The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is a scientific research and development detachment of the United States Air Force Materiel Command dedicated to leading the discovery, development, and integration of direct-energy based aerospace warfighting technologies, planning and executing the Air Force science and technology program, and providing warfighting capabilities to United States air, space, and cyberspace forces. It controls the entire Air Force science and technology research budget which was $2.4 billion in 2006.
The U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation & Missile Center (AvMC), formerly known as the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center (AMRDEC), a part of the U.S. Army Research, Development, and Engineering Command (RDECOM) — now DEVCOM, is primarily a civilian organization tasked to provide research, development and engineering technology and services to support U.S. Army aviation and missile platforms. AvMC conducts research, promotes development, engineering and simulation laboratories and facilities used to develop and improve aviation and missile components, subsystems and systems.
The United States Army DEVCOM Ground Vehicle Systems Center (GVSC) (formerly United States Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC)), located in Warren, Michigan, is the United States Armed Forces' research and development facility for advanced technology in ground systems. It is part of the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM), a major subordinate command of the U.S. Army Futures Command. GVSC shares its facilities with the United States Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command (TACOM). Current technology focus areas include Ground Vehicle Power and Mobility (GVPM), Ground System Survivability and Force Protection, among others.
The Combat Capabilities Development Command, is a subordinate command of the U.S. Army Futures Command. RDECOM was tasked with "creating, integrating, and delivering technology-enabled solutions" to the U.S. Army. Headquartered at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, RDECOM employed more than 13,000 scientists, engineers, researchers, and support personnel working at six major RDE centers and at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL), providing nearly all of the Army's basic and applied research and development services, including in collaboration with other branches of the armed forces and through a network of more than a thousand academic, industrial, and international partners.
The U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center (ECBC) is the United States's principal research and development resource for non-medical chemical and biological (CB) defense. As a critical national asset in the CB defense community, ECBC supports all phases of the acquisition life-cycle ― from basic and applied research through technology development, engineering design, equipment evaluation, product support, sustainment, field operations and demilitarization ― to address its customers’ unique requirements.
The Harry Diamond Laboratories (HDL) was a research facility of the Ordnance Development Division of the National Bureau of Standards and later the US Army, most notable for its work on proximity fuzes in World War II. The organization was founded in 1940, but was not named after its first director Harry Diamond until 1962. HDL was one of seven Army laboratories merged to form the new Army Research Laboratory in 1992.
The Network Science Collaborative Technology Alliance (NS CTA) is a collaborative research alliance funded by the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) and focused on fundamental research on the critical scientific and technical challenges that emerge from the close interdependence of several genres of networks such as social/cognitive, information, and communications networks. The primary goal of the NS CTA is to deeply understand the underlying commonalities among these intertwined networks, and, by understanding, improve our ability to analyze, predict, design, and influence complex systems interweaving many kinds of networks.
The Ballistic Research Laboratory (BRL) was a leading U.S. Army research establishment situated at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland that specialized in ballistics as well as vulnerability and lethality analysis. BRL served as a major Army center for research and development in technologies related to weapon phenomena, armor, electronic devices, and high-speed computing. In 1992, BRL was disestablished and its mission, personnel, and facilities were incorporated into the newly created Army Research Laboratory (ARL).
The Pennsylvania State University Applied Research Laboratory, is a specialized research unit dedicated to interdisciplinary scientific research at the Penn State, University Park campus. The ARL is a DoD designated U.S. Navy University Affiliated Research Center. It is the university's largest research unit with over 1,000 faculty and staff. The Laboratory ranks 2nd in DoD and 10th in NASA funding to universities.
The United States Army Futures Command (AFC) is a United States Army command that runs modernization projects. It is headquartered in Austin, Texas.
The Third Arm Weapon Interface System, or Third Arm, is a passive, stabilizing device developed by the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in 2016 to redistributes the weight of heavy firearms to make them easier to hold and carry. It weighs less than 1.8 kg, and consists of a mechanical appendage made out of carbon-fiber composite that has one end attached to a carbon fiber plate that fits inside an armor plate pocket and the other end attached to a Picatinny rail on top of the gun. It was to permit more accurate use of heavier weapons and reduce fatigue by displacing the weight of the weapon from their arms to their torso and mitigate firing recoil. As of 2018, the Third Arm is a prototype and is still in the testing phase of its development.
