DARPA's Defense Sciences Office: Programs[*]

[* ...these programs deal in incredible sciences, technologies and approaches. Take a look (For descriptions of the different programs, hit the links) ...and these are just the ones DARPA's showing us. Think of the 'secret programs'...]

http://www.darpa.mil/dso/programsexp.htm#z

• Accelerated Insertion of Materials (D-3D)
• Accelerated Learning
• Accelerated Manufacture of Pharmaceuticals
• Armor Challenge
• Blood Pharming
• Chemical Communications
• Chemical Robots
• Cognitive Technology Threat Warning System
• Compact Directional Neutron Source
• DARPA Initiative in Titanium
• Deep Bleeder Acoustic Coagulation
• Discovery and Exploitation of Structure in Algorithms
• Disruptive Manufacturing Technologies
• Education Dominance
• Engineered Bio-Molecular Nano-Devices/Systems
• Feedback Regulated Automated Molecular Release
• Focus Areas in Theoretical Mathematics
• Fracture Putty
• Fundamental Laws of Biology
• Geospatial Representation and Analysis
• Guided BEC Interferometry
• Hardwire® DARPA Armor
• High-Performance, Corrosion-Resistant Materials
• Human-Assisted Neural Devices
• Hyperspectral Radiography Sources
• Instant Fire Suppression
• Integrated High Energy Dense Capacitors
• Long-Term Storage of Blood Products
• Micro Power Sources
• Mobile Integrated Sustainable Energy Recovery
• Multifunctional Surface Systems
• Nano Air Vehicle
• Nano-Composite Optical Ceramic
• Naval Advanced Amorphous Coatings
• Negative Index Materials
• Neovision
• Neurotechnology for Intelligence Analysts
• Next Generation Super Carbon Fiber
• Optical Arbitrary Waveform Generation
• Optical Lattice Emulator
• PowerSwim
• Precision Inertial Navigation Systems
• Predicting Health and Disease
• Predicting Real Optimized Materials
• Preventing Violent Explosive Neurologic Trauma
• Prognosis
• Programmable Matter
• Protein Design Processes
• Reactive Material Structures
• RealNose
• RealWorld
• Restorative Injury Repair
• Revolutionizing Prosthetics
• Robust Portable Power
• Sensor Topology for Minimal Planning
• Slowing, Storing and Processing Light
• Stealthy, Persistent, Perch and Stare
• Structural Amorphous Metals
• Surviving Blood Loss
• Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics
• Tactical Underwater Navigation
• Topologically Controlled Lightweight Armor
• Trauma Pod
• Wasp
• Z-Man

Read more...

Total Information Awareness - DARPA

http://www.scribd.com/doc/22357955/Total Information Awareness - TIA

DARPA's Enhancement of Warfighters: Programmable Matter

http://www.defenselink.mil//news/newsarticle.aspx?id=56269

Moviegoers were captivated as they watched a metallic assassin morph before their eyes in "Terminator 2." The villain turned to liquid before assuming new forms capable of squeezing through narrow openings and transforming its arms into bladed weapons and solid metal tools.
Scientists at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency were wowed too. Now they're working to deliver that same kind of technology to support the good guys: warfighters on the battlefield.
Mitchell R. Zakin, program manager for DARPA's Programmable Matter division, said he's convinced the concept depicted for decades in blockbuster movies and comic books has real-life applications.
He's leading up the effort to develop "programma matter," which he calls "the ultimate adaptable material." It will be capable of changing size and shape and taking on new properties for one use, he explained, then adapting to a whole different form for another use.
Zakin clarified that he's not out to change warfighters themselves, just the equipment they use, the clothing they wear and the loads they carry.

"Warfighters carry an incredible amount of stuff and they don't have any more room to carry more," he said. "Yet they are facing much more complicated battle spaces. They're going into caves and working in cities. They need more sophisticated tools to deal with these environments, yet they can't carry them."

