Category: Defense

Source: United States Air Force

A mobile medical documentation tool developed by Air Force Research Laboratory researchers was selected as the joint integrated electronic health record for point-of-injury and en route care by the Joint Operational Medicine Information Systems. Following this announcement at the July 2022 Defense Health Information Technology Symposium in Orlando, Florida, demand for demonstrations of the Battlefield Assisted Trauma Distributed Observation Kit increased tenfold among military agencies.

BATDOK is a smartphone application that replaces pen and paper records.

“We’ve witnessed a big uptick in BATDOK’s inclusion and adoption into various joint exercises,” said Dr. Gregory Burnett, lead engineer for AFRL’s 711th Human Performance Wing product development branch. “Each of the services is layering BATDOK into their pipelines and overarching planning strategy for modernizing operational medicine.”

Prior to BATDOK’s selection, the 711th HPW team led roughly two operational exercises per year. After the announcement, they began averaging two exercises per month. As of 2023, BATDOK has been provided for evaluation and testing to all the Department of Defense services, Burnett said. BATDOK has also been tested by allied forces in the United Kingdom, Morocco and Australia.

BATDOK’s selection by JOMIS, a program management office within Defense Healthcare Management Systems, is a testament to the team’s capability development work and testing with end users, Burnett said. JOMIS collects operational medicine requirements from the various services and provides medical information technology for military operations.

“AFRL developed a robust operational medicine tool that has been widely acknowledged by medical commanders as the future of information technology in combat point-of-injury medicine,” said Sandra McIntyre, JOMIS program manager. “JOMIS is proud to make BATDOK a primary product in our operational medicine care delivery platform.”

Originally started as an Air Force science and technology initiative in response to an Air Combat Command need for improved battlefield documentation, BATDOK later became a Defense Health Program initiative with funding from Air Force Medical Service. Military medics began evaluating BATDOK in 2016, and the tool deployed operationally in 2019.

BATDOK captures medical documentation to include injury types and the treatment provided to the warfighter. To document their observations and actions, medical providers simply touch buttons on a smartphone.

“BATDOK really is an intuitive tool that takes very minimal training to do the basic functions,” said Mike Sedillo, a program analyst and instructor with AFRL’s 711th Human Performance Wing.

He credits the intuitive nature of BATDOK to feedback received from end users during years of testing.

“It was this constant great relationship with the warfighter that continued to help develop BATDOK,” Sedillo said. “We brought it to various communities, and they offered suggestions.”

Burnett and Sedillo said BATDOK is designed for the joint medical community, not just the Air Force.

“From the onset of BATDOK, we’ve always looked to the joint forces because medical care is not just tied to one service,” Burnett said. “As a casualty is injured on the battlefield, they move through the care continuum and that, at times, represents all the services.”

Today’s BATDOK has various modes to accommodate the medical provider’s progress and the patient’s needs. The team continues to develop the tool by incorporating additional requirements and even provides an updated version of the BATDOK application every two weeks.

“Every button, menu and look of BATDOK has been designed with the joint community’s involvement and end user input,” Burnett said. “This has allowed us to increase the user acceptance as well as its intuitive nature.”

Burnett said combat medics, ground surgical teams and even transport personnel provided valuable input for refining and expanding BATDOK’s capabilities.

“As that casualty [on the battlefield] moves to more definitive care, the documentation and the decision support expands supporting the medical care provider by tailoring the user interface in support of their [immediate] needs,” Burnett said.

While the BATDOK capability was developed within the 711th Human Performance Wing’s Human Effectiveness Directorate, the United States School of Aerospace Medicine also provided support. The BATDOK team engaged with USAFSAM aeromedical evacuation cadre from the schoolhouse to explore ideas and learn about medical documentation needs.

“Having the [Human Effectiveness Directorate] co-located [with USAFSAM] in the wing was a huge benefit,” Burnett said. “The wing has many great thinkers and operational users. This unique combination enabled [the BATDOK team] to explore how to reduce the cognitive workload while optimizing operational mission by engaging with varied subject matter experts.”

The 711 HPW team said the goal of BATDOK is simple: support medical providers and help bring warfighters home.  

“We’re dedicated to making someone else’s job easier who is facing the chaos of war,” Burnett said. “With BATDOK, we are providing [medical providers] with a tool that assists in performing the most critical mission: making sure our service members come home alive.”

