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PSC: Federal Cloud Spending Saw 58 Percent Increase in FY19
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PSC: Federal Cloud Spending Saw 58 Percent Increase in FY19


PSC: Federal Cloud Spending Saw 58 Percent Increase in FY19

The Professional Services Council released a study stating that there has been a 17 percent decline in traditional shared services in the federal government last fiscal year, FCW reported Tuesday. PSC implemented the input of federal acquisition and technology officials as part of the study.

According to the PSC 2019 Vision Forecast, federal spending on cloud capabilities increased by 58 percent mostly due to the Trump administration’s “Cloud Smart” and “Cloud First” initiatives.

Steve Vetter, a program lead for the PSC report, said that efforts to meet the President’s Management Agenda’s goals have resulted in an increase in using provisioned information technology or “as-a-service” capabilities.

“Cloud is a form of shared services, but provisioned IT goes beyond shared services,” he noted.

David Berteau, president and CEO of PSC and 2019 Wash100 Award winner, added that government IT spending may be impacted by unstable global and federal economic environments resulting from appropriation lapses, continuing resolutions and a partial shutdown.

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Greg Robinson: NASA Makes Progress in James Webb Telescope Dev’t
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Greg Robinson: NASA Makes Progress in James Webb Telescope Dev’t


Greg Robinson
Greg Robinson

Greg Robinson, program director of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, said his team and Northrop Grumman are working on testing and integration towards the observatory spacecraft’s launch in March 2021, Space News reported Tuesday.

The activities, including optics and instrument integration, took place at Northrop Grumman’s facility in Southern California.

“That included the integration of the spacecraft’s optics and instruments section with the spacecraft bus and sunshield in August,” said Robinson.

He said the joint team has made good progress in building the telescope over the last six months. The spacecraft has only exhibited minor issues in recent tests, with no major technical challenges, Robinson noted.

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ACT-IAC Accepting Nominations for 2020 Igniting Innovation Awards; Jim Cook Quoted
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ACT-IAC Accepting Nominations for 2020 Igniting Innovation Awards; Jim Cook Quoted


ACT-IAC Accepting Nominations for 2020 Igniting Innovation Awards; Jim Cook Quoted

The American Council for Technology and Industry Advisory Council’s (ACT-IAC) Institute for Innovation is now accepting nominations for its seventh annual Igniting Innovation Conference to be held in the spring of 2020, ACT-IAC announced on Wednesday. 

“Our goal is to identify, recognize, promote and connect innovations and innovators to improve services to citizens and government operations,” said Jim Cook (MITRE Corporation) chair of ACT-IAC’s Institute for Innovation. “We are seeking innovations from all sectors.”

To be eligible, an innovation must have been conceived, developed, deployed or upgraded in the last two years (after October 31, 2017). Nominations will be reviewed by government and industry executives and they will select the top finalists to exhibit at the event.

Nominations may be submitted through January 31, 2020.

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BWXT to Produce Medical Radioisotope Germanium-68 to Meet Demand; Rex Geveden Quoted
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BWXT to Produce Medical Radioisotope Germanium-68 to Meet Demand; Rex Geveden Quoted


BWXT to Produce Medical Radioisotope Germanium-68 to Meet Demand; Rex Geveden Quoted

BWX Technologies, Inc. announced on Wednesday that the company is planning to produce the medical radioisotope Germanium-68 (Ge-68) with a focus on addressing a growing global demand for the product.

“BWXT is in an excellent position to be able to respond to the market’s growing demand for this critical radioisotope,” said Rex D. Geveden, BWXT’s president and chief executive officer. “We acquired the medical isotope business just over a year ago, and we are very pleased with this business and its growing portfolio of products.”

BWXT’s isotope technologies group in Canada has developed proprietary manufacturing technology to produce high purity Ge-68 and is in the process of scaling up its capacity to move into full production in 2020 to address growing global customer demands.

Ge-68 will be produced using cyclotrons at BWXT’s Vancouver facility located on the TRIUMF site. TRIUMF, which is Canada’s particle accelerator center, and BWXT’s medical isotopes group have been working together to support medical isotope production for over 40 years.

