Awards

Award for Sustained Excellence by a Government Agent
Commander Eric Rasmussen, MD, US Navy
TIDES, Communicator, DARPA One-Way

Cdr. Rasmussen stands out in many ways; his exceptional vision, innovation, perseverance, and accomplishments have resulted in several successful DARPA programs. Starting in 1995, Cdr. Rasmussen provided critical leadership in designing and implementing the successful “DARPA One-Way” translation project. In 2000, Cdr. Rasmussen led the effort to apply early DARPA Translingual IDES technologies in RIMPAC 2000 experiments designed to respond to stabilization, security and humanitarian operations for US and coalition partners. And now, Cdr. Rasmussen is playing a leading role in applying TIDES research products in Iraq. Cdr. Rasmussen is currently stationed at Balboa Hospital in San Diego, practicing internal medicine. That is his day job. His night job is working with DARPA. For us, he has been both a Principal Investigator and an Agent for technical transition. Cdr. Rasmussen is an exceptional officer and his dedication and leadership have been in the highest DARPA tradition. DARPA is proud to award the Sustained Excellence by a Government Agent to CMDR Rasmussen.

Small Business Innovation Research Award
Ace Sarich, VoxTec, a Division of Marine Acoustics
Phraselator

The VoxTec division of Marine Acoustics, Inc. has been working on DARPA funded research in the development of a voice-to-voice phrase translation system. While the utility of the software was clearly demonstrated on notebook computers, there was a need to port the software to a handheld device for the field professional. In September 2001, VoxTec had the first working Phraselator prototype. Shortly thereafter, DARPA solicited rapid technology insertions for support of Operation Enduring Freedom. VoxTec responded with a tactical, robust Phraselator system supporting medical triage, force protection, and refugee reunification for use by troops in Afghanistan. In 89 days, the first advanced prototypes were built, stress-tested, and loaded with three mission packages supporting Pashto, Dari, Urdu, and Arabic languages. Ace Sarich personally delivered the Phraselators and provided training to operational forces in Afghanistan and later into Iraq. VoxTec’s achievement on this project is borne out by the fact that under a DARPA SBIR Phase III contract, military organizations have purchased approximately 2,000 Phraselators. The DARPA Phraselator has become a valuable tool for warfighters around the world enabling them to communicate where language resources are scarce. DARPA is proud to award the Small Business Innovation Research Award to VoxTec.

Award for Significant Technical Achievement
BG Keith Holcomb, Institute for Defense Analysis

Steve Roth, MAYA VIZ
Bill Wright, Oculus
Rich Kadel, Polexis
Ray Emami, GITI
Scott Fouse, ISX Corp

Command Posts of the Future

The Command Post of the Future, or CPoF, gives commanders advanced technology to conduct command functions in new and novel ways. CPOF enables soldiers at all levels of the operational hierarchy to collaboratively plan missions by real-time sharing of critical information all the time, and in a distributed environment. For the first time, subordinate commanders using CPOF can begin a parallel planning process in anticipation of a pending mission order. Senior commanders can see the planning underway, and need not ask subordinate commanders for updates. The result is a significantly faster and more responsive planning process. As a testament to CPOF’s importance ortantly, our forces are using this technology in Iraq today. Accepting the award for the CPoF team is Dr. Steven Roth, CEO and Founder of MAYA Viz. DARPA is proud to award the Significant Technical Achievement to the entire CPoF team.

Award for Sustained Excellence by a Performer
Dino Sofianos, Science Applications International Corporation
TIGER program

Dino Sofianos has made a number of substantial and fundamental contributions in several important research areas. In the area of chemical and biological defense research, Dino was critical to the development of DARPA’s TIGER program, which changes the paradigm for nucleic-acid-based detection of biowarfare agents in a way that also has important implications for the diagnosis of naturally occurring disease. Dino also led the team that proposed the use of chlorine dioxide for rapid decontamination of buildings for DARPA’s Immune Building Program. This approach was successfully used to treat the Hart Senate Office Building when it was contaminated with anthrax. In the research area of detection and characterization of underground facilities, Dino’s SAIC group took the lead in the area of detection of chemical plumes, making significant advancements in developing techniques to overcome environmental background clutter. Their work was significantly contributed to program success by defining the theoretical limitations of separating plume from the background clutter. DARPA is proud to award the Sustained Excellence by a Performer to Dino Sofianos.

The Director’s Award for Outstanding Personal Accomplishment
Colonel Bill Johnson

Colonel William Johnson was the key leader in the successful development, and transition to the United States Army, of the Defense Advanced Research Project’s Agency Future Combat System (FCS).

Future Combat Systems is a networked system-of-systems that will serve as the core building block for future United States Army maneuver units.

Colonel Johnson’s vision, leadership, and technical skill, and Army operational experience directly led to the success of the FCS program. He devised a novel Lead System Integrator (LSI) concept that significantly reduced the time needed for FCS architecture design, technology demonstrations, risk reduction evaluations, technology maturity assessment, and operational requirements analysis. He convinced the Army leadership to accept radically new technologies such as Micro Air Vehicle, Net Fires, and A-160 Unmanned Air Vehicle. Armed with these and other Future Combat System technologies, the United States Army will be able to unleash technological surprise on the battlefield and fundamentally change the way ground warfare is fought. The Director of DARPA is proud to award the Director’s Award for personal accomplishment to Col William Johnson.