This report summarizes the 2019 findings of the Panel on Review of Extramural Basic Research at the Army Research Laboratory, which reviewed the programs at the Army Research Office's Physical Sciences Directorate.

The modern telecommunications infrastructureâ€"made possible by research performed over the last several decadesâ€"is an essential element of the U.S. economy. The U.S. position as a leader in telecommunications technology, however, is at risk because of the recent decline in domestic support of long-term, fundamental telecommunications research. To help understand this challenge, the National Science Foundation asked the NRC to assess the state of telecommunications research in the United States and recommend ways to halt the research decline. This report provides an examination of telecommunications research support levels, focus, and time horizon in industry, an assessment of university telecommunications research, and the implications of these findings on the health of the sector. Finally, it presents recommendations for enhancing U.S. telecommunications' research efforts.

Traditionally, engineering education books describe and reinforce unchanging principles that are basic to the field. However, the dramatic changes in the engineering environment during the last decade demand a paradigm shift from the engineering education community. This revolutionary volume addresses the development of long-term strategies for an engineering education system that will reflect the needs and realities of the United States and the world in the 21st century. The authors discuss the critical challenges facing U.S. engineering education and present a plan addressing these challenges in the context of rapidly changing circumstances, technologies, and demands.

The ability of the nation's military to prevail during future conflicts, and to fulfill its humanitarian and other missions, depends on continued advances in the nation's technology base. A workforce with robust Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) capabilities is critical to sustaining U.S. preeminence. Today, however, the STEM activities of the Department of Defense (DOD) are a small and diminishing part of the nation's overall science and engineering enterprise. Assuring the U.S. Department of Defense a Strong Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Workforce presents five principal recommendations for attracting, retaining, and managing highly qualified STEM talent within the department based on an examination of the current STEM workforce of DOD and the defense industrial base. As outlined in the report, DOD should focus its investments to ensure that STEM competencies in all potentially critical, emerging topical areas are maintained at least at a basic level within the department and its industrial and university bases.

An Interim Report on Assuring DoD a Strong Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Workforce is a report on the science, technology, mathematics, and engineering (STEM) workforce of the Department of Defense (DOD) and the U.S. defense industrial base is part of an 18-month study to assess the STEM capabilities that the DOD will need in order to meet its goals, objectives, and priorities. This study also assesses whether the current DOD workforce and strategy will meet those needs; and indentifies and evaluates options and recommends strategies that the department could use to help meet its future STEM needs. This study was undertaken by the National Academy of Engineering and the National Research Council. This report was issued for the purpose of assisting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering with its fiscal year 2012 planning process and with laying the groundwork for future years. Earlier in the project, the Committee on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Workforce Needs for the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S. Defense Industrial Base convened a workshop on August 1 and 2, 2011, in Rosslyn, Virginia. This workshop met for the purpose of gathering a broad range of views from the public sector and the private sector. This includes major defense contractors, and from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), all of which are stakeholders in the future STEM workforce. At the conclusion of this study, a final report will be released.

Many federal funding requests for more advanced computer resources assume implicitly that greater computing power creates opportunities for advancement in science and engineering. This has often been a good assumption. Given stringent pressures on the federal budget, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) are seeking an improved approach to the formulation and review of requests from the agencies for new computing funds. This book examines, for four illustrative fields of science and engineering, how one can start with an understanding of their major challenges and discern how progress against those challenges depends on high-end capability computing (HECC). The four fields covered are: atmospheric science astrophysics chemical separations evolutionary biology This book finds that all four of these fields are critically dependent on HECC, but in different ways. The book characterizes the components that combine to enable new advances in computational science and engineering and identifies aspects that apply to multiple fields.

In its fiscal year 2002 budget summary document the Bush administration expressed concern-based in part on the findings and conclusions of two National Research Council studies-about recent trends in the federal funding of astronomy and astrophysics research. The President's budget blueprint suggested that now is the time to address these concerns and directed the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to establish a blue ribbon panel to (1) assess the organizational effectiveness of the federal research enterprise in astronomy and astrophysics, (2) consider the pros and cons of transferring NSF's astronomy responsibilities to NASA, and (3) suggest alternative options for addressing issues in the management and organization of astronomical and astrophysical research. NASA and NSF asked the National Research Council to carry out the rapid assessment requested by the President. This report, focusing on the roles of NSF and NASA, provides the results of that assessment.

Part of the Physics in a New Era series of assessments of the various branches of the field, Elementary-Particle Physics reviews progress in the field over the past 10 years and recommends actions needed to address the key questions that remain unanswered. It explains in simple terms the present picture of how matter is constructed. As physicists have probed ever deeper into the structure of matter, they have begun to explore one of the most fundamental questions that one can ask about the universe: What gives matter its mass? A new international accelerator to be built at the European laboratory CERN will begin to explore some of the mechanisms proposed to give matter its heft. The committee recommends full U.S. participation in this project as well as various other experiments and studies to be carried out now and in the longer term.

Dramatic progress has been made in all branches of physics since the National Research Council's 1986 decadal survey of the field. The Physics in a New Era series explores these advances and looks ahead to future goals. The series includes assessments of the major subfields and reports on several smaller subfields, and preparation has begun on an overview volume on the unity of physics, its relationships to other fields, and its contributions to national needs. Nuclear Physics is the latest volume of the series. The book describes current activity in understanding nuclear structure and symmetries, the behavior of matter at extreme densities, the role of nuclear physics in astrophysics and cosmology, and the instrumentation and facilities used by the field. It makes recommendations on the resources needed for experimental and theoretical advances in the coming decade.

This report summarizes the 2018 findings of the Panel on Review of Extramural Basic Research at the Army Research Laboratory, which reviewed the programs at the Army Research Office's Information Sciences Directorate.