Friday, August 14, 2009
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Beetle Borgs to the Rescue!!!!
The engineers at the University of California at Berkeley have developed a wireless, flying, cyborg beetle. A radio receiver is used to relay information to electrodes connected to the insect's optic lobes and flight muscles. Beetles are strong enough to carry equipment of substantial weight such as miniature cameras. This creature's abilities were demonstrated by researchers at the 2009 IEEE MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) Conference in Italy.
DARPA is also interested in implanting insects with mechanical devices at infancy so they grow into cyborg adults. For example, wiring could be placed into caterpillars, then growing into cyborg butterflies. Butterflies are known for their ability to fly thousands of miles without feeding, so they could be very successful for this use.
This is very interesting research, and I'm sure could be put to good use. However, it sounds like a scary sci-fi flick where all the cyborg insects attack us and electricute everybody, etc. Mixing technology with biomatter is a very important on-going ethical debate. It's a difficult topic, and also difficult, at least for me, to choose a side.
Ornes, Stephen. "The Pentagon's Beetle Borgs". discovermagazine.com. 30 Apr, 2009. 13 Aug, 2009. http://discovermagazine.com/2009/may/30-the-pentagons-beetle-borgs
Integrated Crisis Early Warning System
DARPA’s Integrated Crisis Early Warning System is described as containing “state-of-the-art computational modeling capabilities that can monitor, assess, and forecast, in near real time, a variety of phenomena associated with country instability.” The Army, Navy, and Air Force, as well as the Department of Homeland Security, have all launched programs aimed at predicting group behavior.
Some say that the military should avoid funding social science, however an estimated $74 million was allocated to this area between 2006 - 2007. William M. Arkin, a national security analyst, is skeptical of much of this work, calling it a “dream counterterrorism program that seeks to create a silver bullet to solve the problem of terrorism." “Those technologies are interesting and worthy of pursuit, but my guess is that they are a poor replacement for examining why it is that terrorism exists in the first place,” Arkin says.
I believe that predictions only go so far, because you can only predict the actions of humans in groups to a certain percentage. Human beings are still animals and therefore can not be pinned down as to performing specific actions 100% of the time.
Luke's Binoculars
DARPA and other research agencies are utilizing neuroscience in pursuit of better military technology. This year DARPA started a project called the Cognitive Technology Threat Warning System, also known as Luke’s Binoculars (think Luke Skywalker from Star Wars). These binoculars use EEG's to monitor brain wave signatures in the prefrontal cortex. This way the government will know as soon as a single soldier has recognized the enemy on the battlefield. Evolution has also built into our prefrontal cortex a false alarm inhibtor. It is the military's hope that EEG would allow the binoculars to bypass this phenomena, alerting soldiers to danger before their brain even has time to process it. DARPA anticipates field-testing a prototype in 2010. They are still trying to build the item effectively keeping the weight 5 pounds or less.
Weinberger, Sharon. "Pentagon to Merge Next-Gen Binoculars With Soldiers' Brains". Wired.com. 1 May, 2007. 13 Aug, 2009. http://www.wired.com/gadgets/miscellaneous/news/2007/05/binocularsWednesday, August 12, 2009
1 million rounds per minute
When complete the Metal Storm will be capable of firing a million rounds per minute. The weapon has no moving parts, instead it uses electric volts to send the bullets flying.
Just scroll to 1:28 and watch the prototype annihilate several boards stacked in a row.
http://www.vincelewis.net/metalstorm.html
Future Combat Systems
The FCS is a joint network connecting the entire military and even some outside sources to share information on a soldiers surroundings. By allowing a soldier to know exactly where everything is located prior to entering the area, the soldier will be able to make better decisions and will increase his or her chances of survival.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ground/fcs.htm
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Navy X Craft
in 2005 the U.S. Navy unveiled it's new seafighter. This new X-craft or experimental craft took only 20 months to construst and carries a far smaller crew then most navy ships.
This ship will test new systems and ideas that may be incorperated into future fighting vessels.
H-60's can be launched from the aft deck as well as UAV's. The stern ramp can be used to launch and recover small craft.
With the navy thinking smaller and more high tech future ships may rely on technology like they have never before.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Stealth UAV
The Navy's latest, biggest and baddest unmanned aerial vehicle has just been unveiled. Yesterday in California, Northrup Grumman showed off a completed X-47B Navy Unmanned Combat Air System, the first of two fighter-plane-size UAVs that the company will produce for the U.S. Navy. The second will follow in 2009. The Navy hopes to start flying the X-47Bs next year. The UAV is expected to have the ability to take off from and land on an aircraft carrier, and the Navy plans to start those trials in 2011.
