project.
        The Air Force and NSWC-Crane also partner on DARPA activities.
    DARPA's Retroactive Array for Coherent Transmission (ReACT) awards are
    jointly managed by Crane and the Air Force while the Adaptive Radar
    Countermeasure (ARC) program is managed by the Air Force with NSWC-
    Crane providing SME support
        Future plans for collaboration include NSWC-Crane support for
    distributed EW development and Air Force SME support to evaluate and
    assess Next Generation Jammer technologies. Bottom line is that the Air
    Force and NSWC-Crane RF EW collaborations are synchronized and mutually
    supportive.
        Within the EO/IRCM area the Air Force has a number of ongoing
    collaborative efforts with NSWC-Crane beginning with their NICKEL Lab.
    The Air Force counterpart is the Dynamic Infrared Missile Evaluation
    (DIME) facility. The purpose of these facilities is to characterize
    various EO/IR threats. The Air Force's EO/IRCM collaboration with Crane
    has a rich history and is one that will only increase in the future
    especially as EO/IR weapon systems become more advanced and capable.
        The strongest collaborative effort within AVAMP is in the area of
    Anti-Tamper which has been ongoing since the inception of the Secretary
    of Defense's Anti-Tamper program. Anti-Tamper technology protects U.S.
    critical information resident on weapons systems from loss due to
    combat losses.
                                     ______

             Question Submitted to Rear Admiral Matthew L. Klunder
                   Question Submitted by Senator Daniel Coats
        Question. Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Crane has become
    widely recognized across the Department of Defense, and within the
    Federal Lab System for rethinking and pioneering Technology Transfer.
    Currently, the Research Directorate within Assistant Secretary of
    Defense--Research & Engineering (ASD-R&E) and the State of Indiana are
    collaborating around Crane's successes to demonstrate how a lab's
    innovation can be used to increase the lab's mission effectiveness.
    What future role do you see for the Navy's Warfare Centers for both
    innovation and economic development? Do you see a leadership role for
    the Office of Naval Research and/or the Naval Research Laboratory in
    this process as the Navy's premier Research and Development
    organizations?
        Answer. The Chief of Naval Research coordinates thousands of
    partnerships across the Department of the Navy's Research Enterprise
    which includes the naval warfare centers and the naval systems
    commands. These efforts are aligned with the nine focus areas of the
    naval Science and Technology strategy. Where appropriate, the field
    activities, including the warfare and system centers, team on
    technology transfer initiatives. The primary mission of these
    activities is to support the naval community with materiel solutions.
    Each R&D activity has a technology transfer office that stimulates
    economic benefit through technology transfer and cooperative
    development. Not only do the nature of the NSWC Crane's intellectual
    property and products set the stage for greater-than-average technology
    transfer opportunities, they have developed methods that are looked at
    as best practices across the Naval Enterprise.
                                     ______

                       Questions Submitted to Mary Miller
                  Questions Submitted by Senator Mark L. Pryor
        Question. Congress is very supportive of research work at the
    Department of Defense and the Department of Energy to develop silicon
    carbide wide band gap power electronics and has provided funding to the
    Army specifically to increase Manufacturing Readiness Levels for
    silicon carbide power electronics and support domestic supply chain
    development. What is the Army's ``roadmap'' or plan for transitioning
    silicon carbide power electronics into Army systems?
        Answer. With the addition of the referenced congressional silicon
    carbide special interest funding, the Army's silicon carbide starting
    material, power devices, and power packaging programs have been moving
    the technology toward commercial and custom power devices with higher
    efficiency, greater reliability, and lower cost. The resulting power
    devices and power module technology are being transitioned to 6.3
    (Advanced) Technology Development demonstration programs sanctioned by
    Program Executive Office Ground Combat Systems with the end goal of
    transitioning the technology to combat vehicle programs of record.
    These programs are focusing on power generation, power distribution,
    and electrified propulsion systems implemented with silicon carbide
    power devices rated at the lower voltage range of 1.2 to 3.3 kV and
    vehicle survivability systems such as electro-magnetic armor
    implemented using silicon carbide devices rated at 15 kV. Technology
    Readiness Level 5/6 demonstrations are planned for fiscal year 2016 to
    fiscal year 2019 through the Combat Vehicle Prototyping Program with
    transition to Paladin Integrated Management Program in fiscal year
    2016, the Future Fighting Vehicle in fiscal year 2021, and Stryker and
    Bradley Modernization Programs in fiscal year 2022.
        Question. How will the Army allocate and execute silicon carbide
    research funds appropriated in fiscal year 2014 taking into account the
    better outlook for technology transition and domestic supply chain
    development for low voltage applications?
        Answer. In fiscal year 2013, an additional $13 million was added by
    Congress for silicon carbide research. Of this $7.6 million and $3.1
    million was used to increase Manufacturing Readiness Levels (MRL) for
    starting material, power devices, and power packaging rated at the
    lower voltages (1.2-3.3 kV) for power generation, power distribution,
    and electrified propulsion systems and at the higher voltages (10-24
    kV) for electronic survivability systems, respectively. With the
    referenced fiscal year 2014 funding of $10 million, the Army plans to
    apportion the research similarly with about $7 million funding power
    electronics rated at lower voltage and about $3 million funding the
    higher voltage applications. With the fiscal year 2013 special interest
    funds we started efforts with two external partners (United Silicon
    Carbide Inc. and Monolith Semiconductor Inc.) that are using fully
    depreciated 6'' diameter silicon foundries for fabrication of their
    silicon carbide power device designs to take advantage of highly cost-
    effective excess silicon processing capability. Further, with the
    fiscal year 2013 funds we refocused work at a current partner (Arkansas
    Power Electronics Inc.) to include power packaging technologies for
    high-temperature silicon carbide power devices rated at the lower
    voltage range (1.2- 3.3 kV). We will continue efforts with these
    external partners using the fiscal year 2014 special interest funding
    as well as add at least two new external partners to further increase
    MRL levels and broaden the tech base of the supply chain. The Army will
    continue to coordinate with the Department of Energy to ensure that
    both agencies' programs with common external partners are leveraged to
    provide maximum benefit to the government.
                                     ______