Read more...

Universal ‘Rubik’s Cube’ Could Become Pentagon Shapeshifter

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/06/universal-rubiks-cube-could-become-pentagon-shapeshifter/

Even by the standards of the Pentagon fringe science arm, this project sounds far-out: [...] that can be ordered to “self-assemble or alter their shape, perform a function and then disassemble themselves.” But researchers back by Darpa are actually making progress on this incredible goal, Henry Kenyon at Signal magazine reports.
One day, that could lead to “morphing aircraft and ground vehicles, uniforms that can alter themselves to be comfortable in any climate, and 'soft' robots that flow like mercury through small openings to enter caves and bunker complexes.” A soldier could even reach into a can of unformed goop, and order up a custom-made tool or a “universal spare part.”
One team from Harvard is working on a kind of “generalized Rubik’s Cube” that can fold into all kinds of shapes. Another is trying to order large strands of synthetic DNA to bind together in a “molecular Velcro.” An MIT group is building “’self-folding origami’ machines that use specialized sheets of material with built-in actuators and data. These machines use cutting-edge mathematical theorems to fold themselves into virtually any three-dimensional object.”
The Programmable Matter project is five months into its second phase, which is supposed to wind up early next Spring. When they’re done, the researchers ought to “assemble four or five three-dimensional solids of a specific size and shape from a set of building blocks.”
Intel, which has done a bunch of programmable matter work on its own, is looking beyond those basic steps. Way, way beyond. The malleable stuff could one day “mimic the shape and appearance of a person or object being imaged in real time, and as the originals moved, so would their replicas,” according to their website. “These 3D models would be physical entities, not holograms. You could touch them and interact with them, just as if the originals were in the room with you.”

[Source: wired.com]

Pentagon Preps Soldier Telepathy Push

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/05/pentagon-preps-soldier-telepathy-push/

Forget the battlefield radios, the combat PDAs or even infantry hand signals. When the soldiers of the future want to communicate, they’ll read each other’s minds.
At least, that’s the hope of researchers at the Pentagon’s mad-science division Darpa. The agency’s budget for the next fiscal year includes $4 million to start up a program called Silent Talk. The goal is to “allow user-to-user communication on the battlefield without the use of vocalized speech through analysis of neural signals.” That’s on top of the $4 million the Army handed out last year to the University of California to investigate the potential for computer-mediated telepathy.
Before being vocalized, speech exists as word-specific neural signals in the mind. Darpa wants to develop technology that would detect these signals of “pre-speech,” analyze them, and then transmit the statement to an intended interlocutor. Darpa plans to use EEG to read the brain waves. It’s a technique they’re also testing in a project to devise mind-reading binoculars that alert soldiers to threats faster the conscious mind can process them.
The project has three major goals, according to Darpa. First, try to map a person’s EEG patterns to his or her individual words. Then, see if those patterns are generalizable — if everyone has similar patterns. Last, “construct a fieldable pre-prototype that would decode the signal and transmit over a limited range.”
The military has been funding a handful of mind-tapping technology recently, and already have monkeys capable of telepathic limb control. Telepathy may also have advantages beyond covert battlefield chatter. Last year, the National Research Council and the Defense Intelligence Agency released a report suggesting that neuroscience might also be useful to “make the enemy obey our commands.” The first step, though, may be getting a grunt to obey his officer’s remotely-transmitted thoughts.

[Source: wired.com]

Mattel's Mind Over Matter Game: 'Mind Flex'

And to see the competition's (UMI) version, go here...

[In the washingtonpost.com's UMI-version video above, there's an out-of-key reference linking mind control technology and the Defense Advance Research Projects Agency, D.A.R.P.A.

...and underneath a snippet from their own web page...]
In 1972, the Agency was renamed the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and emphasized directed energy programs, information processing (the precursor to the Internet or ARPANET)[!!!], research in artificial intelligence, speech recognition, signal processing and tactical technologies.