Moletronics, Insonification, and More from JASON
Nearly two dozen reports from the JASON defense advisory panel have just been added to the archive of JASON reports on the Federation of American Scientists website.
New additions (all pdf) include a 2004 report on “DNA Barcodes and Watermarks,” a 2001 report on “Moletronics” or molecular electronics, and a 1998 report on “Insonification for Area Denial” (where “insonification” means the projection of focused sound waves). Scanned copies of older JASON reports have been OCR’d to render them word searchable.
A partial, chronological list of unclassified JASON titles from 1963 to 2009 (pdf) was prepared by Allen Thomson, who also helped gather the latest additions to the online collection.
The JASON panel is regularly tasked to investigate challenging, complex issues that are on the horizon if not the forefront of defense science. But many of the panel’s reports are sufficiently well written that they are at least partially intelligible to non-specialists. No new JASON reports have been approved for public release since October 2009.
To secure the U.S. bio-infrastructure, maintain global leadership in biotechnology, and safeguard American citizens from emerging threats to their privacy, the federal government must modernize its approach to human genetic and biological data.
To ensure an energy transition that brings broad based economic development, participation, and direct benefits to communities, we need federal policy that helps shape markets. Unfortunately, there is a large gap in understanding of how to leverage federal policy making to support access to capital and credit.
From use to testing to deployment, the scaffolding for responsible integration of AI into high-risk use cases is just not there.
OPM’s new HR 2.0 initiative is entering hostile terrain. Those who have followed federal HR modernization for years desperately want this effort to succeed.