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Editor’s Perspective
7 AI, UAS, rapid tech integration highlight SOF Week 2025 coverage
By John M. McHale III
Connecting with Mil Embedded
31 By Lisa Daigle
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8 Space system designs, RF signal chain, MOSA in space Q&A with Eliot Fine, Product Line Manager for Space and High Reliability Components at Analog Devices
By John M. McHale III, Group Editorial Director
SPECIAL REPORT: Military satellite communications
12 Speed, modularity, and more: Satellite communications and space exploration
By Mike RessL, AirBorn – a Molex Company
MIL TECH TRENDS: Enabling artificial intelligence in military systems
16 From swarms to digital twins: AI’s future in defense is now
By Dan Taylor, Technology Editor
20 AI in deployed systems
By Mike Southworth, Curtiss-Wright Defense Systems
24 Real-time digital twins with AI/ML: A new level of battlefield intelligence By Dr. William Bain, ScaleOut Software
INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT: Rad-hard electronics design trends
28 Radiation-tolerant and radiation-hardened components in space power design
By Chandra Hackenbruch, Infineon Technologies
ON THE COVER:
Artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous technology are revolutionizing military operations. A V-BAT uncrewed aerial system (UAS) recovers aboard Harpers Ferry-class dock landing ship USS Carter Hall (LSD-50). The V-BAT enables the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations Capable (MEU(SOC)) to increase maritime awareness through the use of remote intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance sensors. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Rafael Brambila-Pelayo.
https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1864255/
Behlman introduces the first test-proven VPX power supplies developed in alignment with the SOSA Technical Standard. Like all Behlman VPXtra® power supplies, these 3U and 6U COTS DC-to-DC high-power dual output units feature Xtra-reliable design and Xtra-rugged construction to stand up to the rigors of all mission-critical airborne, shipboard, ground and mobile applications.
> 6U power module developed in alignment with the SOSA Technical Standard
> Delivers 1050W DC power via two outputs
> VITA 46.11 IPMC for integration with system management
> 3U power module developed in alignment with the SOSA Technical Standard
> Delivers 800W DC power via two outputs
> VITA 46.11 IPMC for integration with system management
TITLE
15 ACCES I/O Products, Inc. – M.2 –The new, more flexible alternative to PCIe mini cards
23 AirBorn – FOCUS active optical cable solutions
2 Analog Devices, Inc. –Who better to integrate ADI parts than ADI?
5 Behlman Electronics, Inc. –Behlman leads the pack again!
25 Daqscribe Solutions LLC –Daqscribers finding diamonds in every recording!
10 Dawn VME Products – Dawn single slot OpenVPX development backplanes
33 EPIQ – Software Defined Radio Applications & Platforms
32 GMS – X0 Venom. The world's most advanced 3U OpenVPX rugged modules
3 Mercury Systems, Inc. –AI at the edge demands high-speed processing
27 Micro-Coax, an Amphenol company – Unlocking Performance with Semi-Rigid Coaxial Cables
29 PICO Electronics Inc –Size does matter!
Achieving High Performance
MOSA Conformance
A three-part on-demand webinar series Sponsored by Wind River https://tinyurl.com/ynasyhfy
IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium (IMS 2025)
June 15-20, 2025 San Francisco, CA https://ims-ieee.org/ MILSATCOM
June 16-18, 2025 Arlington, VA
https://www.smgconferences.com/defence/ northamerica/conference/MilSatCom-USA
MOSA Industry & Government Summit & Expo
August 27-29, 2025
National Harbor, MD https://events.techconnect.org/MOSA_2025/
AUSA 2025
October 13-15, 2025
Washington, DC
https://meetings.ausa.org/annual/2025/
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By John M. McHale III
Rapid integration of technology, artificial intelligence (AI) solutions, and drone/counterdrone systems were the hot topics and products at SOF Week 2025 in Tampa, which saw attendance of about 20,000 at the early-May event.
U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) leadership called for acquisition reform, greater use of AI technology, and leveraging uncrewed systems creatively as done in Ukraine, as we detailed in our coverage as the Official Show Daily producer with Shephard Group, including briefs on keynote speeches. Technology Editor Dan Taylor covered each speech for the Show Daily.
