Voices from DARPA – Details, episodes & analysis

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 Moment (ITM) program, which aims to support the development of algorithms that are trusted to independently make decisions in difficult domains, particularly in significant trauma events such as battlefield triage.

DARPA’s research has identified the need for fundamentally different approaches to advance AI technology to a place where we’re willing to trust it and not be foolish to do so. Continuing themes from our mini-series on ELSI – ethical, legal, and societal implications of new technologies and capabilities – we meet with DARPA’s ITM program manager, Dr. Patrick Shafto, and the ITM performers and ELSI advisors, who break down how they’re tackling the fundamental question of alignment in the context of human decision-makers and autonomous decision-making tools.

In case you missed them, check out our previous ELSI series episodes at the following links:

Episode 79: Integrating ELSI

Episode 78: Introducing ELSI

Our special thanks to the following ITM performers and advisors for their contributions to this episode (in order of their appearance):

·        Alice Leung, RTX BBN

·        Joseph Cohn, SoarTech

·        Matthew Molineaux, Parallax Advanced Research

·        Arslan Basharat, Kitware Inc.

·        Jennifer McVay, CACI

·        Dave Cotting, Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA)

·        Sarah Daly, IDA

·        Lauren Diaz, University of Maryland Applied Research Laboratory for Intelligence and Security (ARLIS)

·        Ellie Tyler, ARLIS

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 to enable the development of breakthrough technologies at the speed of relevance.

From DARPA’s pioneering work with Other Transactions, to fast-pitch proposals, to the exploration of previously unrealized authorities, hear how the agency is breaking down the barriers of government contracting, providing companies a clearer path to the national security mission.

Links:

Acquisition Innovation

Collaborative Disruption at DoD – Kathleen Hicks – American Dynamism Summit

Acquisition Innovation: From Other Transactions to Fast-Pitch Proposals

Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Other Transactions Guide

DARPAConnect

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 the AIxCC, discusses who she wants to compete (and why), and what’s at stake for cybersecurity. 

Adams is joined by AIxCC collaborators from the Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF), a project of the Linux Foundation, and OpenAI. OpenSSF’s general manager Omkhar Arasratnam and OpenAI’s head of security Matt Knight discuss their roles in the challenge and impart advice to potential competitors. 

For information on how to register to compete in the AI Cyber Challenge, visit AICyberChallenge.com.

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 demand trajectory was straining both commercial and defense developments, DARPA launched the Electronics Resurgence Initiative (ERI) to address an increasing reliance on advanced electronics, exploding complexity of microsystems, offshore movement of advanced capabilities, and the emergence of hardware security threats. In 2022, the agency kicked off ERI 2.0, expanding the original effort to include reinvention of domestic microelectronics manufacturing.

DARPA’s 2023 ERI Summit, held Aug. 22-24, in Seattle, brought together more than 1,300 participants converged to discuss the challenges on the horizon. The conference spanned three jam-packed days of presentations, workshops, panel discussions, and networking.

In this episode of Voices from DARPA, we've pulled from the more than 10 hours of presentations from leading voices across government, industry, and academia for a primer on the Summit's prevailing theme: what it means to redefine the future of microelectronics manufacturing.

For a deeper dive on ERI 2.0 and the ERI Summit, visit:

ERI Summit playlist – DARPAtv on YouTube

DARPA’s Microsystems Technology Office

Electronics Resurgence Initiative 2.0

ERI Summit

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. Joe Altepeter, a quantum physicist in DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office. Altepeter helps clarify what for most of us is a complicated subject, providing a basic understanding of quantum and describing his two DARPA programs focused on quantum computing. The first program, called Quantum Benchmarking, aims to estimate the long-term utility of quantum computers by creating new benchmarks, or yardsticks, that quantitatively measure how useful a quantum computer would be at solving problems we care about. The second related program, Underexplored Systems for Utility-Scale Quantum Computing (US2QC), seeks to determine if an underexplored approach to quantum computing is capable of achieving utility-scale operation (i.e., its computational value exceeds its cost) much faster than conventional predictions.



Buckle up and tune in for a fast-paced tutorial from DARPA’s quantum mechanic!

·  Dr. Joe Altepeter

·  Quantum Benchmarking

·  Underexplored Systems for Utility-Scale Quantum Computing (US2QC)

There are many ideas in the world, but truly good ones are few and far between – especially when it comes to breakthrough technologies that can change the course of history. Surfacing these types of ideas calls for a constant infusion of fresh perspectives and imagination.