The Augmented Reality Sandtable (ARES) is an interactive, digital sand table that uses augmented reality (AR) technology to create a 3D battlespace map. It was developed by the Human Research and Engineering Directorate (HRED) at the Army Research Laboratory (ARL) to combine the positive aspects of traditional military sand tables with the latest digital technologies to better support soldier training and offer new possibilities of learning. It uses a projector to display a topographical map on top of the sand in a regular sandbox as well as a motion sensor that keeps track of changes in the layout of the sand to appropriately adjust the computer-generated terrain display.
The Robotics Collaborative Technology Alliance (R-CTA) was a research program initiated and sponsored by the US Army Research Laboratory. The purpose was to "bring together government, industrial, and academic institutions to address research and development required to enable the deployment of future military unmanned ground vehicle systems ranging in size from man-portables to ground combat vehicles." Collaborative Technology and Research Alliances was a term for partnerships between Army laboratories and centers, private industry and academia for performing research and technology development intended to benefit the US Army. The partnerships were funded by the US Army.
Multi-Scale Multidisciplinary Modeling of Electronic Materials (MSME) Collaborative Research Alliance (CRA) was a research program in the United States that was initiated and sponsored by the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL). The objective of the program was “to develop quantitative understanding of materials from the smallest to the largest relevant scales to advance the state of the art in electronic, optoelectronic and electrochemical materials and devices.”
The Internet of Military Things (IoMT) is a class of Internet of things for combat operations and warfare. It is a complex network of interconnected entities, or "things", in the military domain that continually communicate with each other to coordinate, learn, and interact with the physical environment to accomplish a broad range of activities in a more efficient and informed manner. The concept of IoMT is largely driven by the idea that future military battles will be dominated by machine intelligence and cyber warfare and will likely take place in urban environments. By creating a miniature ecosystem of smart technology capable of distilling sensory information and autonomously governing multiple tasks at once, the IoMT is conceptually designed to offload much of the physical and mental burden that warfighters encounter in a combat setting.
The Internet of Battlefield Things Collaborative Research Alliance (IoBT-CRA), also known as the Internet of Battlefield Things Research on Evolving Intelligent Goal-driven Networks, is a collaborative research alliance between government, industry, and university researchers for the purposes of developing a fundamental understanding of a dynamic, goal-driven Internet of Military Things (IoMT) known as the Internet of Battlefield Things (IoBT). It was first established by the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) to investigate the use of machine intelligence and smart technology on the battlefield, as well as strengthen the collaboration between autonomous agents and human soldiers in combat. An initial grant of $25 million was provided by ARL in October 2017 to fund the first five years of this potential 10-year research program.
The Atmospheric Sciences Laboratory (ASL) was a research institution under the U.S. Army Materiel Command that specialized in artillery meteorology, electro-optical climatology, atmospheric optics data, and atmospheric characterization from 1965 to 1992. ASL was one of the seven Army laboratories that merged to form the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in 1992.
The Electronics Technology and Devices Laboratory (ETDL) was a research institution located at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey that served as the U.S. Army's central laboratory for electronics research from 1971 to 1992. ETDL was one of the seven Army laboratories that merged to form the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL).
The Vulnerability Assessment Laboratory (VAL) was a research institution under the U.S. Army Materiel Command (AMC) that specialized in missile electronic warfare, vulnerability, and surveillance. It was responsible for assessing the vulnerability of Army weapons and electronic communication systems to hostile electronic warfare and coordinating missile electronic countermeasure efforts for the U.S. Army. VAL was one of the seven Army laboratories that merged to form the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in 1992.
The Human Engineering Laboratory (HEL) was a research institution under the U.S. Army Materiel Command that specialized in human performance research, human factors engineering, robotics, and human-in-the-loop technology. Located at Aberdeen Proving Ground, HEL acted as the Army’s lead laboratory for human factors and ergonomics research from 1951 to 1992, during which researchers investigated methods to maximize combat effectiveness, improve weapons and equipment designs, and reduce operation costs and errors. HEL was one of the seven Army laboratories that merged together to form the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in 1992.
