Cybersecurity for Allied Future Submarines

Cyber has become a supposedly cheap first-strike weapon of political choice by potential adversaries in a milieu placing insurgency, terrorism, international crime and state-based influences in close un-regulated proximity. The merging of electronic and cyber warfare means that not even submarines, however unconnected or firewalled they may be, are immune. The quantum attack surface of submarines is as much in their past, as they are in their designs today and their operations tomorrow: they must survive to be credible and ideally they should even be a contemporary offensive cyber deterrent. Such critical defensive systems require robust security systems engineering and cybersecurity test and evaluation to build and sustain their cyber-resilience. This paper uses Australia’s future submarine program [1]1 to outline key facets needed in a submarine program to achieve cyber resilience, including how to adapt U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) best practices to engineer, test and sustain cyber-resilient submarine systems. Strategies are needed that provision sovereign-owned and operated land-based test sites to design, build, demonstrate and sustain critical submarine systems. This work is most relevant to countries allied to the U.S. and importing submarine capabilities, such as within lesser European powers and also in the Indo-Pacific where both cyber warfare and submarines are proliferating.

Acoustofluidic scanning fluorescence nanoscopy with a large field of view

Large-field nanoscale fluorescence imaging is invaluable for many applications,such as imaging subcellular structures,visualizing protein interactions,and high-resolution tissue imaging.Unfortunately,conventional fluorescence microscopy requires a trade-off between resolution and field of view due to the nature of the optics used to form the image.To overcome this barrier,we developed an acoustofluidic scanning fluorescence nanoscope that simultaneously achieves superior resolution,a large field of view,and strong fluorescent signals.The acoustofluidic scanning fluorescence nanoscope utilizes the superresolution capabilities of microspheres that are controlled by a programmable acoustofluidic device for rapid fluorescence enhancement and imaging.The acoustofluidic scanning fluorescence nanoscope resolves structures that cannot be resolved with conventional fluorescence microscopes with the same objective lens and enhances the fluorescent signal by a factor of~5 without altering the field of view of the image.The improved resolution realized with enhanced fluorescent signals and the large field of view achieved via acoustofluidic scanning fluorescence nanoscopy provides a powerful tool for versatile nanoscale fluorescence imaging for researchers in the fields of medicine,biology,biophysics,and biomedical engineering.

Towards designing telepresence robot navigation for people with disabilities

Purpose–The authors believe that people with cognitive and motor impairments may benefit from using of telepresence robots to engage in social activities.To date,these systems have not been designed for use by people with disabilities as the robot operators.The paper aims to discuss these issues.Design/methodology/approach–The authors conducted two formative evaluations using a participatory action design process.First,the authors conducted a focus group(n¼5)to investigate how members of the target audience would want to direct a telepresence robot in a remote environment using speech.The authors then conducted a follow-on experiment in which participants(n¼12)used a telepresence robot or directed a human in a scavenger hunt task.Findings–The authors collected a corpus of 312 utterances(first hand as opposed to speculative)relating to spatial navigation.Overall,the analysis of the corpus supported several speculations put forth during the focus group.Further,it showed few statistically significant differences between speech used in the human and robot agent conditions;thus,the authors believe that,for the task of directing a telepresence robot’s movements in a remote environment,people will speak to the robot in a manner similar to speaking to another person.Practical implications–Based upon the two formative evaluations,the authors present four guidelines for designing speech-based interfaces for telepresence robots.Originality/value–Robot systems designed for general use do not typically consider people with disabilities.The work is a first step towards having our target population take the active role of the telepresence robot operator.

中美科技产出比较

该文以科技文献为分析基础,从数量与质量方面比较了中美之间科技发展的差距。数量比较选择了SCI、INSPEC、Ei Compendex三大数据库,而质量比较则是应用了SCI中的引文分析。根据作者以前对中国科技产出的评估,该文选择了30个技术研究领域,全面考察了中国在物质科学、环境、工程和生命科学重点发展方向上论文数量情况。SCI数据显示在几乎所有的技术领域内,虽然中国在论文数量方面增幅很大,但美国仍然处于领先地位(2002-2007)。到2007年,INSPEC数据表明,在大多数技术领域内,中国的科技论文数量赶上或超过了美国;但在生物医学和部分环境科学领域,美国仍然保持着较大的领先优势。Ei Compendex的数据分析结果表明,对于大多数技术领域,到2007年中国的科技论文产量更大;而与日益增长的科研经费恰恰相反,美国发表论文的数量似乎在2005年就已经到达了顶峰。如果不考虑生物医学领域,中国显然已经成为美国的强劲竞争对手。为了对质量进行比较,该文对论文和引文数量进行了归一化处理,但仅限于纳米技术领域(1998-2003年)。结果表明,虽然在过去的10年里美国在质量方面明显地领先中国(以及其他主要纳米技术研究国家),但依然不能改表中国的论文质量持续提升的事实。中国目前已经达到可以与法国、意大利、日本和澳大利亚的论文质量相提并论的地步。

Using modeling and simulation and artificial intelligence to improve complex adaptive systems engineering

Systems engineering practices are evolving to address fast-changing needs in fielding complex systems.These needs create an environment in which system needs evolve or change too quickly to be tracked or managed by humans’natural capabilities.We propose that systems engineering must aid systems engineering managers by providing architectural alternatives and design options.Further,as systems become more complex and dynamic,there is an increased need to identify hidden risks,model emergent behav-ior,and expose hidden patterns in the behavior of stakeholders.Systems engineering needs to evolve to build fast-fielded,resilient,and adaptive systems that leverage posi-tive reinforcement feedback loops with multiple experimental and real-world information sources.The very basis of systems engineering must evolve from today’s development paradigms to a future that leverages modeling,simulation,and artificial intelligence to drastically improve the capability and agility for developing new systems.This paper proposes a common way forward to enable this new form of complex adaptive systems engineering.