AN ANALYSIS OF SIZE, WEIGHT AND POWER (SWAP) FOR EMP SHIELDING OF THE RAAD SYSTEM

In 2019, the U.S. Army’s Future Study Program designed and led the Unified Quest Multinational Seminar Wargame. This wargame examined U.S. forces, partners, and allies’ interoperability requirements to defeat a near-peer threat in a future operational environment. As part of the seminar wargame, Army forces executed a critical air assault operation in adversary-controlled terrain to support a river crossing. This task covers multiple aspects of operational planning and coordination for an assault operation as outlined in AFC Pamphlet 71 20-1. An air assault execution revealed the challenges of performing a complex forcible entry operation in a contested, anti-access/aerial denial (A2/AD) environment. Even with future aircraft, the air assault operation was vulnerable to enemy air defense capabilities. Landing zone restrictions reduce the number of areas the multinational forces could conduct air assault operations, providing a marked advantage to near-peer adversaries in planning likely counterattack operations and increasing the risk to forces. Through a combination of integrated air defense systems (IADS), indirect fires, direct fires, and reserve formations specifically tasked with contesting air assault operations, threat forces are expected to contest the air assault force during insertion. As the report stated, the wargame demonstrated the need for new Army air assault capabilities.Major, United States ArmyMajor, United States ArmyCaptain, United States ArmyMajor, United States ArmyMajor, United States ArmyApproved for public release. Distribution is unlimited

A learning analytics approach to correlate the academic achievements of students with interaction data from an educational simulator

This paper presents a Learning Analytics approach for understanding the learning behavior of students while interacting with Technology Enhanced Learning tools. In this work we show that it is possible to gain insight into the learning processes of students from their interaction data. We base our study on data collected through six laboratory sessions where first-year students of Computer Engineering at the University of Genoa were using a digital electronics simulator. We exploit Process Mining methods to investigate and compare the learning processes of students. For this purpose, we measure the understandability of their process models through a complexity metric. Then we compare the various clusters of students based on their academic achievements. The results show that the measured complexity has positive correlation with the final grades of students and negative correlation with the difficulty of the laboratory sessions. Consequently, complexity of process models can be used as an indicator of variations of student learning paths

Communicate! — A Serious Game for Communication Skills

Communicate! is a serious game for practicing communication skills. It supports practicing interpersonal communication skills between a health care professional such as a doctor or a pharmacist, or a (business) psychologist, and a patient or client. A player selects a scenario, and holds a consultation with a virtual character. In the consultation, the player chooses between the various options offered in the scenario. The player scores on the learning goals addressed by the scenario, and gets immediate feedback through the effect of the choice between the answer options on the utterance and emotion of the virtual character. Communicate! also offers an editor for scenarios. A scenario is a graph-like structure, extended with several constructs to avoid the development of repetitive structures. We have performed several experiments with Communicate!, both with students to evaluate the use of Communicate! in various programs at Utrecht University, and with teachers to evaluate the development of scenarios for Communicate

Investigating the morphological and genetic divergence of arctic char ( Salvelinus alpinus)

Polymorphism facilitates coexistence of divergent morphs (e.g., phenotypes) of the same species by minimizing intraspecific competition, especially when resources are limiting. Arctic char (Salvelinus sp.) are a Holarctic fish often forming morphologically, and sometimes genetically, divergent morphs. In this study, we assessed the morphological and genetic diversity and divergence of 263 individuals from seven populations of arctic char with varying length-frequency distributions across two distinct groups of lakes in northern Alaska. Despite close geographic proximity, each lake group occurs on landscapes with different glacial ages and surface water connectivity, and thus was likely colonized by fishes at different times. Across lakes, a continuum of physical (e.g., lake area, maximum depth) and biological characteristics (e.g., primary productivity, fish density) exists, likely contributing to characteristics of present-day char populations. Although some lakes exhibit bimodal size distributions, using model-based clustering of morphometric traits corrected for allometry, we did not detect morphological differences within and across char populations. Genomic analyses using 15,934 SNPs obtained from genotyping by sequencing demonstrated differences among lake groups related to historical biogeography, but within lake groups and within individual lakes, genetic differentiation was not related to total body length. We used PERMANOVA to identify environmental and biological factors related to observed char size structure. Significant predictors included water transparency (i.e., a primary productivity proxy), char density (fish·ha-1), and lake group. Larger char occurred in lakes with greater primary production and lower char densities, suggesting less intraspecific competition and resource limitation. Thus, char populations in more productive and connected lakes may prove more stable to environmental changes, relative to food-limited and closed lakes, if lake productivity increases concomitantly. Our findings provide some of the first descriptions of genomic characteristics of char populations in arctic Alaska, and offer important consideration for the persistence of these populations for subsistence and conservation

International round-robin study on the Ames fluctuation test

An international round-robin study on the Ames fluctuation test [ISO 11350, 2012], a microplate version of the classic plate-incorporation method for the detection of mutagenicity in water, wastewater and chemicals was performed by 18 laboratories from seven countries. Such a round-robin study is a precondition for both the finalization of the ISO standardization process and a possible regulatory implementation in water legislation. The laboratories tested four water samples (spiked/nonspiked) and two chemical mixtures with and without supplementation of a S9-mix. Validity criteria (acceptable spontaneous and positive control-induced mutation counts) were fulfilled by 92-100%, depending on the test conditions. A two-step method for statistical evaluation of the test results is proposed and assessed in terms of specificity and sensitivity. The data were first subjected to powerful analysis of variance (ANOVA) after an arcsine-square-root transformation to detect significant differences between the test samples and the negative control (NC). A threshold (TH) value based on a pooled NC was then calculated to exclude false positive test results. Statistically, positive effects observed by the William's test were considered negative, if the mean of all replicates of a sample did not exceed the calculated TH. By making use of this approach, the overall test sensitivity was 100%, and the test specificity ranged from 80 to 100%