The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency launched a new social media platform designed to help the public, industry and the government engage real-time in research and development efforts.
DARPA unveiled Polyplexus on Tuesday that gives access to scientific evidence and accelerates information sharing for research proposal generation and research sponsor engagement. The platform features a public information feed where users can promote topics, a private tool for analyzing new ideas and an incubator environment for government and industry research sponsors to locate specialists.Â
“Polyplexus maintains a balance between public information exchange and protection of private intellectual property,†said John Main, program manager in the DARPA Defense Sciences Office. “It also creates an avenue for broader participation in DARPA research and development, including by those who aren’t looking for a research project but who have knowledge to contribute, such as retirees.â€
The science office will select 30 research efforts from Polyplexus incubators over the next 18 months. Recipients can funding of up to $100,000 each. DARPA said it already selected three incubators on quantum machine learning, human learning and strategic technological surprise for the initial funding.Â
