Defense Advanced Research Projects AgencyNews

News

With more than 200 different programs across the spectrum of science and engineering, DARPA frequently has news to share. We regularly announce the launch of new programs, contract awards and—most exciting—compelling results from our ongoing research. We strive to report on our work and activities in language that can be understood and appreciated by the full range of individuals in military and civilian positions interested in our work—from technical experts with a need to know, to people who simply find our mission important and our accomplishments fascinating.

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4/10/2019

Three Teams Qualify to Compete in DARPA Launch Challenge

The DARPA Launch Challenge aims to fundamentally shift military space capabilities to enable on-demand, flexible, and responsive launch of small payloads. Three competitors successfully completed the qualification phase and will attempt to launch to low-Earth orbit from two different U.S. locations within a matter of weeks. Teams will receive notice of the first launch site a few weeks prior to launch and exact details on the payload and intended orbit just days before launch. DARPA is targeting both launches for early 2020.

4/5/2019

DARPA Announces Second Annual ERI Summit

Since its official announcement on June 1, 2017, DARPA’s Electronics Resurgence Initiative (ERI) has sought to advance the development of a specialized, secure, and heavily automated electronics industry. ERI – a five-year, upwards of $1.5B investment to enable far-reaching improvements in electronics performance – has fostered collaborations among the commercial electronics sector, defense industrial base, and university researchers. As ERI enters its second year, DARPA seeks to reconvene the electronics community at the second annual ERI Summit in Detroit, Michigan, July 15–17. The Summit will allow electronics innovators to share their vision for the future, review technical progress, and provide input into future research directions.

4/1/2019

OFFSET Seeks Proposals to Accelerate Swarm Tactics in Virtual Environments

DARPA is soliciting creative proposals for the fourth swarm sprint in its OFFensive Swarm-Enabled Tactics (OFFSET) program. OFFSET envisions swarms of 250 collaborative autonomous systems providing critical capabilities to ground units in urban areas where challenges such as tall buildings, tight spaces, and limited sight lines constrain essential communications, sensing, maneuverability, and autonomous operations.

3/25/2019

DARPA Seeks to Make Scalable On-Chip Security Pervasive

For the past decade, cybersecurity threats have moved from high in the software stack to progressively lower levels of the computational hierarchy, working their way towards the underlying hardware. The rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) has driven the creation of a rapidly growing number of accessible devices and a multitude of complex chip designs needed to enable them. With this rapid growth comes increased opportunity for economic and nation-state adversaries alike to shift their attention to chips that enable complex capabilities across commercial and defense applications. The consequences of a hardware cyberattack are significant as a compromise could potentially impact not millions, but billions of devices.

| Cyber | Electronics | Microchips |

3/22/2019

In the Sky and on the Ground, Collaboration Vital to DARPA’s CODE for Success

On a brisk February morning in the Yuma, Arizona, desert, a swarm of unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with DARPA’s Collaborative Operations in Denied Environment system, or CODE, successfully carried out mission objectives, even when communications were offline and GPS was unavailable.

| Air | Autonomy | Unmanned |

3/21/2019

Using AI to Build Better Human-Machine Teams

The inability of artificial intelligence (AI) to represent and model human partners is the single biggest challenge preventing effective human-machine teaming today. Current AI agents are able to respond to commands and follow through on instructions that are within their training, but are unable to understand intentions, expectations, emotions, and other aspects of social intelligence that are inherent to their human counterparts. This lack of understanding stymies efforts to create safe, efficient, and productive human-machine collaboration.

| AI | Autonomy | Interface |

3/21/2019

Designing Chips for Real Time Machine Learning

The current generation of machine learning (ML) systems would not have been possible without significant computing advances made over the past few decades. The development of the graphics-processing unit (GPU) was critical to the advancement of ML as it provided new levels of compute power needed for ML systems to process and train on large data sets. As the field of artificial intelligence looks towards advancing beyond today’s ML capabilities, pushing into the realms of “learning” in real-time, new levels of computing are required.

3/19/2019

DARPA Launches Social Media Platform to Accelerate R&D

DARPA aims to apply the power of social networks to research and development via a novel social media platform purpose-built to quicken the pace of U.S. technology development. Polyplexus, which was recently launched as a public platform, is designed to increase access to scientific evidence and accelerate hypothesis development, research proposal generation, and research sponsor engagement. The platform’s real-time interactions and functionality are designed to dramatically shorten the time between the emergence of concepts and the submission of worthy proposals.

News

Selected DARPA Achievements