Army Engineering Research Opportunities

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Army Engineering Research Opportunities Thomas
L. Doligalski, Ph.D. Engineering Sciences
Directorate U.S. Army Research Office Thomas.dolig
alski_at_us.army.mil
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Full Spectrum of Army Missions
Environmental Complexity
Increased strategic responsiveness
Urban Open rolling terrain

• Brigade in 96 hrs Division in 120 hrs Five
  Divisions in 30 days
• Fight immediately upon arrival
• Simultaneous air and sea lift
• Anti-terrorism

High
Low
Stability and Support Operations
Small Scale Contingencies
Major Theater War
Spectrum of Conflict
Capabilities for an Uncertain Future Current and
future armies have a wider range of problems to
solve
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What Drives Army Research?The Army Vision
Heavy forces must be more strategically
deployable and more agile with a smaller
logistical footprint, and light forces must be
more lethal, survivable and tactically mobile.
Achieving this paradigm will require innovative
thinking about structure, modernization efforts
and spending. CSA, 23 June 1999
The ST community is the key to the long term
transformation of the Army - - CSAs HASC
testimony
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The Army Transformation
. . . Responsive, Deployable, Agile, Versatile,
Lethal, Survivable, Sustainable.
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Technology Barriers to theObjective Force
Today
Objective Force
100 lb. load
lt 30 lb. effective load

• Bulk
• Power needs
• Human Dependence
• Heavy weight
• Logistics burden
• Response time
• Single function

lt 20 tons
70 tons
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U.S. Army Research Office

• 50 Program Managers
• 160M annual investment in 1,500 funded programs

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Proposal Evaluation Process
? Army interests published in Broad Agency
Announcements
Receipt ofSolicited Proposals
? DTIC search required to prevent
duplication
PreliminaryScreening
SciencePeer Review
Army Lab/RDECReview
? Evaluates technical merit and relevance to
Army needs
? Evaluates technical merit
Analysis ofReferee Reports
? Scores given by the reviewers are analyzed
DivisionRecommendation/ManagementDecision
? One in four proposals accepted
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Extramural Single-Investigator Program
inMechanical SciencesTechnical Relevance and
Formulation

• Problem/Questions
• What is the structure of complex compressible
  flowfields?
• Can novel materials and structures be
  incorporated in optimized hybrid composite
  materials?
• Can nano-technology yield improved smart
  materials for actuation devices?
• Can energy release rate be optimized/controlled?

Fuel Modulation (Control) of Combustion
Instability
Fuel Modulation (Control) of Combustion
Instability

• Significance/Potential Impact
• Understand unsteady separation, vortex
  shedding/turbulent flow
• Capability to inhibit failure of multi-functional
  systems under dynamic loading
• Enhanced actuation properties in electro elastic
  materials
• Control of ignition of multi-component
  propellants fuels

• Technical Barriers
• Lack of experimental/computational resolution of
  multi- spatial and temporal scales
• Inadequate capability to characterize/model
  multi-scale, 3-D processes/heterogeneous
  interfaces
• Difficulty producing nano-composites with
  piezoelectric properties
• Poorly understood mechanisms of ignition and
  transient combustion dynamics

• Future Opportunities/Follow-on Research
• Mechanical interactions in chemical, biological
  and hybrid systems
• Micro-scale, interlocking, active devices for
  miniature ultrasonic motors and robots
• Nano-composites for passive structural damping
  treatments
• Composite, nano-scale energetic materials for
  gun/rocket propulsion

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Extramural Single Investigator Program
Environmental SciencesTechnical Relevance and
Formulation

• Problem/Questions
• Inability to resolve and represent atmospheric
  effects of winds, moisture, temperature,
  visibility, and dispersion in the lowest 1 km at
  high resolutions in complex natural environments
• Lack of understanding of the fundamental nature
  and behavior of the dynamic natural environment
  and terrestrial processes at different spatial
  and temporal scales How to remotely rapidly
  characterize of the natural environment and
  predict its behavior? On-the-move detection
  discrimination landmines UXO?