“That rapid fielding, that rapid integration, that feedback loop is critical across the joint force,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told attendees during his keynote address on the second day of SOF Week 2025. “Today that means mortar and munitions, AI-enabled targeting platforms, and new counterUAS systems.”
Taylor reported that Hegseth also highlighted the planned Golden Dome missile-defense system for the U.S. and mentioned a future 6th-generation fighter aircraft.
“Our goal is to put the best systems in the hands of our warfighters,” Hegseth noted. “We’re doing this by reviving our defense industrial base, reforming our acquisition process, and rapidly fielding emerging technologies. What we see today in your formations [is] the fielding of rapidly emerging technologies, which are critically important to help us remain a leader in the world for generations to come. Everyone here today ... has a role to play in rebuilding our military.”
Gen. Bryan P. Fenton, USSOCOM commander, told SOF Week attendees that the war in Ukraine demonstrates the necessity for USSOCOM to innovate much more quickly than it has in the past, according to Taylor’s reporting.
“We’ve got to get away from current processes that deliver us yesterday’s requirements today,” Fenton said. “If we’ve learned anything from our partners in Ukraine, it’s that we need to innovate now in minutes, days, and weeks, not years and decades. And we’ve got plans to trailblaze this change.”
Taylor reported that Fenton pointed to constant innovation in the commercial sector that could become useful to the U.S. military, from driverless taxis to drones that deliver pizzas.
“We need those kinds of systems for the special ops community that is waiting for it: attritable, asymmetric, affordable, and plentiful at scale to deceive, dazzle, sense, make sense of, and
John.McHale@opensysmedia.com
act addressing the multiple challenges we’ve laid out,” Fenton noted. “We see companies – small companies, big companies, many others – with unique breakthrough ideas that are gamechanging in sensing and disrupting our adversaries’ kill chains, and they are bringing incredible solutions to our Global SOF warfighters, helping us with problems and giving us novel ways to think about modernizing existing capabilities.”
He specified quantum computing and AI as technology the SOF community should be taking advantage of.
Along those lines, USSOCOM announced that it had extended its contract with Legion Intelligence to continue deploying generative AI (GenAI) infrastructure across secure and classified networks. The contract extension follows what the company describes as successful implementation of GenAI capabilities across a variety of cloud-based, hybrid, and on-premises environments in support of USSOCOM missions, according to the announcement.
Marrying AI and autonomous systems is something companies like Shield AI are already doing. During the May event, Heath Niemi, vice president of Strategic Engagement at Shield AI, talked on-camera with us about the capabilities of the V-BAT tactical uncrewed aerial system – a Group 3 vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) uncrewed aerial system (UAS) equipped with Shield AI’s proprietary Hivemind autonomous pilot software. (View the Niemi interview at https://tinyurl.com/bddryz89.)
Combining this tech is beyond game-changing for small units, as Brandon Tseng, Shield AI president and co-founder told me prior to last year’s SOF Week, saying that he saw AI pilots – a self-driving technology as applied to drones – as the most likely use of AI in the next five to 10 years. “There is no reason why a SEAL platoon or a Ranger troop can’t wield the same combat power as a carrier strike group. No reason why with AI that those 16 people can’t have the same combat power as a 5,000person carrier strike group consisting of 200 aircraft, short- and long-range missiles, destroyers, etc.”
The ways in which tools like Hivemind are being leveraged for combat and ISR applications are also covered in this issue by Dan Taylor on page 16, where he speaks to Shield AI as well as Red Cat, Palladyne, Raytheon, and Wind River.
During SOF Week, Red Cat and Palladyne made news with a demonstration during which Red Cat’s Teal 2 and Black Widow UAS platforms with Palladyne AI’s Pilot software enabled the drones to independently detect and track static and dynamic ground targets – including humans and vehicles – without centralized infrastructure. To read more, please visit www.militaryembedded.com/sofweek.
