The Department of Energy has selected nine projects to receive $16 million in funding to conduct small-scale research experiments on the DIII-D National Fusion Facility, an Office of Science scientific user facility operated by General Atomics.

DOE said Wednesday the selected technology projects will develop new systems on the DIII-D tokamak and advance collaborative research to establish the scientific foundation for developing a fusion energy source.

“While establishing the scientific basis for fusion energy, we must also improve the maturity of existing fusion technologies and explore entirely new innovations that have the potential to revolutionize the fusion landscape,” said Jean Paul Allain, associate director of the Office of Science for Fusion Energy Sciences.

The projects will strive to assess and improve the technical maturity of plasma actuators, provide tools and algorithms to sustain high fusion performance, resolve key plasma transport issues, improve access to burning plasma regimes and optimize the fusion reaction process.

The awardees were selected by competitive peer review under the Innovative Fusion Technology and Collaborative Fusion Energy Research in the DIII-D National Program funding opportunity announcement released in January.

Air Force Special Operations Command has developed a framework for incorporating immersive learning technologies into training activities across the entire command.

The Extended Reality Training Framework employs virtual, mixed and augmented reality technologies to redesign the command’s training landscape and provide a more realistic autonomous learning environment, AFSOC said Wednesday.

The framework focuses on four distinct lines of effort: building a virtual hangar for aircraft and munitions maintenance workforce training; incorporating VR into all flying training units responsible for training AFSOC aircrew; integrating XR into operational units; and utilizing AR for aircrew and special tactics teams.

“The use of XR in training allows Air Commandos to experience highly realistic simulations of complex scenarios, missions, and environments they may encounter in real-world operations,” said Lt. Gen. Tony Bauernfeind, commander of AFSOC.

New research from RAND Corporation‘s National Security Research Division found that the Navy and Marine Corps face a new threat environment that demands them to reevaluate the survivability of their current fleet of surface connectors.

RAND said the U.S. military’s existing fleet of amphibious connectors was designed and developed under different operational concepts and “might not be as survivable when they operate in a contested environment against an evolved adversary.”

The nonprofit research organization recommended that the naval services address the survivability of their current fleet of amphibious craft by developing and formalizing an analytic framework for connector survivability.

According to RAND, the Navy and Marine Corps must also invest in the survivability of the current connector fleet; develop techniques, procedures and associated training to support the new operating concepts; and utilize operational and tactical intelligence for amphibious forces.

ChatOps tools have huge potential to enhance decision-making at the edge, according to Barry Duplantis, vice president and general manager of Mattermost’s North America public sector arm.

These technologies enable constant connection between mission teams and decision makers using flexible, scalable command and control communication tools, and Mattermost’s ChatOps platform was shown to be beneficial in the Air Mobility Command’s recent Mobility Guardian 2023 exercise, the company said in a case study report.

During the readiness exercise, 3,000 U.S. and Allied Forces personnel were deployed, with detachments from the U.S., United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France and Japan, allowing over 15,000 U.S. and global forces to participate concurrently in exercises throughout the Indo-Pacific region.

“The Mobility Guardian 2023 exercise demonstrates the critical value of ChatOps in supporting mission operations and enabling teams to move at the speed of the mission,” Duplantis stated.

Mobility Guardian exercises are generally unscripted to challenge forces to think and act quickly in difficult operational environments. This year, the exercise utilized Mattermost’s ChatOps tool to support the use of asynchronous communication channels and collaboration platforms.

Duplantis noted the anticipated impact of ChatOps tools on the Department of Defense’s broader Joint All-Domain Command and Control initiative, which aims to revolutionize joint operations for an information advantage.

“As the DOD progresses on its JADC2 initiatives, I’m confident we’ll see increased reliance on ChatOps across branches as they collaborate to enhance decision quality at the edge,” he said.