US Army Research Laboratory

Most plastics don’t break down easily – and when they do, they create problematic microplastic particles. A new type of compostable plastic is embedded with enzymes that, when triggered, quickly break the material down to its constituent molecules.

There are now several robots that are designed to accompany and assist ground-based army troops. Those machines could soon have a new ability – detecting changes in the environment that may be missed by soldiers.

While autonomous drones are now pretty good at avoiding large obstacles, thin suspended power lines can still pose a challenge. A new onboard sensing system, however, could change that.

The excavation and disposal of landmines is a time- and labor-intensive business, so it can be quite a waste of resources if the detected object is not actually a mine. A new system could help, by reducing the number of mine-hunting errors.

The US Army is developing a voice interface that allows two-way dialogue between soldiers and autonomous robotic systems. The Joint Understanding and Dialogue Interface (JUDI) is designed to reduce training costs and improve soldier/robot teamwork.

The US Army has developed a more realistic bite sleeve for training military working dogs. Worn during biting exercises, the protective silicone and Kevlar sleeve looks and feels more like a human arm, but still shields the wearer from harm.

Materials that can heal themselves after becoming damaged have opened up some interesting new possibilities over the past decade or so, and a newly developed example inspired by squid ring teeth is claimed to act faster than most.

Lockheed Martin is turning to the littlest factories imaginable to develop a new generation of advanced materials. Working under a US$10 million, five-year contract the company will develop ways to bioengineer the DNA in single-cell organisms as a way to create new materials.

A thermal imaging system being developed for the US Army Laboratory uses polarized infrared light to reveal details like facial features. The technology will allow soldiers to pick out details even in total darkness, such as tripwires, booby traps, buried landmines, and mortars and UAVs in flight.

Scientists at the US Army Research Laboratory are working on software to help fallen military robots right themselves. The purpose of this is not only to make such battlefield bots more efficient, but also less dependent on their soldier partners for support.

It looks as if the days of the venerable explosive TNT are numbered as researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and the US Army Research Laboratory in Aberdeen, Maryland develop a new explosive that has the power of TNT, yet is safer and more environmentally friendly.

At the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland, the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) is testing a prototype passive support system called Third Arm, which evenly distributes the weight of heavy weapons, allowing soldiers to use them with less fatigue and greater accuracy.