By John M. McHale III
High-reliability radio-frequency (RF) components are in demand for various military space missions, as is the use of commercial innovation in low-Earth orbit (LEO) and other space domains, Eliot Fine, Product Line Manager for Space and High Reliability Components at Analog Devices, told me in a recent McHale Report podcast. During the podcast, we also covered the space electronics market, radiation-hardening techniques, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) modular open system approach (MOSA) mandate’s impact on space systems, and details on the RF signal chain, a concept developed by Fine’s team at Analog Devices. Edited excerpts follow.
MCHALE: Can you please share your experience in the defense and space industry and your responsibility with ADI [Analog Devices, Inc.] and your group’s role within the overall larger company?
FINE: I’ve been with ADI for about six years and for much of that time, I was working with aerospace and defense customers, and specifically with the space market. [Recently] I moved into a product line role. ADI is structured by verticals at a broad level, so that would be aerospace and defense [in my case], and then into technical groups that have product responsibility and do product development for those particular technologies. We are a unique and particularly exciting technical group at ADI, because we’re not doing just one thing. We are instead producing high-rel components and solutions for the space market and for other applications that require that degree of high reliability. We get to leverage the broad breadth of ADI’s technology [where] there’s a vast IP portfolio that we get to pull from, which is really exciting.
We’ll actually partner with the silicon design groups to help them think about space as an end market as they’re doing their early phase design. It ends up being kind of a mix between a business unit and a functional unit in terms of how we interface with the rest of ADI. We have product development, radiation
effects, and marketing all under one roof, as well as some operations and programmanagement folks.
MCHALE: What are the hottest applications for military space missions today? Are they small sats, longer-life satellite programs, classified, manned space flight? Where are you seeing the most activity?
FINE: All of the above. We’re still seeing those classified missions. We’re still seeing some manned space flight, but small sats, shorter mission lives, and proliferation are starting to become a trend more and more, not only with the commercial world, but also with the military and aerospace world. We have a long history supporting all the programs mentioned, from things like the James Webb Space telescope to a handful of classified programs. And as I said before, we get to leverage our breadth of technology to support all those various mission applications. Short answer is we see it all, but definitely that trend towards collaboration is a fairly common one.
MCHALE: Developing components for space takes longer to ensure they can survive the extreme radiation environments above Earth’s atmosphere. What are the factors driving rad-hard designs today? What kind of requirements are you getting from your defense customers?
FINE: As we said before, the industry is trending towards that proliferation. They want broad-based coverage for communication and threat detection. It’s no longer looking at single points of interest. We want a broad network and not only in LEO, but also moving towards MEO [medium Earth orbit] and GEO [geosynchronous Earth orbit] proliferation. We’re not doing the single- or couple-point GEO satellites anymore. Speed is definitely critical – that rapid deployment, being able to leverage commercial solutions to get something up into space faster. There’s no time for boutique solutions anymore and customers are looking for leading-edge technology to be able to leverage in their applications.
We’re moving away from the days where products that were defined before I was born are still used commonly in space. There are quite a few products, even in our portfolio, that are old that we still support and will continue to support. But we want to look to pulling in as much modern technology as possible.
And you touched on something there about how we qualify things for space, and how that is a long lead time. We’re doing what we can to try to shorten that lead time. We
want to leverage our commercial solutions as much as possible. We want to also intercept our product-line designs earlier in their design cycle. We’re not waiting until the commercial silicon is released as a commercial product, to then go back and say, okay, can we turn this into a space-qualified product? Can we modify the silicon? We want to instead work with them early on to define something that’s dual-use, that can service those commercial applications and also service the military market with some minor modifications.
MCHALE: Is that the 80% solution when it comes to rad-hard design? If someone doesn’t need megarad-hard then they [don’t] pay for it. Is that what you’re going after with that part of the market?
FINE: Absolutely. Customers are more cost-sensitive than ever. More programs are firm, fixed-price. They’re looking for ways to deliver on time and in budget. A good way to do this is adjusting the requirements to meet the real demands of the mission profile. You don’t need mega-rad, as you said, for a three-yearmission-life LEO application. So, we try to offer a breadth of screening and test capabilities so that customers can pick the right thing for their mission. We would ideally like to have the same product, or same product family, with an offering that supports a short-missionlife LEO, something that might be more medium-mission-life, and then deepspace, long missions. We want to try to have that suite of offerings for our customers so that they can pick and choose what they need based on the application.