Source: United States Air Force

FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. (AFNS) —  

In this week’s look around the Air Force, new doctrine is released on mission command, a blended wing aircraft is in development that could save money on fuel, and improvements are coming for dormitories and child development centers. (Hosted by Senior Airman Saomy Sabournin)

Watch on DVIDS | Watch on YouTube
For previous episodes, click here for the Air Force TV page.

Source: United States Air Force

NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, Nev. (AFNS) —  

The 805th Combat Training Squadron’s Shadow Operations Center-Nellis, also known as the U.S. Air Force’s Advanced Battle Management System Battle Lab, recently experimented with joint partners that helped evolve a new joint airspace management and joint fires capability at Nellis Air Force Base. Working with the U.S. Army’s Mission Command Battle Lab and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the ShOC-N hosted and collaborated on a joint experiment of the Air Space Total Awareness for Rapid Tactical Execution, or ASTARTE, system, an advanced warfighting innovation project.

As the Air Force’s premier command and control battle lab, the ShOC-N supports the development, advancement and maturation of key technologies and capabilities designed to compress the kill chain for joint and coalition warfighters.

ASTARTE is a DARPA program, with Army and Air Force sponsorship, designed to enable efficient and effective airspace operations and de-confliction in a highly congested battlespace. ASTARTE automates the ability to provide a real-time common operational picture of airspace in and above an Army division to reduce the time required to execute time-sensitive joint fires. Raytheon Corporation developed the artificial intelligence-enabled software to support airspace synchronization and tactical decision-making with a modular approach to allow ASTARTE functionality to seamlessly plug into existing Army and Air Force command and control systems.

“The ASTARTE program highlights the opportunity offor integration at ShOC-N. Software developers from Raytheon, DARPA, and the C2 operators successfully worked through automation to and from fielded systems from Solipsys, Lockheed Martin, and others to show what’s possible when you bring motivated partners together,” said Lt. Col. John Ohlund, 805th CTS commander.

Army and Air Force warfighters simulated a division-level Joint Air Ground Integration Center, or JAGIC, to evaluate the ASTARTE software in an air-ground conflict using both live data from the Air Force’s Red Flag exercise and simulated data produced by the ShOC-N. In addition to Army role players, Air Force air battle managers acted as an Air Force tactical C2 node, in this case, a Control and Reporting Center, assessing ASTARTE information sharing needed to enhance real-time battle management decision-making.

Joint warfighters ran ASTARTE through various combat scenarios and JAGIC battle drills to evaluate the program’s ability to make sense of multiple data streams to create a unified common operational picture and to make tactical recommendations for enhancing joint fires. Additionally, this event provided a critical opportunity to assess the system as a decision aid to augment or potentially replace legacy C2 systems. Recent ASTARTE system enhancements included improvements to the user interface and role player training, placing a greater emphasis on “transparency” of the processes by which the system generates potential courses of action.

“In comparison to previous test events, we observed significantly reduced reliance on legacy C2 systems while using the ASTARTE software, and the role players reported a greater understanding of how the ASTARTE system executes tasks,” said Dr. Mary Schurgot, ASTARTE program manager in DARPA’s Strategic Technology Office.

The 805th CTS and additional program stakeholders successfully evaluated ASTARTE software, identified operational considerations and future improvements, and facilitated a strategy to transition the DARPA program to the Army and Air Force.

“For the Air Force, this was all about contributing to the continued evolution of future warfighter capabilities – and it’s really great to see the invaluable role the 805th CTS plays in facilitating the ABMS Battle Lab work with joint partners to bring DoD innovation efforts to Soldiers and Airmen in the field, furthering our mission to shape multi-domain command and control moving forward,” said Col. Michael Lake, 505th Command and Control Wing deputy commander, Hurlburt Field, Florida.

Source: United States Air Force

ARLINGTON, Va. (AFNS) —  

The Department of the Air Force, in partnership with the Defense Logistics Agency Energy, reached a critical milestone Aug. 31, in piloting advanced nuclear energy technology with the issuance of the Notice of Intent to Award a contract to Oklo Inc.

Oklo Inc. will site, design, construct, own and operate a micro-reactor facility licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission at Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska. The notice initiates the acquisition process to potentially award a 30-year, firm-fixed-price contract to the vendor after successfully obtaining an NRC license.

