U.S. SPECIAL OPERATIONS COMMAND -- HURLBURT FIELD, Fla. The U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) -- together with the Air Force Research Lab's Strategic Development Planning and Experimentation (AFRL-SDPE) directorate -- is currently developing a variant of the venerable C-130J "Super Hercules" aircraft: an MC-130J Commando II Amphibious Capability (MAC) to improve the platform's support of seaborne special operations. 

Military technology has long looked to the natural world for its cues, taking a page from a field called biomimetics, in which principles from chemistry, biology, and engineering are applied to human-fabricated materials, systems, or machines that function similarly to biological processes.

DAYTON, Ohio. Infoscitex (IST), a DCS company, has won a contract to provide research, discovery, and development support to the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) under the Redefining the Basic Analytical and Simulation Environment (REBASE) program. The multiple-award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract has a shared cost ceiling of $48 million over a four-year period of performance.

ATLANTA, Ga. The U.S. Air Force is investing in the Hermeus Corporation, a United States-based aerospace company, via a $60 million jointly funded contract intended to accelerate the development of hypersonic aircraft and propulsion systems.

WASHINGTON. Satellite provider Hughes Network Systems and low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet company OneWeb have been chosen by the U.S. Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) to demonstrate managed LEO satellite communications (SATCOM) services to connect the Arctic region to sites around the globe and facilitate tactical communications. 

PALO ALTO, Calif. Industrial security company Xage Security has won a contract with the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) to digitize and secure flightline maintenance operations.

CHANTILLY, Va. Intelligence and cyber engineering firm Centauri LLC has won an $11.1 million contract with the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to develop algorithms and collection techniques to enable synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensors to detect, locate, and view ground-based targets as part of the Moving Target Recognition (MTR) project.