MCHALE: More shorter-life satellites are being deployed today, with 15-year life cycles mostly a thing of the past, like the stuff that you say was built before you were born. Are the shorter lifespans driving the demand for less than mega-rad?
FINE: That’s reducing the focus on total ionizing dose (TID) as a metric, so singleevent effects (SEE), and single-event latchup (SEL) is still critical because you can’t have your parts fail in space
if there’s a solar flare or something like that. But, if the mission life is short, we don’t need 200 KRAD TID [total ionizing dose]. Many missions can be good enough with 10. Then that opens up a broader door of what types of products are available, and what type of products we can qualify for space as well. Because we may not need to redesign or design in a different process to get that 200 KRAD threshold.
MCHALE:When we last spoke you talked about a concept called the RF signal chain, and you said you were trying to push that into the space market. What do you mean by that? What is the signal chain, what is on the chain, and what is it doing in space?
FINE: At ADI we want to be system providers in general for our customers, whether that’s complete modules and systems that we sell to some of our customers first or offering a breadth of components that can be put together to meet a whole signal chain or a power chain. We’re using that same mentality in space. We’re positioning ourselves to support the radio in space, everything from the informer to bits and back. We want to be that solution provider, whether as a complete system, or as a suite of components that can get you to a complete system. So, we have a strong portfolio of the informer, ICs, RF amplifiers, control products and detectors, frequency-conversion and -generation RF transceivers, and high-speed data converters to allow our customers to put together that whole radio in space.
MCHALE: How is the DoD’s MOSA [modular open system approach] mandate impacting military space designs? Does it go in hand in hand with this push we hear about towards leveraging COTS [commercial off-the-shelf] components in space?
FINE: I think it does go hand in hand with leveraging COTS. They come from that same core need where customers want increased speed and agility [in] a rapidly changing environment. Everyone wants faster time to market, and they rarely have time to be bespoke. So, it does come from that same core need. In your magazine, you had a great article from Dawn Zoldi [April/May 2025, “The Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor: MOSA in flight”] on what Lockheed Martin was doing to create platform architectures and how they were digitally modified for different missions and applications. That trend has continued, I think, and I’m seeing a similar approach at many of the major players in the industry.
MCHALE: Regarding COTS, it was often considered a nasty four-letter word in the military space market, because the C stood for “commercial.” But now you’re seeing the phrase “COTS in space” much more often. The price requirements are increasing demand for COTS components. How do you meet that demand for COTS while maintaining reliability?
FINE: Part of it is developing with space in mind [from the beginning], thinking about space as part of the requirements for [each] product. The other thing we’re doing is we’ve created flows specifically tailored at a step-down tiers from that traditional space, Class V product, where we have “commercial space high” or CSH [product screening and qualification flow] that is leveraging the native plastic package, leveraging the cost efficiencies of commercial manufacturing and the reliability that comes with the commercial production scale. You get lower failure-in-time (FIT) rates when you’re producing in mass versus producing just a couple units at a time. We leverage that commercial manufacturing, but then we still put that product through a full quality-control inspection and 240-hour burn in. It’s a best-of-both-worlds scenario where you use that plastic product, you get the smaller form factors, you get more modern technology, but you still have a lot of confidence that you’re not going to have earlylife failures, infant mortality with those products.
Stepping down from that, we have our commercial space low offering, which is essentially like a space-enhanced product, where we’ve done things to validate the product
for space, but will offer radiation testing on that product and wafer traceability. We’ll make sure there’s no little things like that that take it a step up from COTS. Basically you’re getting a COTS product, or COTS-like, and we can price them much more aggressively because we’re leveraging our commercial manufacturing flows. We’re offering different things for different missions. We know there are going to be some missions where pure COTS or automotive products are going to be used. We want to support those customers, too. We’re not here to tell you have to use a certain type of product from us. We want to have an offering that can support different types of missions for different lengths, with different types of products.
