Lifeboat Foundation

Britain will spend more than £800million funding next-generation military technology including tiny “dragonfly drones” for gathering intelligence and laser weapons to eliminate missiles.

Michael Fallon, the Defence Secretary, will today announce an innovation unit which will encourage individuals and companies to pitch ideas to a panel of experts. The best ideas will be fast-tracked with the support of an £800million fund over the next decade.

Projects which will be funded include a “micro-drone” with tiny flapping wings inspired by the biology of a dragon fly, which could have a “huge impact” on operations in urban environments.

Continue reading “Dragonfly drones and lasers: Britain invests £800m in next generation of military technology” »

Pentagon research agency DARPA wants to develop a system that’s capable of countering a swarm of attack drones.

A Mission Impossible Battery that self destructs.

Here at HEXAPOLIS, we have talked about biodegradable electronics that are designed to automatically dissolve once their job is done. Such self-destructing devices could be especially useful in the world of medicine, where implants currently have to be surgically removed, as well as the military. As part of a new research, scientists at the Iowa State University have devised an innovative transient battery, which as its name suggests can melt away in less than 30 minutes.

Technological advancements in recent years have allowed researchers to develop an array of self-destructing electronics that are capable of performing specific functions. Up until now, however, these devices were driven by external power sources. Previous attempts to create transient batteries largely gave birth to contraptions that lacked power, stability and a substantial shelf life. More often than not, they were also quite slow in demolishing themselves. Speaking about the research, recently published in the Journal of Polymer Science, Part B: Polymer Physics, the team stated:

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Nifty.

Radio communication is a weak point for most military operations — it is often not long enough or strong enough to adequately meet soldiers’ needs. The U.S. Air Force’s “go big or go home” solution to improve their long-distance calls? Supercharge the atmosphere by detonating aerial plasma bombs attached to tiny satellites, reports New Scientist.

The Air Force is asking for help in developing plasma bombs, which would be delivered to the atmosphere by tiny cube satellites and then detonated to release ions upon arrival. The Air Force is working with several research teams, each of which is tasked with coming up with their own design for the plasma bombs. The first stage of the project is theoretical, requiring researchers to come up with an atmospheric plasma delivery method. Selected researchers then will be invited to test their proposal in a vacuum chamber simulator and eventually on exploratory flights.

Continue reading “U.S. Air Force’s plan to improve radio communications? Plasma bomb the atmosphere” »

Glad folks realizes and admit to the risks; however, I stand by my argument until the underpinning technology is still tied to dated digital technology; it will be hacked by folks like China who are planning to be on a new Quantum network and platforms. Reason why all countries must never lose sight of replacing their infrastructure and the net with Quantum technology.

A team of researchers from Pittsburgh has won DARPA’s Cyber Grand Challenge – a competition billed as the ‘world’s first automated network defense tournament.’ The implications for the Internet of Things (IoT) are grave, as the machines on display threaten to ravage the already flaky state of IoT security.

DARPA, the Department of Defense’s (DoD) Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, is a wing of the US military that investigates how the latest technological breakthroughs can be put to use on the battlefield. With nation-state cybersecurity now declared a new front in conventional warfare, militaries around the world will be flocking to gather the tools needed to exert force in this new medium.

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New way for IoT and data centers in general to improve energy use, costs, etc.

Arrays based on vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers offer a high-bandwidth, low-power, and low-cost solution for intra-data centers.

Continue reading “Pioneering research in parallel optical interconnect technology for cloud computing” »

For the future: After years of developing unmanned combat #robots, U.S. Marine Corps was finally able to test drive one… at last.

Reminds me of the 1980s all over again with Reagan’s StarWars Program.

Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov has revealed that the Russian military has commissioned several types of laser weaponry, but remains tight-lipped about the kinds of systems being developed. What kinds of systems does the officer have in mind? Military experts speaking to one of Russia’s leading independent newspapers attempted to find out.

Continue reading “Facts About the Secret Laser Weapons Systems Russia is Developing” »

Another major leap for science & maybe for mankind (depends on the mission)?.

http://www.livescience.com/55662-darpa-submarine-hunter-completes-tests.html

The U.S. is set to launch an unmaned submarine hunting ship in 2018.

Continue reading “US Military’s Robotic Submarine Hunter Completes First Tests at Sea” »