• Can the Destructive Bootleg Fire Teach Us to Prevent Wildfires Before They Start?

    More and more, people are moving to less populous, woodland regions of the country, a phenomenon that puts more people in the path of potential wildfires and requires critical utilities such as power and water to be transported long distances from their origins. This creates a system of infrastructure that’s vulnerable to major disruptions—which is exactly what happened in the Bootleg fire.

  • Developing Cohesive, Domestic Rare Earth Element Technologies

    The U.S. has adequate domestic REE resources, but its supply chain is vulnerable due to dependence on foreign entities for separation and purification of these elements. DARPA program aims to fortify supply chain by utilizing bioengineering approaches to facilitate REE separation and purification.

  • Exploring Rare Earth Elements Opportunities

    The purified form of REE is primarily sourced from foreign nations, so the U.S. supply chain of the rare earth elements presents a problem. Justin Wilson, a Cornell chemistry professor, has received a DOE grant to develop more efficient methods of separating rare earth elements that will make their domestic availability economically viable.

  • Smartphone Network Offers Inexpensive Earthquake Early Warning

    A new study demonstrates how Earthquake Early Warning using smartphone technology can be both inexpensive and effective for millions of people. 

  • Delivering Aid to Disaster Scenes with Hydrogen Fuel Cell-Powered Vehicles

    DHS S&T, along with other government agencies, is working on the design and creation of the “H2Rescue” emergency vehicle. The H2Rescue is an innovative new truck that can be a lifeline to responders and community members during times of chaos and uncertainty because the H2Rescue is fully powered by a hydrogen fuel cell.

  • An Urgent NATO Priority: Preparing to Protect Civilians

    Russia’s hybrid warfare approach calls for attacking the populations of Russia’s adversaries not through WWII-like carpet bombing, but rather with a combination of disinformation campaigns, cyberattacks on critical infrastructure, supporting proxy forces, and backing terrorist attacks. “Should NATO prepare for this scenario? Absolutely,” Victoria Holt and Marl Keenan write.

  • Interactive Police Line-Ups Improve Eyewitness Accuracy

    Lineups are used around the globe to help police identify criminals. Typically these involve witnesses examining an image of the suspect alongside ‘fillers’ – individuals who look similar, but who weren’t involved in the crime.A new interactive lineup software enables witnesses to rotate and view lineup faces from different angles.Researchers found that witnesseswere more likely to accurately pick out the criminal from the lineup.

  • U.S. Military Urges Washington to Heed Warnings on China

    For much of this year, officials with U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, the Pentagon and U.S. intelligence agencies have repeatedly warned about the threat from a rising China, from its growing military might to what they describe as Beijing’s ever bolder forays into cyberspace and brazen espionage campaigns. These official are voicing concern that key policymakers and lawmakers may not be taking the threat posed by China seriously enough.

  • New York Defines Illegal Firearms Use as a “Public Nuisance” in Bid to Pierce Gun Industry’s Powerful Liability Shield

    New York will soon test that notion that calling the illegal use of firearms a “public nuisance” could bring an end to the gun industry’s immunity from civil lawsuits. I’ve been researching lawsuits against the gun industry for over 20 years, and I doubt that the New York statute would end the gun industry’s immunity from liability. It is even less clear whether the statute will do much to curb gun violence.

  • U.S. Concerned About Report China is Expanding Missile Silos

    Using images provided by the satellite imaging company Planet, researchers found that China is building 119 silos in the desert of the northwestern province of Gansu.The expansion of the number of launch silos for China’s arsenal of intercontinental range ballistic missiles raises fears that nuclear weapons will become a new issue of contention between Washington and Beijing.

  • Extremism, Paramilitarism Threats in Europe

    A new report examines case studies from the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Ukraine and outlines potential security risks as well as avenues to mitigate threats associated with extremism in paramilitary groups throughout Central and Eastern Europe.

  • Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China

    What do qualitative metrics and case studies reveal about how China attempts to exert influence around the world? How should the United States respond to China’s influence-seeking activities? A new report assesses China’s ability to use various mechanisms of influence to shape the policies and behavior of twenty countries, as well as the lessons that these examples offer for the U.S. strategic competition with China.

  • The Role of Local Police in Countering Domestic Terrorism

    The Biden administration’s National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism lays out a multi-tiered approach to a growing threat. The White House strategy rests, in part, on increased federal-local cooperation, which remains difficult to achieve in practice. The administration’s strategy presumes local police departments have more insight into local permutations of violent extremism – and that federal agencies should have the capabilities to counter it. However, differing priorities and capabilities between local police departments will remain a significant challenge for federal agencies as they attempt to counter domestic terrorism.

  • Financing Violent Extremists

    Ethnically or racially motivated terrorism (EoRMT) is a complex phenomenon that encompasses a wide range of actors. These range from individuals, that operate as lone actors or so called “lone wolves” to small and medium organizations, as well as transnational movements which span borders, and sometimes even continents. A new report finds that the funding of such terrorist attacks varies from country to country, adding to the challenge of tackling such financing.

  • With Cyberattacks Growing More Frequent and Disruptive, a Unified Approach Is Essential

    Coordinated cyberattacks can create massive disruptions to infrastructure and supply chains. New treaties are needed to prevent cyberwarfare, but it’s challenging to predict technological advances.