Voices from DARPA

logistics challenge sparked a movement to break a nearly century-old barrier holding back heavy vertical-lift aircraft. Phillip “Donna” Smith is a program manager in DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office. He oversees several of the agency’s aerial drone programs, including the Lift Challenge, a national public competition that began with one simple metric: improve payload-to-weight ratio in vertical aircraft, which currently lift only as much as they weigh. What began as a hypothesis that these a

As the landscape of naval warfare changes, traditional defense methods like large convoys and standard object recognition are becoming impractical. New, scalable solutions are needed to help U.S. Navy Sailors identify maritime threats, track potential targets, and safeguard the massive commercial and military logistics vessels that form the backbone of global trade and defense. In this episode, we speak with Christopher Kent, a program manager in DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office. With a backg

What new capabilities can we unlock by understanding how to rearrange the building blocks of matter? At some time in our lives, most of us have learned that matter is made of molecules, molecules are made of atoms, and atoms are made of protons, electrons, and neutrons. But what’s less commonly learned is what’s going on inside those atoms and molecules, such as when a bond breaks or internal components are rearranged through a chemical reaction. In this episode, we sit down with Keith Whitene

What if we could turn economic complexity into strategic understanding? In this episode, we sit down with David Rushing Dewhurst, Ph.D., a program manager in DARPA\'s Information Processing Techniques Office, IPTO. Dewhurst works at the complex intersection of economics, data science, and national security to develop tools that help America navigate a world where economic competition has become a primary battlefield. Dewhurst shares his unconventional path to the agency and takes us through tw

What does it take to solve the world's most urgent national security and economic challenges? At DARPA, it starts with questioning past assumptions. In this episode, we go behind the scenes of a major organizational pivot to hear directly from the office leaders driving the change. We unpack the "why" behind the new names on the doors of two tech offices: The Multi X Office (MXO): Formerly the Microsystems Technology Office (MTO), MXO is breaking down the walls between physics, chemistry, biol

BTO Program Manager Lt. Col. Adam Willis, M.D., U.S. Air Force, joins Voices from DARPA to share his remarkable journey from a ROTC physics major to a leading innovator in military medicine. Dr. Willis discusses how a desire to apply science to help people led him down the dual paths of a Ph.D. in theoretical and appliled mechanics and a medical degree with a focus on neurology. He recounts the moment a demonstration of the DARPA-funded Revolutionizing Prosthetics program sparked his interest,