Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have created algorithms designed to help utilities and city planners identify electrical service locations across the southern U.S. that would be susceptible to climate change and population growth.

ORNL researchers merged climate simulations that run on the Titan supercomputer with population datasets to develop the algorithms, the national lab said July 29.

The scientists used the algorithms to analyze the potential impacts of predicted changes in population and temperature in nine states that include Alabama, Florida and Georgia through 2050.

“These results can affect how future service areas are defined and where new substation capacity within the national grid may need to be located,” said Melissa Allen, an ORNL scientist and one of the authors of the paper “Impacts of Climate Change on Sub-regional Electricity Demand and Distribution in the Southern United States.”

Allen co-authored the study with Mohammed Olama, Steven Fernandez and Joshua Fu.

The Energy Department’s office of science supported the research project in partnership with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

UT-Battelle, a joint venture of Battelle and the University of Tennessee, oversees the national lab for DOE.

NASA plans a new two-year project to study five technology concepts in a bid to help the aviation industry reduce aircraft fuel consumption, noise and carbon dioxide emissions.

The space agency said Saturday its researchers will explore the five green technology ideas as part of the Transformative Aeronautics Concepts Program and that three of those concepts are geared towards electrically powered aircraft.

“There definitely was an emphasis in our selections on bringing forward activities that addressed a NASA aeronautics goal to reduce the carbon footprint of aviation during the 21st century,” said Doug Rohn, a NASA program manager.

Several research teams will work to develop alternative fuel cells as well as identify methods to change the shape of aircraft wing in flight.

Researchers will also examine the potential uses of three-dimensional printing technology to increase electric motor output, lithium-air batteries to store energy and aerogel materials to build aircraft antennas.

The Office of Personnel Management has established a time frame for the implementation of federal law that requires agencies to identify personnel information technology and cyber-related functions across the government.

Mark Reinhold, associate director of employee services at OPM, said in a memo dated Aug. 1 that agencies must determine the percentage of IT and cyber personnel who hold industry-recognized certifications as well as develop a strategy to  mitigate staff training gaps by December.

He said OPM will collaborate with the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education to perform security data standard coding structure revisions in the Enterprise Human Resources Integration system in an effort to align EHRI codes with the NICE Workforce Framework.

OPM want agencies to start adoption of the revised codes in October and complete revised coding for civilian IT and cyber positions and vacancies by December next year, Reinhold added.

He noted that agencies must submit annual reports on IT and cyber-related civilian “roles of critical need” to OPM from December 2018 through 2022.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has announced the teams that will receive approximately $4 million in total cash awards as the presumptive winners in its cyber defense tournament.

DARPA said Thursday the ForAllSecure research team will receive $2 million for the group’s Mayhem computer system that landed first place in the preliminary results of the Cyber Grand Challenge.

The department also named the TECHx team’s Xandra and Shellphish’s Mechanical Phish systems as second- and third-place winners with cash awards worth $1 million and $750,000, respectively.

Seven teams comprised of white-hat hackers, academics and private-sector experts competed in the challenge, where automated systems worked to detect and patch flawed code and discover opponents’ vulnerabilities.

DARPA said the Cyber Grand Challenge aims to support the development of autonomous systems that can detect, evaluate and patch software vulnerabilities to prevent hacking.

Winners will be awarded at the Paris Hotel in Las Vegas before the start of the DEF CON hacker tournament, where Mayhem is set to become the first machine player in the all-human “capture the flag” competition, DARPA added.