MCHALE: How does the government funding for microelectronics – talking about the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 – impact defense space systems, and when will we see the impact?
Reliable and Ready. You need it right. You want Dawn. Highly useful as stand alone or in combination with other backplanes, with or without RTM connectors. Multiple units can be topology wired using MERITEC VPX Plus cables. The Dawn family of one-slot OpenVPX test station and development backplanes gives engineers the ability to perform compatibility tests and easily reconfigure payload module profiles and slot interoperability to meet custom requirements.
FINE: ADI is committed to robust supply chain and supply-chain security, with or without CHIPS Act funding. This is something is something that we’re going to do regardless. We have already built in redundancy to Taiwan into the way we manufacture our products. We have a plan to get redundant to Taiwan and China in manufacturing over the next couple of years, whether that’s keeping a large-volume die bank, or whether that’s actually duplicating our foundry processes at other at other foundries outside of Taiwan and China. On a commercial level, on a broad ADI level, we are already looking for that reliability. But ADI is poised to receive CHIPS Act funding. A portion of this will be used to expand our trusted-manufacturing facility in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, where we [produce] the vast majority of our RF space products and do integrated assemblies there for defensive customers.
MCHALE: From a disruption standpoint, what do you see being a disrupter in the space market? A technology? A procurement strategy? A couple years ago, I had a gentleman in the space industry say the disruptor would be COTS in space as a procurement strategy. What do you see?
FINE: I think that procurement strategy is valid. [It’s] already happening. I think that the procurement strategy is changing [now]. But I think the big change 10 years from now will be the intelligent edge. We will see significantly more compute power on the satellite itself, so AI [artificial intelligence] can be leveraged to preprocess the data before transmitting back to Earth, which reduces the packet size that has to come back and reduces power up there. This then dovetails into autonomous maneuvering, broader connectivity, both on Earth and in space. I think even farther out, maybe not quite as far as we think, the lunar economy will start to start to pop up. And we’re already seeing seeds of that planting as I talk to customers in the space market. MES
Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI) www.analog.com/en/index.html
TECHNOLOGY, TRENDS, AND
Military Embedded Systems focuses on embedded electronics – hardware and software – for military applications through technical coverage of all parts of the design process. The website, Resource Guide, e-mags, newsletters, podcasts, webcasts, and print editions provide insight on embedded tools and strategies including technology insertion, obsolescence management, standards adoption, and many other military-specific technical subjects.
Coverage areas include the latest innovative products, technology, and market trends driving military embedded applications such as radar, electronic warfare, unmanned systems, cybersecurity, AI and machine learning, avionics, and more. Each issue is full of the information readers need to stay connected to the pulse of embedded technology in the military and aerospace industries.
By Mike RessL
Meeting the insatiable demand for high-bandwidth, reliable data transmission is a major imperative for applications involving satellites and space exploration where uninterrupted communication is paramount. According to a 2024 study from Research and Markets, the rapid rise in space exploration, combined with the increasing frequency of satellite launches, is ramping requirements for radiation-hardened (rad-hard) electronics that can withstand cosmic radiation and solar flares. As a result, the global rad-hard electronics market is expected to reach $9.77 billion by 2034. This growth is driven by private and government entities embracing highly rugged and reliable solutions capable of enduring extreme ionizing radiation exposure while optimizing stringent size, weight and power (SWaP) requirements.
The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) relies heavily on satellites, with proliferation considered a top priority of the Space Development Agency (SDA). With responsibility for managing the development and deployment of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture, the SDA is planning to deploy hundreds of optically interconnected
satellites to collect and transfer missioncritical data via transport, tracking, custody, deterrence, navigation, battle management, and support layers.
In late March 2025, SpaceWERX, the innovation arm of the U.S. Space Force, announced plans to create multiple maneuverable space vehicles for increasing the speed and flexibility of in-space operations. The development of an “orbital carrier” is designed to serve as a prepositioned satellite launch pad in space to enhance the nation’s space defense by enabling on-demand space vehicle and satellite deployments. These priorities are closely aligned with the need to transfer data accumulated from spacecraft payloads – including sensors, instruments, and technologies – to other spacecraft modules for on-board processing and analysis before sending results to the ground.
