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• USAF 59th Medical Wing Clinical Research division at Lackland AFB, TX are studying vascular injuries and their effects on limbs, based on field experience in Iraq and Afghanistan where these injuries are 75% more common than previous wars. Their subject model suggests that conventional wisdom re: 6 hours to re-establish blood flow to an injured leg may be wrong – anything beyond an hour may be causing problems.

• WikiLeaks identified cooperating Afghans, and will get people killed. These days, there’s also LubyanskaPravda, a series of “top secret” documents said to be from Russia’s FSB (KGB successor), covering operations it has run in former Soviet Republics.

• Biden as Belichick: The US should appoint a “head coach” – such as the vice president – to oversee the government’s efforts to combat weapons of mass destruction, the head of the WMD Commission set up to study the issue tells a US Senate panel.

• The King and I: Military leaders loyal to the Thai King are being placed in top positions in the Thai military as the government moves to counter the “red shirt” movement.

• Boeing and the Argon Buy: Boeing has completed its purchase of Argon ST, a Fairfax, VA-based supplier of military C4ISR systems, for $34.50 per share, or $775 million in cash.

• EXPRESS Service: CSC snags task order worth up to $104 million to provide technology integration and engineering support to the US Army Aviation and Missile Research Development and Engineering Center under the $7.7 billion EXPRESS contract vehicle.

• US Lobbying firms upset that late filers under the Lobbying Disclosure Act will now be named publicly. Life is tough. Bring a helmet.

• Boeing announces receipt of the first new AN/APG-82v1 AESA radar, which will be retrofitted to American F-15s.

• 10th Mountain Division becomes the 6th US Army unit to field the new CH-47F Chinook.

• ESCO Technologies gets 5-year contract worth up to $35 million to supply anti-icing valves for the T700 engine used in US Army’s UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters.

Ebola patient

Up to $200M+ in contracts. (July 20/10)

The Defense Threat Reduction Agency at Fort Belvoir, VA is awarding contracts to find new anti-viral compounds that are effective against hemorrhagic fever viruses, a class that includes Ebola etc.

DID would caution readers that drug development is a long and expensive process ($100 million is often mentioned as the table stakes to get a drug through approvals), and that promising therapies don’t all make it through the research and testing stages. Even so, the research is interesting, and worth our time to share and explain…

• AVI BioPharma’s AntiSense Approach
• Alnylam Pharmaceuticals & Tekmira’s RNAi Approach [updated]
• Functional Genetics’ TSG101 Approach
• Peregrine Pharmaceuticals’ Bavituximab
• Contracts & Key Events [updated]
  
  Continue Reading… »

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• Superconductor step forward: USA’s Brookhaven National Laboratory adds insights into the “pseudogap” phase.

• Quantum dots may lead to dark pulse lasers, with applications in atomic clocks and networking technologies.

• European governments look to defense cuts to balance budgets.

• EADS mulls expansion in India, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, where defense spending is expected to grow at healthy rates.

• Israel is cutting its defense budget for first time in years.

• AVI BioPharma snags US Army contract worth up to $291 million to develop antidotes for biological threats, such as the Ebola and Marburg viruses.

• Space Tracking and Surveillance System (STSS) demonstration satellites, built by Northrop Grumman and Raytheon to track missiles as part of a BMD system, successfully tracked a Minuteman III ICBM.

• CSBA Paper looks at potential US responses to China’s sea-denial doctrines: “Why AirSea Battle?” [PDF]. Defense Tech moves to strike up a conversation.

• Indian Air Force signs EUR 560 million contract for 12 AW101 VIP helicopters.

• Are trans-Atlantic defense partnerships viable? Wall Street Journal weighs in.

• So do European governments and firms, as ripples continue to spread from the KC-X tanker bid pullout by Round 1 winners EADS/Northrop Grumman.

• US and South Korea exercises prelude to that country taking over wartime operational control of its forces in 2012. Defense against WMD a focus. DoD article | CCTV.com report | AFP | Korea Herald | JoongAng Daily

• Navistar expects orders for US military trucks to raise profits in 2010.

• L-3’s STRATIS division wins $230.9 million contract recompete to provide intelligence support services to US and multinational forces in Iraq; division also snags $24.8 million US Special Ops imagery contract.

• Sikorsky’s H-92/CH-148 Cyclone naval helicopter prototype arrives in Canada for trials.

• Northrop demonstrates LITENING surveillance and targeting pod on a Super Hornet; Raytheon’s ATFLIR had been the only qualified option.

• South Africa: “Navy ready to defend World Cup.” We still don’t think that will be enough to stop the Brazilians.

“Go Ahead, Make My Day”
(click to view full)

The US Army Research, Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM) awarded 10 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts for CBRNE (chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive) support services at Edgewood Chemical Biological Center at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD.

