Lifeboat Foundation

Today’s defense electronics systems rely on radio frequency (RF) mixed-mode electronics – those that integrate RF, analog, and digital circuits onto a single chip – to interface RF signals with digital processors. This technology supports critical communications, radar, and electronic warfare (EW) capabilities, as well as being widely used to support commercial telecommunications. The Department of Defense (DoD) has capability demands that far exceed the requirements of the commercial world in terms of speed, fidelity, capacity, and precision. Current commercial RF mixed-mode systems on a chip (SoCs) are implemented on digital complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) platforms, a technology that has been used for decades to construct integrated circuits, highly integrated transceivers, microprocessors, and beyond. Despite continued advancement and scaling along the trajectory of Moore’s Law for high integration density, these CMOS platforms are unable to support operations at higher frequencies with larger signal bandwidths and higher resolutions, essentially limiting their use in next-generation mixed-mode interfaces needed for emerging defense RF applications.

To advance RF mixed-mode interfaces beyond current limitations, DARPA established the Technologies for Mixed-mode Ultra Scaled Integrated Circuits (T-MUSIC) program. T-MUSIC was first announced in January 2019 as a part of the second phase of DARPA’s Electronics Resurgence Initiative (ERI). One area of research under ERI Phase II focuses on the integration of photonics and RF components directly into advanced circuits and semiconductor manufacturing processes, enabling unique and differentiated domestic manufacturing capabilities. As such, T-MUSIC will explore the integration of mixed-mode electronics into advanced onshore semiconductor manufacturing processes. The goal is to develop highly integrated RF electronics with an unprecedented combination of wide spectral coverage, high resolution, large dynamic range, and high information processing bandwidth.

Sensors are usually thought of in terms of physical devices that receive and respond to electromagnetic signals – from everyday sensors in our smartphones and connected home appliances to more advanced sensors in buildings, cars, airplanes and spacecraft. No physical sensor or aggregation of electronic sensors, however, can continuously and globally detect disturbances that take place on or above the earth’s surface. But the physical atmosphere itself may offer such a sensing capability, if it can be understood and tapped into.

To that end, DARPA recently announced its Atmosphere as a Sensor (AtmoSense) program, whose goal is to understand the fundamentals of energy propagation from the ground to the ionosphere to determine if the atmosphere can be used as a sensor. A Proposers Day is scheduled for February 14, 2020, in Arlington, Virginia.

It’s well known that energy propagates from the Earth’s surface to the ionosphere, but the specifics of how that happens is not currently known enough to use the atmosphere as a sensor. Scientific literature has clearly documented that events like thunderstorms, tornadoes, volcanos, and tsunamis make big “three-dimensional wakes” that propagate to the upper reaches of the ionosphere and leave a mark there. Since that energy traverses several other layers of atmosphere – the troposphere, stratosphere, and mesosphere – on its way up to the ionosphere, the idea is to try and identify the disturbances the “wake” is making along its way to see if researchers can capture information to indicate what type of event caused it.

In 2019, tiny satellites found all the gaps in space regulation—and flew right on through.

A number that sets the strength of electromagnetic interactions isn’t altered by the extreme gravity around the Milky Way’s supermassive black hole.

An oral medication created by growing a desired protein in plant leaves could help patients with fractures and broken bones heal more quickly, according to researchers at the University of Pennsylvania.

This Indian-origin superbug has spread through hospitals and communities in Asia, Australia and Europe.

Learn about what science weapons are, how they work, and why they’re the most useful weapons in the game.

French health officials declared an end to the country’s COVID-19 outbreak on Monday.

France had confirmed 12 cases of the coronavirus since it first reached the country on January 24. Unfortunately, one of those patients died from their infection. But the French-language news outlet Le Parisien reports that the remaining 11 have all made complete recoveries — meaning there are no longer any COVID-19 cases in any French hospital.

There are “no longer any hospitalized patients in France,” said Health Minister Olivier Véran, in French. “The last one is cured and is no longer contagious.”

Because the concept of smart cities is still very new, with rare finalized and implemented projects, the topic is still unclear. Although big titles and strategies are well defined, the on-ground application is still uncertain, giving us the opportunity to question its planning process. In fact, how can we go wrong when designing smart cities? What key element are we failing to address in the planning phase?

The answer is quite simple. While a lot of city leaders try to skip crucial planning phases to buy time and save money, they often tend to do so by reducing community involvement. Gathering data and implicating every citizen in order to expose the glitches and the needs of society is usually an extensive process. In fact, they would rather adopt basic technologies and generic master plans, than questioning the problems faced by citizens and generating a solution-based design. Governmental officials would prioritize tech over people and not the other way around. Evolving into common practice, many bureaucrats praise a bottom-up approach, but wouldn’t reach out to the less fortunate and the most marginalized part of the society.

How to Future-Proof Our Cities? 4 Key Initiatives to Increase Resilience.