BWXT’s Ge-68 product will be used in Gallium-68 (Ga-68) generators, a source of the diagnostic radioisotope Ga-68. Using specific disease-targeting molecules, Ga-68 provides diagnoses and enables treatment planning using positron emission tomography (PET).

Ge-68 is the third new medical radioisotope development project underway at BWXT.

About BWX Technologies

Headquartered in Lynchburg, Va., BWX Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: BWXT) is a leading supplier of nuclear components and fuel to the U.S. government; provides technical and management services to support the U.S. government in the operation of complex facilities and environmental remediation activities; and supplies precision manufactured components, services and fuel for the commercial nuclear power industry.

With approximately 6,350 employees, BWXT has 11 major operating sites in the U.S. and Canada. In addition, BWXT joint ventures provide management and operations at more than a dozen U.S. Department of Energy and NASA facilities.

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Perspecta Labs Receives $25M Task Order from U.S. Army to Continue Collaborative Research Alliance Program; Petros Mouchtaris Quoted
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Perspecta Labs Receives $25M Task Order from U.S. Army to Continue Collaborative Research Alliance Program; Petros Mouchtaris Quoted


Perspecta Labs Receives $25M Task Order from U.S. Army to Continue Collaborative Research Alliance Program; Petros Mouchtaris Quoted

The United States Army as the Applied Research and Experimentation Partner (AREP) for the cybersecurity Collaborative Research Alliance (CRA) program has awarded a potential five-year, $25 million task order to Perspecta Labs to continue applied research, maturation, experimentation and validation work for the service branch, Perspecta announced on Wednesday.

“At Perspecta Labs, we pride ourselves on successfully transitioning the advanced research we conduct and innovative solutions we invent to real-world applications,” said Petros Mouchtaris, Ph.D., president of Perspecta Labs. 

Perspecta Labs will continue to support the CRA with applied research and experimentation and assist with the accelerated transition of this research into the field. Specifically, the company will leverage and extend its CyberVAN testbed to provide sophisticated capabilities for cyber experimentation in tactical, as well as strategic, environments.

“We are excited to lead the efforts of transferring cyber technology research into operational capabilities to support Army missions and provide warfighters with resilient, secure, intelligent networks in dynamic and hostile battlefield environments,” Mouchtaris added. 

Perspecta Labs’ CyberVAN provides a realistic, high-fidelity cyber environment that scales to handle large networks, incorporates wired and wireless networking effects accurately, and provides flexible, easy-to-use libraries and interfaces for users.

About Perspecta Inc.

At Perspecta (NYSE: PRSP), we question, we seek and we solve. Perspecta brings a diverse set of capabilities to our U.S. government customers in defense, intelligence, civilian, health care and state and local markets. Our 270+ issued, licensed and pending patents are more than just pieces of paper, they tell the story of our innovation. 

With offerings in mission services, digital transformation and enterprise operations, our team of 14,000 engineers, analysts, investigators and architects work tirelessly to not only execute the mission, but build and support the backbone that enables it. Perspecta was formed to take on big challenges. We are an engine for growth and success and we enable our customers to build a better nation.

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NSA, DHS Award Designation to Grand Canyon University for Cybersecurity Program
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NSA, DHS Award Designation to Grand Canyon University for Cybersecurity Program


NSA, DHS Award Designation to Grand Canyon University for Cybersecurity Program

Grand Canyon University in Phoenix has received the National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense designation from the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.

The CAE-CD status reflects the university’s commitment to educating future professionals to help reduce cyber risk to U.S. information infrastructure assets, GCU said Tuesday.

GCU provides students access to a laboratory the university operates with the Arizona Cyber Threat Response Alliance. The lab, called Cyber Center of Excellence, works to help students gain hands-on experience in preventing hacker activities.

The university added its College of Science, Engineering and Technology offers a bachelor’s degree program that includes various topics such as information technology system planning and implementation, cloud computing and cyber forensics.

According to GCU, the cybersecurity program was designated through the 2024 school year.

Heather Montie, associate dean at the College of Science, Engineering and Technology, said the designation could open up public-sector career opportunities to students.