“The Department of the Air Force announcement today demonstrates how the Department of Defense continues to invest in facilitating U.S.-developed technology that provides mission assurance and advances our national interests in Alaska and the homeland,” said Brendan Owens, assistant secretary of Defense for Energy, Installations, and Environment.” We are watching this project closely and working with the other military departments to identify additional installations where deployment of U.S.-developed advanced nuclear technology will improve power reliability and installation resilience.”

Micro-reactors are small nuclear reactors that can produce carbon-free energy and are equipped with built-in safety features that self-adjust to changing conditions and demands to prevent overheating. The technology’s ability to operate independently from the commercial grid and reduce greenhouse gas emissions make micro-reactors a promising power source for critical national security infrastructure.

“Today is a historic first for the Air Force, state of Alaska, and the nation. Safe, reliable, clean energy using micro-reactor technology will be an integral part of Air Force installations in the future. The best part of this innovation is that we are coming together at the beginning to demonstrate this capability—partnering with key regulatory authorities, state, and local communities to ensure we get this right and do it safely,” said Dr. Ravi Chaudhary, assistant secretary of the Air Force for Energy, Installations, and Environment. “It’s a huge team effort. By seizing the initiative on this critical technology today, we are laying the foundation for American competitiveness in energy for years to come.”

As the impacts of changing environmental conditions become more recognizable, the Department understands the importance to secure energy infrastructure, supply chains and logistics to ensure mission resilience and resource availability.

“Our partnerships with Oklo Inc., Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Department of Energy, Alaska stakeholders and Tribal Nations are imperative to a successful pilot and future implementation scalability of this transformational technology,” said Nancy Balkus, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for Environment, Safety and Infrastructure.

The micro-reactor is expected to be operational by the end of 2027, as directed by the fiscal year 2019 National Defense authorization Act.

“Eielson (AFB) is eager to welcome this cutting-edge technology onto the base. The NOITA to Oklo Inc. reinforces our commitment to innovation in order to protect and defend the nation with even greater efficiency and effectiveness,” said Col. Paul P. Townsend, 354th Fighter Wing commander at Eielson AFB.

For more information on the micro-reactor pilot project, please visit their website.

Source: United States Air Force

ARLINGTON, Va. (AFNS) —  

Department of the Air Force senior leaders presided over a ceremony unveiling commemorative wall art titled, “A Shared Foundation; Celebrating 75 Years of Air and Space Power,” at the Pentagon Aug. 29.

DAF celebrated the 75th Anniversary of Air and Space heritage in September 2022 and commissioned the art to help tell the stories of the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Space Force, which required nearly 18 months to complete due to the artist’s extensive research into each of its numerous elements.

The artist, Warren F. Neary, focused the content of the piece on the contributions of Airmen and Guardians throughout the eras. Beginning with the earliest airpower innovators in the Army Air Corps, the art highlights significant milestones and achievements.

“[Neary] met with DAF leadership and visited bases around the country to capture the range of the missions and the people that compose our Air and Space Forces,” Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall remarked. “The people you see in the painting are depictions of real Airmen, real Guardians; both are part of our heritage and those who are currently serving … [This artwork shows] people who helped build our organization, the aircraft and equipment that shaped our experiences and the missions that drove it all.”

In addition to depicting Airmen and Guardians, the artwork features various Air Force and Space Force platforms and systems. In total, 114 unique visual elements are incorporated into the piece.

Each group of elements in the artwork is designed to form the shape of the delta or infinity symbols. The delta symbol carries a deep, historic meaning for both the Air Force and Space Force and signifies upward trajectory and rapid advancement. The infinity symbol represents the ever-present requirements for adaptation, improvement, innovation and vigilance.

” Our heritage is incredibly important — it tells our story. It reminds us of who we are and where we have come from, and why it all matters. The images that surround this piece are powerful. They shape our culture, our sense of purpose and our warfighter mindset.” -Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall

Neary has created many works of art throughout his career depicting subjects of air and space power. He has received national-level recognition, and his artwork has been exhibited in the National Museum of the Air Force, the Museum of Aviation, the U.S. Air Force Art Collection and the U.S. Army Center for Military History, in addition to private collections.