Ongoing technological improvements in avionics modules and spacecraft payloads are generating ever-increasing amounts of high-resolution data that requires high-bandwidth cables to carry data signals between modules. To keep pace with rising data rates, spacecraft designers are deploying higher-speed communication links, including alternatives to traditional copper coaxial cables. Designing and developing rad-hard interconnects is a balancing act, as they must accommodate ever-increasing bandwidth while withstanding prolonged exposure to extreme environmental, electrical, mechanical and thermal stressors.
For starters, the electronics to support faster transmission speeds must be more impervious to radiation exposure. Over time, ionizing radiation, which is measured by total ionizing dose (TID), can degrade the performance of components, rendering them inoperable. Additionally, single-event effects (SEE) caused by interaction with high-energy particles can result in electronic disturbances, ranging from intermittent errors and voltage disruptions to catastrophic device failures.
Choosing fiber-optic cables over copper delivers much faster speeds over longer distances without signal degradation. Unlike coaxial cables, fiber-optic cables are immune to electromagnetic interference (EMI) because they rely on the transmission of light rather than electric signals, and light is not affected by EMI. Using fiber, however, introduces new operational challenges as traditional fiber interconnects must be spliced,
polished, and terminated precisely to avoid risk of exposure to foreign object debris (FOD) and cable damage leading to intermittent or complete link failure. Moreover, stringent cleaning and inspection of fiber-optic interconnects is required to avoid contaminated connections, which remain one of the most prevalent causes for fiberrelated performance problems in data centers.
Fortunately, a subset of fiber-optic cable solutions, called active optical cable (AOC), alleviates these concerns by blending the benefits of copper and fiber-optic cable assemblies into an integrated interconnect assembly. AOCs are already popular and proven in data centers for connecting servers and networking equipment when distance requirements exceed the limitations of copper cables. Now, next-generation, space-rated AOCs are emerging to provide game-changing advantages for the aerospace and defense market. This enabling technology not only delivers high-speed, high-capacity (“big pipe”) transmission, it also offers product designers much-needed design flexibility, modularity and versatility.
Unlike conventional fiber-optic cables, which consist of fibers terminated by optical connectors, AOCs are an optical fiber cable with electrical connectors at each end. They accept the same electrical inputs as traditional copper cables but use optical fiber between the connectors for increased cable speed and distance without sacrificing compatibility with standard electrical interfaces.
As depicted in Figure 1, an electrical signal on the transmit side of an AOC goes through the copper interface and triggers a laser diode driver (LDD) that lights the vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL). That laser then sends an optical signal down the fiber to the receiving end of the cable where it is received by a PIN photodiode, which is a type of photodetector or semiconductor device used to convert light signals into electric signals. The PIN photodiode sends the signal to the current-tovoltage converter, called the transimpedance amplifier (TIA), which creates and sends an electrical signal back through the copper interconnect to devices, hosts, or printed circuit boards (PCBs).
The operation is straightforward, as the user simply unplugs the copper cable and plugs in the AOC to realize additional speed and performance benefits. Moreover, the termination of the fiber-optic cable is handled internally to the system, which alleviates problems associated with cleaving, polishing, and terminating fiber. With AOCs, fiber terminations are performed in a cleanroom environment during the assembly process, further reducing contamination risks.
One of AOC’s overarching benefits is its versatility, as either copper or fiber can be used to meet application needs. At short distances, typically less than three meters,
copper is still more cost-effective and therefore the preferred option. At longer distances, however, as well as when dealing with applications where signal integrity is paramount, AOCs are the superior choice. Space-rated AOCs currently support up to 50 Gb/sec aggregate bandwidth at a length of 35 meters while rugged, non-space options can support similar speeds at distances as far as 100 meters.
Designed for multi-lane data communications and interconnect applications, AOCs are protocol-agnostic, which is especially relevant in the defense and aerospace industries where proprietary applications and protocols are commonplace. AOCs weigh less than copper and withstand shock and vibration better than traditional fiber-optic transceiver solutions and are easier to install.
