Voices from DARPA

What new capabilities can we unlock by understanding how to rearrange the building blocks of matter? At some time in our lives, most of us have learned that matter is made of molecules, molecules are made of atoms, and atoms are made of protons, electrons, and neutrons. But what’s less commonly learned is what’s going on inside those atoms and molecules, such as when a bond breaks or internal comp...

What if we could turn economic complexity into strategic understanding?  In this episode, we sit down with David Rushing Dewhurst, Ph. D. , a program manager in DARPA\'s Information Processing Techniques Office, IPTO. Dewhurst works at the complex intersection of economics, data science, and national security to develop tools that help America navigate a world where economic competition has become...

What does it take to solve the world's most urgent national security and economic challenges? At DARPA, it starts with questioning past assumptions. In this episode, we go behind the scenes of a major organizational pivot to hear directly from the office leaders driving the change.  We unpack the "why" behind the new names on the doors of two tech offices:  The Multi X Office ( MXO ): Formerly the...

BTO Program Manager Lt. Col. Adam Willis, M.D., U.S. Air Force,  joins Voices from DARPA to share his remarkable journey from a ROTC physics major to a leading innovator in military medicine. Dr. Willis discusses how a desire to apply science to help people led him down the dual paths of a Ph. D. in theoretical and appliled mechanics and a medical degree with a focus on neurology. He recounts the...

It started with a movie. It led to a mission. In this episode of "Voices from DARPA," we sit down with Michael Feasel, Ph. D. , a program manager in the Biological Technologies Office , to discuss his extraordinary journey to the forefront of American innovation. From a pre-med student who found his calling in an inorganic chemistry class, to career inspiration from a Nicolas Cage film, Mike's pat...

What happens after you've worked on projects that could change the world? We go beyond the cutting-edge technology and "secret labs" to explore the most vital part of DARPA's mission: its people. Six former Program Managers discuss their experiences and what comes after a tour of duty at the agency. They share their initial anxieties, the challenges of working on projects outside their expertise,...

The AI Cyber Challenge, AIxCC, marks a pivotal inflection point for cyber defense. Numerous attacks in recent years have illuminated the ability for malicious cyber actors to exploit vulnerable software that runs everything from financial systems and public utilities to the health care ecosystem. AIxCC Competitors successfully demonstrated the ability of novel autonomous systems using AI to secure...

The Service Chiefs Fellows connect their operational insights with potential DARPA breakthroughs. We explore DARPA’s Service Chiefs Fellowship Program (SCFP) , a 12-week immersive experience that brings together participants from various backgrounds across the Department of Defense (DOD) and other U.S. agencies. Its dual core purposes are to educate future leaders from military services and other...

RACER enables off-road vehicles to travel autonomously and reliably at high speeds over cross-country terrain, enabling new capabilities for our warfighters.  Since the DARPA Grand Challenge kicked off more than 20 years ago, the Department of Defense has been very publicly invested in creating the capabilities necessary for ground vehicles to travel autonomously in areas without roads, signs, map...

What do smart bandages, ocean-powered sensors, and quantum biology have in common? They’re all part of Dr. Leonard Tender’s work at DARPA. On the latest episode of Voices from DARPA, he discusses his fascinating research in the Biological Technologies Office and how these innovations are shaping the future of national security. Bioelectronics for Tissue Regeneration (BETR) BioElectronics to Sense...

Microelectronics are the foundation of technology today, but what about tomorrow? Ten years from now? Twenty? Real breakthroughs don’t come from simply refining what already exists—they come from reimagining what’s possible. In this episode, Dr. Whitney Mason, Director of DARPA’s Microsystems Technology Office (MTO), takes us inside the research that is pushing microelectronics beyond conventional...

U.S. national security depends on an aging IT infrastructure that supports a vast network of systems spanning the globe. Over the past three decades, traditional security practices—like virus scanning, patching software, and intrusion detection systems—have led to a landscape of vulnerable systems. The Department of Defense is no exception, where legacy IT systems and even the most advanced fighte...