That’s why DARPA created the DARPA Innovation Fellowship, a two-year position for early career scientists and engineers. Fellows push the limits of existing technology by exploring new ideas for answering high-risk, high-reward “what if?” questions in the realm of national security.

In this episode of the Voices from DARPA podcast series, we hear from Dr. Jinendra Ranka, director of DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office (DSO) – which oversees the Innovation Fellowship Program – about how the program offers unique opportunities for Fellows to make connections, demonstrate what’s possible and take risks. We also speak with four Fellows from the program’s first cohort – Dr. Rebecca Chmiel, Lieutenant Krishnan (Krish) Rajagopalan, Dr. Allegra A. Beal Cohen and Dr. Alex Place – for their perspectives on what it takes to develop high-impact, exploratory technology efforts for the Department of Defense.

Current DARPA Innovation Fellows

Advanced Research Concepts

Generative artificial intelligence has captured the world’s attention after recent advances in the commercial sector. Its ability to create deepfakes, or highly realistic multimedia, has turned a once highly specialized skill into something as easy as clicking a button.

As a result, the threat of manipulated media –audio, images, video, and text – has increased while social media provides a ripe environment for viral content sharing. Though, not all media manipulations have the same real-world impact.

In this episode of Voices from DARPA, Dr. Wil Corvey, program manager for DARPA’s Semantic Forensics (SemaFor), discusses how the program goes beyond detection to delve deeper into understanding the intent behind manipulated media and how their team is creating tools available for today’s analysts. They are joined by SemaFor researchers Arslan Basharat, assistant director of Computer Vision at Kitware Inc. and Luisa Verdoliva, professor at the University of Naples in Italy.

Imagine you are going to space. There is a long list of items and supplies you definitely will need, but there is an even longer list of things you might need, depending on how your mission progresses. This includes known unknowns like fuel for unplanned maneuvering, replacement parts or tools, and a wide range of other products that could be useful, but may not be utilized. The current paradigm is to pack everything you might possibly need, but this approach is complex and logistically burdensome.

Imagine instead that you pack only fermentation equipment, feedstocks, and a freezer full of microbes that each convert the feedstock into a different useful molecule, material, or product so you have everything you might need and can produce it on demand.

Or what if you could enable a new paradigm where future space structures – that are much too large to launch on a rocket – are built off-Earth using materials and designs optimized for the space environment?

This Voices from DARPA episode features discussions with Dr. Andy Detor, program manager in DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office, as well as Dr. Anne Cheever, program manager in the Biological Technologies Office. Detor runs the Novel Orbital Moon Manufacturing, Materials, and Mass Efficient Design, or NOM4D program. Cheever heads up the Biomanufacturing: Survival, Utility, and Reliability beyond Earth, or B-SURE, program. While neither program is conducting manufacturing in space, both are supporting proof of concept studies to determine whether it might be feasible in the future.

This episode of the Voices from DARPA podcast series explores the possibility of an “energy web” that, much like the World Wide Web easily and quickly spreads information, could instantly distribute energy from remote, currently untapped sources. DARPA Program Manager Col Paul Calhoun describes his bold POWER program, aimed at leveraging power beaming for near-instantaneous energy transport through a multi-path network.

The project team plans to demonstrate long-distance wireless power transmission that can power an aircraft. Such a system might also one day readily distribute abundant, far-flung wave or solar generated power to places in need. “If we can get to a world where we are no longer tying energy production to carbon…it allows us to unlock production without some of the negative impacts,” says Calhoun.

At a time when the race to create the best artificial intelligence-enabled technology is at its fiercest, experts at DARPA say we need to recalibrate the direction of research in the field.

Within DARPA’s Information Innovation Office, one of the research thrusts focuses on proficient artificial intelligence (AI), which the office defines as how to build AI-enabled systems that we could trust with our lives and not be foolish to do so.

This episode of Voices from DARPA features an excerpt from a recent presentation by Dr. Kathleen Fisher, the director of the Information Innovation Office, which is leading DARPA’s initiative to explore future directions of AI for national security, called AI Forward.

Dr. Fisher delves into the topic of trustworthy AI for adversarial environments and what it will take to create technology that is more than a tool, but rather function as a true partner.

To access the full presentation, visit our YouTube page. DARPA will also accept applications for its AI Forward Workshops through March 20, 2023. To learn how you can apply, visit: https://www.darpa.mil/work-with-us/ai-forward