Background: International collaboration in science and technology (S&T) has expanded exponentially over the past two decades and is now considered the norm within the open scientific community.  Today, many countries no longer have monopolies in areas where there was no competition as recently as a decade ago. Even for fields in which technological dominance still exists, the gap between leader and established followers (and increasingly new players) is shrinking. This shift in S&T competitiveness is illustrated by the volatility of technological leadership in fields such as supercomputing, where the “cutting edge” is often measured in months. Thus, doing the best science means that researchers from academia, industry, and government need to maintain an awareness of advancements in S&T throughout the world.  The purpose of this study is to assess current global S&T engagement practices used by the research arms of the U.S. Department of Defense to take advantage of the opportunities and deal with the challenges brought about by the globalization of S&T. 

The Committee on Globalization of Science and Technology: Opportunities and Challenges is conducting an assessment of the opportunities and challenges of the globalization of S&T for the Department of Defense and the Services (U.S. Army, Air Force, and Navy). The committee will assess (a) current DoD strategies in the three Services for leveraging global S&T and how they are being implemented, (b) past outcomes of these efforts, and (c) the impact these efforts have had on the U.S. Defense S&T enterprise. The committee will consider models for global S&T engagement utilized by other national and international organizations, including the cost effectiveness and efficiency of those approaches and how taking advantage of globalization can shorten the transition time from research to fielded product. The committee will also assess how the ongoing globalization of S&T may impact the future DoD mission space (e.g., research funding/priorities, workforce needs, science diplomacy, operational readiness, avoiding technology surprise, etc.). In addition to findings, the committee may also make recommendations for future DoD and Service strategies to better meet the challenges and opportunities that result from the ongoing globalization of S&T. The product of this project will be a committee-produced, and NRC-reviewed, consensus report containing the findings and/or recommendations of the study committee. 

The sponsors of the study are the Office of Naval Research, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, and the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Research and Technology.
 

Committee Members: Ruth David (Co-chair, Analytic Services Inc.), Arden Bement (Co-chair, Purdue University), Jim C.I. Chang (National Cheng Kung University), C.W. Paul Chu (University of Houston), Susan Cozzens (Georgia Institute of Technology), Katharine Frase (IBM Corp.), Patricia Gruber (Battelle Memorial Institute), Daniel Hastings (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Peter Hoffman (The Boeing Company), Anthony (Bud) Rock (Association of Science and Technology Centers), and James Wilsdon (University of Sussex).

Click HERE for committee member biographies.

National Academies Staff: Ethan Chiang (Co-study director), William Berry (Co-study director), Patricia Wrightson, and Neeraj Gorkhaly. 

Meetings:

·          1st meeting: February 13-14, 2013 in Washington, D.C. (meeting materials available HERE)

·          2nd meeting: April 3-4, 2013 in Washington, D.C. (meeting materials available HERE)

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Background: The Committee on Integrating Humans, Machines and Networks: A Global Review of Data-to-Decision Technologies is conducting an analytical assessment of global research efforts in several technologies that enable humans, machines and computer systems to collaboratively digest and analyze vast amounts of unstructured data in dynamic environments to make decisions. The purpose of this study is to create a coherent and integrated global picture of progress achieved and the challenges ahead.

The sponsor of the study is the National Ground Intelligenc Center of the U.S. Army. 


Committee Members: Jacques S. Gansler (Chair, University of Maryland), Mary (Missy) Cummings (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Barbara J. Grosz (Harvard University), Anita Jones (University of Virginia), Amy A. Kruse (Intific, Inc.), George (Ron) Mangun (University of California – Davis), Tom Mitchell (Carnegie Mellon University), See-Kiong Ng (Singapore’s Agency for Science, Technology and Research), Donald A. Norman (Nielsen Norman Group), Guillermo R. Sapiro (Duke University), Ross Shachter (Stanford University), James D. Shields (Charles Stark Draper Laboratory), Liz Sonenberg (University of Melbourne), Katia Sycara (Carnegie Mellon University), Alyson Wilson (Institute for Defense Analyses), and Victor W. Zue (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)