Nathaniel Bastian

Nathaniel D. Bastian, PhD, joined DARPA in August 2023 as a program manager to develop, execute, and transition programs in artificial intelligence (AI) and cyber operations.

As a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, he serves as an academy professor at the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point. His research focus areas span the security, robustness and resiliency of AI-enabled systems, intelligent battlefield C5ISR-T decision systems, computationally-efficient edge computing, generative AI for modern warfighting, and emerging technologies for alternative computing.

Bastian joins DARPA from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at USMA, where he currently serves as deputy director of the Robotics Research Center (RRC) and principal investigator of the Laboratory for AI Research & Engineering (LAIRE) within RRC. He previously served as chief scientist, division chief, Data & Decision Sciences, and chief data scientist at the Army Cyber Institute (ACI). His extensive portfolio focuses on researching, designing and developing intelligent, assured, human-aware, data-centric, and decision-driven capabilities that enable decision advantage for multi-domain operations across the complex, contested, congested, and evolving battlefield. He also teaches courses and advises cadets in systems engineering, mathematical sciences, and computer science a permanent USMA faculty member.

Prior to becoming an academy professor, Bastian served as an operations research/systems analysis officer with assignments as the chief AI architect at the DoD Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, operations research scientist at the ACI/USMA, and analytics officer at the U.S. Army Human Resources Command. He also previously served as an aeromedical evacuation officer and UH-60 helicopter pilot with the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade, including a year-long deployment supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

Bastian was a National Science Foundation graduate research fellow, a Fulbright U.S. student fellow to the Netherlands, and served on DARPA’s Information Science and Technology Study Group. He also served as a distinguished visitor professor at the National Security Agency and a visiting research fellow at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab.

He is a senior member of INFORMS and IEEE, as well as an active member of MORS, ACM, and AAAI. His work has been included in more than 100 journal articles, conference papers, and books.

Education

• PhD, Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, Pennsylvania State University
• MEng, Industrial Engineering, Pennsylvania State University
• MS, Econometrics and Operations Research, Maastricht University
• BS, Engineering Management (electrical engineering) with honors, United States Military Academy