AOCs also boast smaller cable diameters than copper, which eases installation and routing in space-constrained satellites and spacecrafts. The combined capabilities can reduce both supply-chain cost and complexity because customers can buy a holistic interconnect solution from a best-of-class AOC provider without needing to source and manage multiple suppliers.
Taking AOCs into space
Widely used in data centers for decades, AOC technology has continued to mature and diversify through the use of increasingly ruggedized commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components that simplify assembly and deployment while boosting reliability. As Figure 2 illustrates, space-rated AOCs deliver heightened performance while requiring less space, weight, and maintenance than traditional AOCs. For space-industry applications, however, companies must be prepared to address a set
of rigorous requirements classified as Thermal, Electrical, Mechanical, Optical and Radiation (TEMOR).
A different type of balancing act emerges when dealing with the unique circumstances of putting electronics into space. It is crucial to understand the exact application as well as the intended lifespan of all associated electronics, along with the entire realm of environmental factors possible over the course of the mission. This understanding enables the assessment of appropriate safety factors. For instance, ensuring resilience against effects of radiation-induced attenuation (RIA) is a top priority. The impact of RIA can worsen as distances increase, causing a gradual darkening of optical materials, making it increasingly difficult for light to pass through the fiber.
Other considerations range from requirements for different error-correction mechanisms and redundant circuits to special materials for shielding and housing. Increasingly, development efforts also should consider the DoD’s preferred method for designing adaptable systems, known as the Space Systems MOSA [modular open systems approach] reference framework. MOSA advocates for the use of open interface standards with modular systems to expedite deployments while enhancing resiliency and compatibility of future space systems.
Space-rated electronics also must withstand a wide range of temperatures while minimizing the release of gas from cables and components in the vacuum of space. Other critical areas of concern include power consumption, vibration levels, and optical cable distance, as well as the type and duration of radiation exposure. In particular, interconnects must be designed to resist radiation-induced embrittlement, conductivity loss and atomic oxygen erosion while retaining reliable operation in vacuum environments.
AOCs typically have simpler designs with fewer parts than traditional transceivers, which reduces potential failure points and inventory stock keeping units (SKUs). To reach the pinnacle of reliable performance for space-based operation,
however, product designs must be thoroughly analyzed to ensure products will perform flawlessly under the harshest conditions.
A litany of tests, as delineated in Figure 3, must be conducted throughout the entire design and development process to qualify product performance for its intended application and life cycle. Worstcase analysis of the long list of functional features can include electrical stress, the telemetry and command interface, decoupling, de-rating, timing, logic compatibility, link margin, power sequencing, power consumption, and signal integrity.
Following a complete and comprehensive design process, fastidious attention to detail must be applied to the cable assembly process, including stress and dynamics analyses to gauge performance across the complete spectrum of dynamic and thermal environments. Other tests, such as venting analysis, should be conducted to determine how well the assembly tolerates depressurization and pressurization cycles, along with electrical and RF simulations and analysis.
Exhaustive product design evaluations are imperative to expose the product’s components to radiation, EMI, thermal, VCSEL, and PIN life testing across multiple temperatures and bias conditions. Depending on the severity of the performance requirements, multiple testing cycles generating reports with hundreds of pages of results might be needed before sign-off on a space-rated product. On the manufacturing side, cleanroom environments overseen by specially trained technicians are necessary to ensure that optics are properly sealed while safeguarding them from any potential FOD exposure.
When time is of the essence, rad-hard SAOC solutions reduce engineering time by eliminating the need for a specialized transceiver, as well as the time and expense of cleaning, testing and terminating fiber. Additionally, an economy of scale is gained by owning both ends of a communication link, as this eliminates the need to carry and certify two distinct solutions from different vendors. Standards for testing, analysis, and lot acceptance are also elevated. In the future, the ability to design, develop, and
deploy next-generation satellites, spacecraft and space vehicles will depend on the availability of radiation-hardened and non-outgassing electronic components. MES
Mike RessL has five years of experience with AirBorn, where he leads the FOCuS space-rated AOC development. Prior to AirBorn he spent 14 years with Hitachi Cable as Vice President of Technical Marketing and Business Development; five years at Lucent Technologies – ONG Group; and 10 years at Amoco Laser, a spin-off from research work performed at the Amoco Research Center. His technical expertise includes data communication hardware development and test for space applications, electro-optics, semiconductor devices, lasers, fiber optics, microscopy, MEMS, internet privacy, and location-based data access systems. He also holds 16 patents in these areas. RessL holds a bachelor of science degree in physics, and earned an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.