The X-47 was designed to be adept at long-range surveillance because of its large range and high flight ceiling. And despite being a beast—it will have a 62-ft wingspan and weigh around 45,000 pounds at takeoff—the X-47B is designed for stealth. This aircraft shows the Navy's growing embrace of unmanned technology, including both unmanned underwater vehicles and aerial vehicles. But the X-47B would be a technological step forward—besides carrying stealth features, it is supposed to have the ability to execute some maneuvers, such as refueling in midflight, autonomously.
Andrew Moseman, Popular Mechanics
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military_law/4296188.html
Sweet all porpose rifle!
The Objective Individual Combat Weapon (OICW) provides an enhanced capability for the 21st century infantryman, with the potential to selectively replace the M16 rifle, M203 grenade launcher, and M4 carbine. When fielded, the OICW dual munition system will provide superior firepower to the U.S. Army, Marine Corps, Air Force, Special Operations Command, Navy, and Coast Guard.
Program guidelines were derived from the Small Arms Master Plan (SAMP) and Joint Service Small Arms Master Plan (JSSAMP). OICW was managed by JSSAP during the Advanced Technology Demonstration (ATD) phase. For the PDRR/EMD phase, OICW management will transition to PM Small Arms with support provided by ARDEC.
Effective range to 1,000 meters
Full defilade target capability
Moving target tracking capability
KE semi two-round burst; HE semi automatic
Recoil level 1/3 that of the M14
Ruggedized composite weapon housing
Separable HE/KE weapons
Precise target range, automatically communicated to 20mm HE bursting ammo
Five times more lethal than the M16/M203, at > twice the range
Rate of fire with KE ammo >850 rounds/min, with HE >10 rounds/minute
Easily field strippable in under two minutes
Day/night fire control; weapon interface, iron sight backup
HE ammo functional modes: airburst, MOUT short arm, point detonation, point detonation delay, and self-destruct
Laser ranging accuracy ±1/2m out to 500m, ±1m out to 1000m
Equipment guide, Military.com,
http://tech.military.com/equipment/view/89063/objective-individual-combat-weapon.html
Unmaned plane can fly around the world?
The RQ-4A Global Hawk long range High Altitude Endurance (MAE) UAV took its first flight in March of 1998 as a Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration proof of concept platform. As with the Predator medium altitude UAV, the Global Hawk UAV is capable of high altitude surveillance and reconnaissance over a greatly extended period and ranges.
The Global Hawk's electro-optical/Infrared cameras and synthetic aperture array radar give it a complete day/night all weather surveillance capability. From an altitude of 65,000 feet the SAR can generate a 10km wide strip map at one meter of resolution, and a 2x2 km spot map at one foot resolution. In Ground Moving Target Indicator (GMTI) mode, the Global Hawk is capable of detecting ground targets moving as slow as 4.5 miles per hour. The Global Hawk is capable of mapping up to 40,000 square nautical m per day and up to 1900 individual spot maps.
Equipment guide, Military.com,
http://tech.military.com/equipment/view/89669/rq-4a-global-hawk-high-altitude-uav.html
Lasers on Planes!!!!
2. High-energy lasers
These are powerful energy beams that travel through air or space in straight lines. They travel at the speed of light and can strike over distances of thousands of kilometres.
How they work: Large mirrors focus powerful laser beams onto a small spot on the target. The heat produced burns through the surface of the target, disrupting flight, disabling warheads, or igniting fuels or explosives.
Limitations: It needs much more energy to do damage than bullets, which destroy targets with their momentum. Powerful lasers need fuel or electrical power and are also very bulky (the US Airborne Laser fills a Boeing 747). Travelling through air and turbulence can disperse the energy of the beam.
Jeff Hecht, Top 10: Weapons of the future
12:07 04 September 2006, http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn9979-top-10-weapons-of-the-future-.html
Robots That Eat
Robotic Technology Inc. has developed a new kind of robot. This robot actually uses alternative sources of fuel such as organic matter. This entails mainly plant matter, however the robot may use more traditional fuels also such as gasoline, kerosene, coal, etc. Dr. Bob Finkelstein (which strangely sounds like Frankenstein) says that the EATR (Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot) will not eat any animal or human remains. The main advantage of the EATR is that they could roam the countryside for months and even years without any required attention from humans beings. This sounds beneficial, but I feel it could also turn into something quite terrible. Who wants robots running around for years on end eating random things (and hopefully not us)?
Keller, John. "Biomass-Eating Military Robot Is a Vegetarian, Company Says". Foxnews.com. 16 Jan, 2009. 10 Aug, 2009. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,533382,00.html
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