• Impact
• Predictive and diagnostic capabilities to
  exploit
• environmental conditions, complexity, and
  variability
• and to foresee and utilize dynamic environmental
• conditions for military operational success and
• sustainable Army land use

• Future Opportunities/Follow-On Research
• Development and use of high-resolution
  measurements to promote better theoretical and
  model capabilities Study of air-land interface
• Development of novel geophysical remote sensing
  and analysis techniques New studies of the
  air-land interface, soil moisture remote sensing
  and dynamic variability spatial scaling and
  complexity of dynamic physical phenomena within
  the natural environment

• Technical Barriers
• Large dynamic range of motions (106)
  inadequate parameterization of unsteady processes
  at smaller scales lack of high-resolution
  measurements
• Complex, dynamic, non-linear behavior of
  natural materials processes Inadequate
  capability for rapid surface/subsurface sensing
  and characterization

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Extramural Single-Investigator Program
inElectronicsTechnical Relevance and Formulation

• Problems/Questions
• Can we eliminate the material flaws that limit
  performance in IR detectors and lasers?
• Do bio-molecules have detectable THz resonances?
• Can we overcome barriers to miniaturization in
  Moores Law?
• Can injection problems in multi-field devices be
  solved?
• Is real-time computational electromagnetics
  feasible?

• Significance/Potential Impact
• Provide optimal quality electronic materials.
• Enable spectroscopy in THz regime
• Smaller, faster information devices
• Better understanding of field and matter
  interactions

• Future Opportunities/Follow-on Research
• Remote sensing of bio-agents
• Multilayer and multicomponent materials systems
• Quantum confined devices
• Correlation sensing
• New material systems (ZnO, dilute Nitrides)
• Multifunctional micro-chip room temperature
  sensors
• High fidelity modeling simulation of
  RF/analogue devices and circuits

• Technical Barriers
• Defects and nonuniformity in materials/devices-/ci
  rcuits
• Lack of THz components, esp. sources,
  andreproducible and unique THz resonances
• Heat and noise in nano and molecular devices
• Interface and transport for Electronic/Photonic-/M
  agnetic nano-devices
• Complexity of circuits, antennas, and propagation
  pathways

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Extramural Single Investigator Program Computing
Information ScienceTechnical Relevance and
Formulation

• Problem/Questions
• How do we achieve information dominance with
  limited BW?
• How can information be protected from hacker
  attacks especially in wireless communications
  networks?
• How do we analyze and design adaptive systems and
  multiple autonomous/robotic systems seeking a
  cooperative objective?
• How do we improve IR target acquisition reduce
  false alarms?

• Significance/Potential Impact
• Network protocols signal processing to enable
  fully-connected, mobile wireless communications
  (MWC) and increase capacity.
• Detection of intrusions attacks, design
  responses to attacks, manage access to MWC
  networks information systems.
• Control system models/theory for autonomous
  systems networks.
• Avoid empirical incremental IR ATR algorithm
  advances.

• Technical Barriers
• No fixed infrastructure or central control in MWC
  networks, limited channel BW, highly variable
  channel, limited spectrum availability.
• Securing, highly mobile, low SNR,
  energy-constrained MWC. Real-time detection
  response to attacks in high-speed networks.
• Control of swarms over limited BW MWC.
  Accu-rate efficient models for nonlinear
  systems.
• IR image metrics are not available, number of
  parameters are huge highly variable, design is
  ad hoc incremental, no theory exists.

• Future Opportunities/Follow-on Research
• Design of MWC network protocols control using
  cross layer design methods, networks with array
  antennas (space-time, MIMO, beam steering)
  UAV relay.
• Detection of automated responses to novel
  attacks. IA metrics vulnerability assessment
  analysis tools.
• Models for nonlinear system optimization.
  Control with unknown delay. Control of quantum
  systems.
• Adaptive ATR algorithms, sensors, platforms.
  Application of complexity theory to IR ATR.
• Design of circuits and processing for energy
  efficiency.
• Battlespace visualization and display.

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