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NIST Issues Final Big Data Interoperability Framework
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NIST Issues Final Big Data Interoperability Framework


NIST Issues Final Big Data Interoperability Framework

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has released its final Big Data Interoperability Framework meant to support the development of software tools that can perform data analysis in any computing environment. NIST said Tuesday the framework can also help analysts move their workloads across platforms.

“This framework is a reference for how to create an ‘agnostic’ environment for tool creation. If software vendors use the framework’s guidelines when developing analytical tools, then analysts’ results can flow uninterruptedly, even as their goals change and technology advances,” said Wo Chang, a NIST computer scientist.

The final framework consists of nine volumes and includes taxonomies and consensus definitions for software developers, privacy protections and data security requirements for software tools and a reference architecture interface specification to facilitate the deployment of such tools.

“The reference architecture interface specification will enable vendors to build flexible environments that any tool can operate in,” Chang said.

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DHS S&T Develops Chemical Assessment Model Suite
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DHS S&T Develops Chemical Assessment Model Suite


DHS S&T Develops Chemical Assessment Model Suite

The Department of Homeland Security’s science and technology directorate has created a set of models intended to help federal agencies examine chemical threats and the potential effect of a life-threatening attack.

DHS said Tuesday the Chemical Consequence and Threat platform includes a repository of data from 37 representative targets and 184 substances.

The CCAT tool is designed to facilitate random sampling of metrics such as population density, weather condition, evacuation time to help agencies identify defense investment opportunities.

S&T developed the suite as part of the directorate’s All-hazards Countermeasure Assessment and Planning Tool and to comply with the chemical terrorism analysis requirement under Homeland Security Presidential Directive-22.

“To support this analysis, CSAC’s Chemical Hazard Characterization Program allows DHS to understand what is happening with chemical events around the world, what we need to plan for now domestically, what we may need to plan for in the future, and what actions have the largest effect on our ability to prevent or respond to an attack,” said Rachel Gooding, senior research scientist at S&T’s Chemical Security Analysis Center.

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GAO’s Innovation Lab Aims to Support Auditing Work With Analytics, AI; Taka Ariga Quoted
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GAO’s Innovation Lab Aims to Support Auditing Work With Analytics, AI; Taka Ariga Quoted


Taka Ariga
Taka Ariga

The Government Accountability Office has established an innovation lab to advance the use of analytics capabilities and emerging technologies to help improve the work of auditors and other government personnel.

GAO said Tuesday the formation of the lab is one of the tasks of the agency’s science, technology assessment and analytics team, which was created in January.

“Data analytics is the tradecraft of distilling hidden insights and enabling people to rapidly act on those insights,” said Taka Ariga, GAO’s first chief data scientist and director of the innovation lab. “In the user-centric environment of the Innovation Lab, by applying data science at scale and exploring emerging technologies such as machine learning and digital ledger, we will help the audit community address grand challenges.”

GAO said the innovation lab plans to leverage distributed ledger technology, AI and other emerging technologies to conduct audits of federal programs and save taxpayer dollars.

“Innovation Lab will help us collectively move the needle of the federal government, creating a space where we de-risk the use of innovative solutions and people can think about tackling challenges differently, allowing them to make better-informed decisions,” Ariga said.

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Ron Thompson on NASA’s Data Resources, Implementation of National Data Strategy
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Ron Thompson on NASA’s Data Resources, Implementation of National Data Strategy


Ron Thompson
Ron Thompson

Ron Thompson, chief data officer at NASA, told Government Matters in a video interview posted Monday how the agency leverages data to support its missions.

Thompson discussed NASA’s data resources and how the agency executes the Office of Management and Budget’s National Data Strategy based on those resources.

“We are in direct alignment with OMB’s direction and it gives us really, the ability to go into our mission and be able to have these conversations, be able to liberate the data that is in these silos and I think we have really good examples where advancements are being made in areas but we just need to sort of take a higher view of it,” he said.

He cited the role of a CDO council, NASA’s efforts to further develop its data science cadre as well as its collaboration with industry partners and other agencies.

“We are really in our early groundwork, learning from others such as Commerce who have been well established in this role,” Thompson said. “We are learning from them, we’re learning from industry in this space, we’re learning how to set up our governance model and most importantly how to achieve better outcomes for our mission.

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