What characteristics make a person trustworthy? Under what circumstances would a person delegate life or death decisions to artificial intelligence (AI)? Does it matter that AI systems reflect trustworthy humans’ decision-making preferences, morals, and ethics? If so, what characteristics are most important? These are some of the fundamental questions DARPA researchers are exploring for the In the...

Accomplishing DARPA’s mission of creating and preventing strategic surprise is as much a business challenge as it is a technology challenge. In this episode, team members from DARPA’s Contracts Management Office – Office Director Effie Fragogiannis and Deputy Director Catherine Stevens, along with Senior Advisor Scott Ulrey – explore what it takes to innovate contracting processes and mechanisms t...

In this episode, Dr. Jean-Paul Chretien and Elissa Rupley from our Biological Technologies Office provide an exciting update from the recent DARPA Triage Challenge (DTC) workshop at the Guardian Centers in Perry, GA.   The DARPA Triage Challenge, or DTC, aims to drive breakthrough innovations in identification of “signatures” of injury that will help medical responders perform scalable, timely, an...

In this episode, Dr. Vishnu Sundaresan from our Defense Sciences Office highlights several technology programs designed to precisely control chemical processes to enable distributed, small-batch manufacturing of chemical products while retaining efficiencies of large-scale industrial production. Colloquially calling this portfolio “decentralized chemistry for everything,” the concept aims to shift...

In this episode, we’ll be taking a deeper dive into ELSI – ethical, legal, and societal implications of new technologies and capabilities – and specific examples of how DARPA programs have incorporated those considerations into their structure. We’re highlighting three examples of how DARPA integrated ELSI throughout the program lifecycle via the counsel of experts from the medical, scientific, le...

As a global leader in innovation, DARPA starts an average of 50 new programs each year. These programs span a variety of technical disciplines to develop breakthrough technologies for national security, all of which have the potential to raise ethical, legal, and societal implication – or, ELSI – considerations. Taking time to consider ELSI’s role in a program can contribute to the responsible dev...

Good ideas can come from anywhere, but what is the best way to find them, or help them find you?   In 2022, DARPA hit the road in pursuit of the answer. Comprising six regional events, DARPA Forward took the agency across the country to engage untapped talent and strengthen the nationwide innovation ecosystem. The event series offered a powerful lesson in breaking down barriers of entry in pursuit...

In this episode we hear from quantum physicist Dr. Mukund Vengalattore , a program manager in DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office , who oversees a portfolio of fundamental research programs aimed at unlocking new quantum insights and overcoming challenges to enable revolutionary capabilities for defense. These include harnessing atoms and superconducting structures for novel sensing applications (imag...

We usually think of materials based on our experience in the natural world. For example, something that’s light is usually fragile (like a feather) or something heavy is usually strong (like a brick). But what if we could engineer a material that had completely new characteristics that defied properties found in nature? Engineered materials, also known as metamaterials, allow us to do just that. D...

Established in 2006, the Young Faculty Award (YFA) program aims to identify and engage rising academics in early-career research positions - particularly those without prior DARPA funding - and expose them to Department of Defense (DOD) needs and DARPA's mission to create and prevent technological surprise. The YFA program provides high-impact funding to researchers at U.S. institutions early in t...

Ahead of the AI Cyber Challenge (AIxCC) Open Track registration period, which begins later this year, this episode of  Voices from DARPA features Perri Adams, DARPA’s program manager for the competition. Over the next two years, AIxCC will challenge teams to develop AI-driven systems to automatically find and correctly fix the critical code that underpins daily life. Adams shares the backstory for...

Supply chain disruptions stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic, among other issues, shined a bright light on the global reliance on microchips. The nationwide recognition underscored the need to strengthen the domestic microelectronics industry, including on-shore fabrication and next-generation research, development, and capabilities. Back in 2017, already recognizing that the microelectronics dema...

In popular culture, quantum is a descriptive term often added to various technical topics and projects to make them sound cool. But what is quantum mechanics, really, and how do we know whether quantum technologies will transform computing, communications, sensing, and a host of other fields?  To find answers, join us for a new episode of the Voices from DARPA podcast series, where we hear from Dr...