                 Question Submitted by Senator Susan M. Collins
        Question. The University of Maine has developed a ``bridge in a
    backpack'' for constructing short- to medium-length bridges in the
    field with very light-weight materials. Soldiers or Marines can
    literally carry the materials needed to build a bridge on their backs
    without having to use heavy equipment or large crews.
        What research is the Army conducting to reduce the logistics
    footprint necessary to conduct expeditionary operations, from small
    items to larger infrastructure such as bridges?
        Answer. Army Science & Technology has a wide variety of research
    efforts that aim to reduce the Army's logistics footprint. A few
    examples include Modular Protection Systems which provide easily
    assembled, rapidly deployed force protection in austere environments;
    virtual contingency base planning tools which reduce operations,
    support, and resupply costs; and highly efficient field waste water
    systems that reduce potable water demand and waste water production at
    contingency bases.
        Many of our efforts in reducing our logistical footprint are
    underpinned by advanced materials science research, a high priority
    initiative in Army Basic Research. The Army's Materials by Design
    within the advanced materials science research initiative is a paradigm
    shift for the development of new classes of materials. This could
    result in greatly reduced weight for protection materials, much higher
    energy density for batteries, and more efficient, longer lasting
    electrical components.
                                     ______

                   Question Submitted by Senator Daniel Coats
        Question. Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane is the largest
    multiservice, multidomain facility within the Department of Defense
    (DOD) for Electronic Warfare (EW), EW sensors and electronics. What
    plans does the Army's Science & Technology program have in fiscal year
    2015 to partner with NSWC Crane in the area of electronic warfare to
    maximize the limited amount of EW resources? Do you have any plans to
    visit NSWC Crane in the near future?
        Answer. The Army Science and Technology community has partnered
    with Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Crane on a number of
    initiatives. For instance, the Army's Communication Electronics
    Research and Development Center, Intelligence and Information Warfare
    Directorate (CERDEC I2WD) supports joint Service working groups
    developing defensive electronic attack techniques and standardizing
    seeker countermeasure lab practices across the Services. Additionally,
    NSWC Crane created the Communications Electronic Attack with
    Surveillance and Reconnaissance/Networked Electronic Warfare Remotely
    Operated airborne jammer pods for the Army. These systems have been
    retired from the field and CERDEC I2WD will be receiving one of the
    pods for experimentation. Finally, the Army Research Laboratory (ARL)
    held an information exchange meeting with NSWC Crane in fiscal year
    2014, which included a discussion about sharing EW signature data.
    Crane has been extremely helpful to ARL, loaning a Counter Radio-
    Controlled Improvised Explosive Device Electronic Warfare Vehicle
    Receiver/Jammer and a Thor dismounted manpack jammer for compatibility
    experiments. ARL plans to continue to work with NSWC Crane during
    fiscal year 2015.
        While I do not currently have plans to visit NSWC Crane, I would
    welcome the opportunity to do so in the future.

                              SUBCOMMITTEE RECESS

        Senator Durbin. Thank you to our panel for the testimony
    today. We are going to pursue this topic at the next level
    which is called appropriations. So we will try to help. Thank
    you very much for being here.
        [Whereupon, at 11:21 a.m., Wednesday, May 14, the
    subcommittee was recessed, to reconvene subject to the call of
    the Chair.]