The Math and Science of Seabees

Filed under Education & Culture, Videos by on May 11, 2012 at 7:12 am {no comments}

Navy personnel are setting a positive example for young people in Yokosuka, Japan, by teaching the importance of science, technology, engineering and math as it relates to everyday life.  How did they do that?  Real world experience, of course.  Seabees demonstrated the importance and uses of math and science to girls from the Yokosuka Middle School.

Even building a Japanese lantern takes math skills:



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Inspiring Future Leaders STEMS From Innovative Thinking

Filed under Education & Culture, Life Sciences by on May 8, 2012 at 11:05 am {no comments}

Ms. Mariam Cocker, from Eleanor Roosvelt High School in Maryland, takes the controls of an F-35 Simulator, instructed by Lockheed Martin Fighter Demonstration Center.

The 317th Recruiting Squadron, based at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, recently started a program to inspire innovation and creativity in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) programs.  They challenged students in Washington D.C., Virginia and Maryland schools with a simple question: Why are STEM careers important to our Nation?

The squadron received an overwhelming response.  Recruiters reached out with the Air Force STEM 2020 Challenge contest to hundreds of schools in the region.  Upon learning of the program, counselors and teachers in Middle Schools and High Schools responded by posted the contest on their social media sites and web pages.

It went viral from there.

The 317 RCS received submissions from schools all over the DC, Virginia and Maryland area.  Eventually, 20 outstanding essay writers were selected in April, and given “golden e-vites” to spend the day learning about innovation in the Department of Defense.  They were each allowed to bring a parent with them.  “This is the Willy Wonka” of STEM programs,” stated MSgt Buffy Brown, Air Force STEM 2020 coordinator.

Essay contest winners were invited to Washington D.C. for a day of innovation and exploration.  They received insider tours of the Pentagon from senior strategy members assigned to the Joint Staff and Air Staff.

I believe we refer to this as the VIP tour.

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Cool Under Pressure – Using Science to Stave Off Hypothermia

Filed under Education & Culture, Physical Sciences by on April 13, 2012 at 7:51 am {no comments}

By Bob Reinert for USAG-Natick Public Affairs

Capt. David DeGroot, Ph.D., puts volunteers into a water immersion tank at the U.S. Army Institute of Environmental Medicine at Natick Soldier Systems Center as part of a study that is looking at how Soldiers' bodies cool down. (By David Kamm,NSRDEC Photographer)

Seventeen years after four soldiers died from hypothermia during the final phase of Ranger School, researchers at the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine at Natick Soldier Systems Center continue to study how the human body cools down, in hopes of one day developing medical techniques to help prevent such tragedies.

“You can’t design possible countermeasures — pharmacological treatments, perhaps — until you know mechanisms,” said Capt. David DeGroot, Ph.D., a research physiologist in USARIEM’s Thermal and Mountain Medicine Division, who is leading the study. “You’ve got to understand the basic mechanism before you (say), ‘Okay, now how do I target it?’

“This is going to allow us to get further insight with the actual mechanisms so that we can follow it up with, Okay, what could we possibly do in terms of an intervention to mitigate that rate of core temperature drop?”

Dr. John Castellani, serving as an Army captain with USARIEM at the time, was a member of the team that conducted the institute’s initial study at Camp Rudder on Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., soon after the February 1995 deaths. He still works at the institute as a research physiologist.

Castellani said that the original study led to adjustments to the tables Rangers use to determine what amount of exposure to cold is safe.
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Epidemic Intelligence: Using the Internet & Text Messages to Fight Disease

Filed under Education & Culture, Technology by on April 9, 2012 at 7:01 am {no comments}

Local doctors in Iquitos conduct a follow-up visit with a young Peruvian child as part of NAMRU-6 project on febrile surveillance. (Courtesy of National Naval medical Research Unit 6)

In the field of ‘epidemic intelligence,’ public health experts often turn to formal and informal data sources to learn about disease events occurring around the world. Advances in technology have been largely responsible for spurring the ability to augment the type and nature of potential data sources.

For example, unstructured data gleaned from the Internet in near real-time can be of significant value in identifying cues or signals that may indicate a disease outbreak is occurring in somewhere  in the world. This information can then be used to help guide response activities among public health officials when appropriate. The massive amount of data contained on the Internet, along with easy to use search tools and computerized language translation software, help make this work possible.

Websites hosted all over the world allow data to be uploaded from virtually anywhere – for instance, in the middle of the Congo with a cellular or satellite phone – making the Internet a very useful tool for discovering novel outbreaks. Where CNN and the BBC are less likely to provide news coverage, the multitude of non–English websites can provide access to information in remote towns in faraway places.

Surveillance of media and other Internet-based sites has become such a rapid method to learn about incipient outbreaks among humans, animals, and even plants, that agencies such as the World Health Organization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control have specialized programs to do this work.

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White House S&T Advisor Tours the Naval Research Laboratory

Filed under Education & Culture, Technology by on March 24, 2012 at 10:42 am {no comments}

Director of the Institute for Nanoscience at the NRL, Dr. Eric Snow, briefs Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Dr. John P. Holdren, during a tour of NRL prior to attending the opening of the Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research. (U.S. Navy photo by John F. Williams/Released)

Advisor to President Barack Obama for the Office of Science and Technology Policy, Dr. John P. Holdren visited the Navy’s corporate laboratory, March 16, to dedicate the opening of the Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research (LASR) and tour the sprawling 130-acre Washington, D.C., campus.

