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Federal agencies apply supercomputing resources toward COVID-19 pandemic Apr 22, 2020

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From modeling airflows aboard medical evacuation aircraft to simulating vaccine candidates, the Defense Department's supercomputing resources are being brought to bear on various aspects of the government's pandemic response. Dr. Will McMahon and Dr. Kevin Newmeyer from the DoD High Performance Computing Modernization Program join Jared Serbu to share some examples. Later, we talk with Dr. Piyush Mehrotra, the chief of the Advanced Supercomputing Division at NASA about how his agency is contributing to the government's supercomputing consortium for COVID-19.

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Pentagon releases last of four solicitations to test 5G technologies Apr 08, 2020

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Last week, the Defense Department released its latest in a series of requests for prototype proposals (RPPs) to help pave the way for incorporating 5G technologies into military networks. Depending on how the project pans out, it could lead to significant improvements in how 5G networks operate in the commercial sector too. Sal D’Itri, the chairman of the spectrum consortium joins Jared Serbu to discuss the new RPP, focused on dynamic spectrum sharing, and the previous three 5G solicitations DoD has already published.

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Nearly 200 military doctors, nurses graduating early to help with coronavirus Apr 01, 2020

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Because of the coronavirus crisis, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences is conferring medical degrees early so those new clinicians can get to work right away. 150 M.D.s and 33 advance practice nurses got their degrees on Wednesday. Dr. Art Kellerman, the dean of USU's Hebert School of Medicine at USU joins us to talk about how the early graduation was accomplished. Also: a look at how the federal oversight community is going to be involved in the more than $2 trillion pandemic relief bill Congress just passed. And we'll discuss exactly what authorities federal agencies have under the president’s recent invocation of the Defense Production Act.

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Navy's 'RAISED' process aims to reduce cybersecurity approval processes from months to one day Mar 11, 2020

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The Navy is jumping on the bandwagon of federal agencies who are reforming their IT security processes to speed new capabilites through the approval process in as little as a day. That’s a far cry from the 13-18 months it currently takes new capabilities to make their way through the Navy’s implementation of the Risk Management Framework. Capt. Susan BryerJoyner joins Jared Serbu to talk about the forthcoming changes under a program called Rapid Assess and Incorporate Software Engineering in a Day (RAISED).

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Defense Innovation Unit picks 5 commerical companies to help military counter small drones Mar 06, 2020

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A little over three years ago, when the forerunner to what’s now called the Defense Innovation Unit was still in its infancy, one of the first projects the Pentagon asked its new Silicon Valley outpost to tackle was the emerging problem of threats from small drones. That’s partly because several well-funded startups had already started to emerge to help companies and other non-Defense customers, like stadium and critical infrastructure operators, deal with the problem of countering unmanned aerial systems (UAS). So DIU was tasked with trying to bring those commercial technologies into the Defense fold – exactly the sort of thing it was designed for. On this week's show, Lt. Col. David Willard, DIU's counter-UAS program manager joins us to talk about how things have progressed since 2016, up to the point where DoD now has five commercial companies on contract to build prototypes.

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DIU picks 5 commerical companies to help military counter small drones Mar 04, 2020

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2019 Pentagon audit shows some signs of progress, OIG says Feb 12, 2020

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After its first two years of full-scale financial audits, the Defense Department is starting to get some of its first concrete indications of how much work likes ahead of it before it can finally earn a clean audit opinion. And according to DoD’s inspector general, there are clear signs of progress – though they’re not necessarily to be found in the number of audit findings the department has been able to fix. On this week's show, Carmen Malone, the Deputy Assistant Inspector General for Audit joins Jared Serbu to discuss the plain-language summary the OIG just released on DoD's 2019 audit findings.

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Pivotal year for overhaul of Army's contracting IT systems Feb 05, 2020

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For almost a decade now, Congress has been pressing the Defense department to modernize and consolidate the IT systems it uses to write contracts. This is a pivotal year in accomplishing that: The Army is beginning to roll out its new Army Contract Writing System, and the Navy is expected to follow shortly thereafter with one that's based on the same commercial product. On this week’s show, we talk with Cherie Smith, the Army’s program executive officer for enterprise information systems, and Stuart Hazlett, the deputy assistant secretary of the Army for procurement, about how the two services are working together, why this procurement got off to a rocky start, and the potential for how it could change things if all goes well. This interview is part of a broader report on the contract writing system changes. For the bigger picture, check out Jason Miller's related story.

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Army's Project Sentinel aims to fix authorization bottleneck for IT systems Jan 22, 2020

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It’s been five years since the Defense Department adopted the Risk Management Framework to assess the cybersecurity of its IT systems. It was a rough ride at first, but DoD organizations have started to work the bugs out. The Army has just launched a three-phase RMF reform effort called Project Sentinel. Nancy Kreidler, the director of cybersecurity and information assurance in the Army CIO’s office talked with Federal News Network’s Jared Serbu about what the Army’s changing, and why.

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Family and supply chain issues join Pentagon's top management challenges this year Dec 04, 2019

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The Defense Department Inspector General has released its annual list of the top ten management challenges facing the Pentagon. Most of the items in the 2020 edition are familiar: shoring up financial management, countering challenges from China, Russia, and global terrorist networks, and defending DoD networks from cyber threats. But there are two new entries this year: One deals with taking care of servicemembers and families. The other points toward the Pentagon’s need to securing and better manage its supply chain. On this week’s show, Brett Mansfield, Senior Advisor to the DoD Inspector General, and Courtney Fones, the IG’s Program Director for Audit join Jared Serbu to discuss the specifics behind those two additions.

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