ECBC is the USA’s principal research and development center for non-medical chemical and biological defense. The center develops technology in the areas of CBRNE detection, protection, and decontamination, and provides support over the entire lifecycle – from basic research through technology development, engineering design, equipment evaluation, product support, sustainment, field operations and disposal.

The 10 ID/IQ contracts have a 5-year period of performance and a total value of $485 million for all awardees. Work will be performed at ECBC facilities on Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD, at contractor offices, and at other customer sites as required.

The winners of the 10 contracts are:

Continue Reading… »

PolyMedix of Radnor, PA has now received 3 biodefense-related contracts from the US government, including a a $1.6 million, 1-year contract from the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) to develop new “defensin-mimetic antibiotic compounds.” The primary goal of that contract is to devise more effective rapid-response countermeasures against anthrax, plague, and tularemia. Other work may have benefits against pan-Staphylococcal infections, and pneumonia.

How does their proposed approach work, and what makes it novel?

• BAAC to the Future?
• Contracts and Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
  
  Continue Reading… »

“Il n’y a pas de liberté, il n’y a pas d’égalité, il n’y a pas de fraternité sans securité.”
—French President Nicolas Sarkozy

By mid 2007 it seemed that France’s President Sarkozy was softening on defense after an electoral stumble. In July 2007, Sarkozy put together a group that was tasked it with creating a White Paper to define France’s future defense policy. The last time an exercise of this type had been conducted was in 1994.

That group eventually returned with its report, and on June 17/08, President Sarkozy made a speech outlining the key elements of that future direction. The decisions made will change the shape of French defense spending, and will launch an attempt to implement an interlocking set of procurement, infrastructure, and political reforms and changes.

This DID article offers some details from that plan, explains the implications for NATO and the EU, and follows ongoing developments, which include recent cabinet approval of a 6-year spending plan…

• France’s 5 Foci
• Military Programs and Decisions
• Other Elements of Interest
• France, NATO, and the EU
• Updates and Key Events [NEW]
• Additional Readings
  
  Continue Reading… »

Nuclear airbust

L-3 Services, Inc. in San Leandro, CA received a $7.4 million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for the design, development, integration and production of a form, fit and function, environmentally sealed, state-of-the-art Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Pulser and its associated control system. Work will be performed in San Leandro, CA, and is expected to be complete in August 2010. Contract funds in the amount of $1.25 million will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured under an electronic request for proposals, with 2 offers received by the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division in Patuxent River, MD (N00421-08-C-0070).

EMP is a side-effect of intense radiation bursts, usually from a nuclear weapon. Its effect is to fry most semiconductor-based electronics within its effective range, which is to say most electronics these days. This gives EMP a potential offensive use via strategically placed nuclear airbursts. Rep Roscoe Bartlett [R-MD] has led the charge on this issue in Congress, working to establish an EMP Commission that has reported on the USA’s general vulnerability to such attacks.

The military’s interest in this issue is narrower and more specific. Military systems are checked for their ability to survive specific EMP levels – but to do that, one needs to generate an EMP. Since the exact fate of any one device depends on its resistance, the power of the original pulse, and its distance from the source, testing EMPs from devices like L-3’s pulser can be much smaller – and much closer – than the real thing.

Meridian Medical Technologies Inc. in Columbia, MD received a maximum $49.1 million firm fixed price contract for nerve agent antidotes, morphine and related medical services and supplies.

Work will be performed in Columbia, MD and in Missouri on behalf of the US Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Federal Civilian Agencies. There was originally one proposal solicited with one response, and the contract will end on March 31/09. The contracti will be managed by the Defense Supply Center Philadelphia in Philadelphia, PA (SPM200-05-D-0010).

How do you train militaries and public agencies for the challenges and scale of nuclear, chemical, or biological (NBC) attacks or outbreaks, without creating unacceptable levels of disruption in society’s daily workings during the exercise? The US military has similar scope and space problems for other military exercises. Its solution is a combination of live training, virtual simulators et. al., and “constructive” environments. That last piece of the puzzle integrates the live and virtual efforts in an imaginary world, and provides status reports to commanders.

Right now, the “live virtual constructive” training environment for NBC operations appears to be falling short of its goals. To fix this, Cubic Applications, Inc. in Lacey, WA received a not-to-exceed $16.3 million cost-plus-fix-fee contract. They will provide investigative research and analysis, explore emerging technologies, and develop proof-of-concept/ prototype solutions to the shortfalls in realistic Nuclear, Chemical and Biological training. The goal is to create “a single, more realistic operational and training environment for the Live Virtual Constructive.”

Work will be performed in Shalimar, FL and is expected to be complete in May 2011. Contract funds in the amount of $2 million will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured via a Broad Agency Announcement, with 1 offer received by The Naval Air Warfare Center, Training Systems Division in Orlando, FL (N61339-08-C-0024).