“For nearly 90 years NRL has served the Navy, Marine Corps and our Nation in ever evolving capacities,” said Dr. Holdren, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. “This new facility, dedicated today, builds on a grand NRL tradition of military research and innovation.”

The Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), established through Congress in 1976, is mandated to advise the President and others within the Executive Office of the President on the effects of science and technology (S&T) on domestic and international affairs and lead interagency efforts to develop and implement sound S&T policies and budgets to provide the greatest benefit to society.

With the objective to enable continued scientific leadership in autonomy, the state-of-the-art laboratory will become the nerve center for autonomy research for the Department of Defense (DoD) and will provide specialized facilities to support highly innovative research in intelligent autonomy, sensor systems, power and energy systems, human-system interaction and network and communications platforms.

“Today, the Navy and Marine Corps rely on robotics and autonomous systems for a host of missions, including unmanned air vehicles providing intelligence in Afghanistan, robots that defeat improvised explosive devices, and submersibles that explore the depths of the ocean,” added Holdren.

To see a photo album form Dr. Holdren’s tour of the research facilities, visit the Naval Research Laboratory’s Facebook Page.

Read the full story at the Naval Research Laboratory’s website.

New Rehab Handbook to Assist Warrior Transition Leaders

Filed under Education & Culture by on December 12, 2011 at 5:36 pm {no comments}

There’s a new book out there for new unit leaders involved in the warrior care and transition program.

As Army leaders built the warrior care and transition program, they realized the need for a text to assist new unit leaders attending a two-week course at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. This handbook, which was a year in the making, was hot off the presses Nov. 17.

“Warrior Transition Leader — Medical Rehabilitation Handbook,” was co-edited by Rory Cooper, Col. Paul Pasquina and Ron Drach. With all the books delivered, they’re now planning for a second printing.

“We recognized from the outset (that) we really needed a comprehensive text to provide insights into how you run these programs,” said Lt. Gen. Eric B. Schoomaker, Army surgeon general.

Co-editors of the"Warrior Transition Leader Medical Rehabilitation Handbook," sign copies of their book following a presentation at the Uniformed Service University at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.

The text identifies what the contributing elements of success are for Warrior Transition Units, Schoomaker said, “and how the comprehensive transition plan — this aspiration model of healing and rehabilitation — (can help Soldiers) transition back into uniform or into civilian life — maybe with a whole new role in life. That’s what this text is really designed to do.”

As they developed the first program, he said the nurse case managers, the squad leaders, the primary care physician and all the other cadre and support team members built the Warrior Transition Units as they learned lessons about how best to support, heal, rehabilitate and transition Soldiers and their families. (more…)

Air Force Launches Culture and Language Website

Filed under Education & Culture by on December 9, 2011 at 3:13 pm {no comments}

The Air Force Culture and Language Center, part of Air University’s Spaatz Center here, recently launched a new public website to provide information on the Air Force’s efforts to increase cross-cultural competence — a critical warfighting skill cited by Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in an August memorandum to all Defense Department personnel.

1st Lt. Ryan Castonia (center) studies Arabic with fellow students.(U.S. Air Force photo/1st Lt. Scott Ghiringhelli)

“Both military and civilian personnel should have cross-cultural training to successfully work in DOD’s richly diverse organization and to better understand the global environment in which we operate,” the secretary wrote.

The site, www.culture.af.mil, highlights all AFCLC departments and programs, including free courses that provide Community College of the Air Force credit for Airmen and other cross-cultural competence media resources. Additional training and educational resources are offered to DOD members through the AFCLC’s private site, at https://wwwmil.maxwell.af.mil/afclc/, which requires users to have a Common Access Card and be on a .mil or .gov server.

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DoD 2011 NPLD Project – Catoosa Trout Stream Trash Pickup, Volunteer Training Site Catoosa

Filed under Earth Sciences, Education & Culture by on December 8, 2011 at 11:22 am {no comments}

DoD is funding 41 National Public Lands Day (NPLD) sites on military installations in 2011. The event  encourages volunteers to explore and enjoy America’s natural wonders through outdoor recreation. Find out more about one of these projects below.

Jr. ROTC members at the Catossa Volunteer Training Site

Jr. ROTC members at the Catossa Volunteer Training Site

This NPLD project consisted of a trash pickup on the banks of the section of Tiger Creek located within the Tennessee Army National Guard (TNARNG) Volunteer Training Site in Catoosa County, Georgia.  Tiger Creek is a designated as a Georgia Trout Stream and is listed by the State of Georgia as an Impaired Water. Steep terrain and cool mountain water provide habitat for brook and introduced rainbow and brown trout. The trout streams in Northern Georgia are the southernmost extent of trout streams in the eastern US. The economic impact of trout fishing in Georgia has been estimated to exceed $172 million annually. The pickup is needed to remove road side trash that has been deposited on the creek bank due to frequent flooding over the past year. This trash is unsightly, a hazard to water quality, harmful to wildlife and damaging a delicate ecosystem. (more…)

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