AirBorn, a Molex Company • https://www.airborn.com/
Enabling artificial intelligence in military systems
By Dan Taylor
Drones that hunt targets without human pilots. Artificial intelligence (AI) systems that predict when military equipment will break down weeks before it actually fails. Computer networks that keep working even when enemies jam communications or cut internet connections. These visions of the future are unfolding right now, as the defense industry moves beyond prototypes to deploy AI systems that military personnel can use in real operations.
The shift toward real-world use of artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled battlefield technology represents a fundamental change in how the military thinks about AI. Instead of trying to replace human decision-makers, these new systems are designed to give warfighters better information faster, handle routine tasks automatically, and keep critical systems running when traditional networks fail.
However, making AI work reliably in changeable military environments carries so many questions: How do you train computer systems when real combat scenarios are too dangerous to practice? How do you ensure autonomous weapons make the right choices in lifeor-death situations? Perhaps most importantly, how do you build AI that soldiers and commanders will actually trust?
The solutions put forward by several defense contractors reveal not just what military AI could do someday, but what it’s already doing today on bases and in field operations around the world.
Bringing autonomous intelligence to smaller units
Red Cat (San Juan, Puerto Rico) hopes to fundamentally change how small military
units gather intelligence with its Black Widow small uncrewed aerial platform. Working with partner company Palladyne AI through the Red Cat Futures Initiative, the companies recently demonstrated three uncrewed aerial systems (UASs) that conducted autonomous target tracking without human intervention.
“We conducted a three-drone test using Teal 2 and Black Widow doing autonomous collaboration of target tracking on the edge, so that really enables the operators to do other missions while the drones are out there collecting that intel,” says Tommy Brown, vice president of business development and sales at Palladyne AI. (Figure 1.)
The approach enables warfighters to define an area of interest and select available drones, then send them via ATAK [Android Team Awareness Kit] to investigate autonomously. The drones begin tracking whatever they find – people, vehicles, or other targets – and maintain surveillance without further human input.
What makes this autonomy possible is the Black Widow’s onboard computing power, specifically its Qualcomm RB5 processor that enables distributed collaboration without requiring connectivity back to a base station.
Black Widow is “very much like your cellphone” where “the warfighter has access to a variety of different applications that can help with a variety of missions,” says Stan Nowak, vice president of marketing at Red Cat. The platform serves as a hub for multiple AI applications developed by Red Cat Futures Initiative partners, including voice command control and target recognition capabilities.
The immediate benefit for small units can be substantial. “We are getting capability that used to only be available with much larger drones or other platforms,” Brown says. “That three- or fourperson element now has the capability to do all of that just out of a backpack.”
Looking ahead, both companies see potential for multidomain operations where AI systems coordinate across
Figure 1 | Red Cat’s Black Widow is a modular small uncrewed aerial system (sUAS) designed for short-range reconnaissance in electronic warfare environments, featuring integrated AI, high-resolution EO/IR [electro-optical/infrared] sensors, and a field-repairable design. Image via Red Cat.
different environments. Such capability means taking on new challenges, including integration with space-based radar systems and maritime platforms.
“There are different AI tools where we are … doing target recognition and tracking on the open sea,” Brown notes. “That’s a different model than you have to use on land.”
While Red Cat and Palladyne focus on small-unit operations, Shield AI (San Diego, California) is tackling a broader challenge: that involved in enabling autonomous systems to execute complete missions rather than just basic functions. The company’s Hivemind platform represents a shift from what the industry calls “platform autonomy” to “mission autonomy.”
“AI-powered autonomy is rapidly expanding beyond the air domain into maritime, space, and missile defense, driven by the need to extend the life of legacy systems and close critical operational gaps,” says Christian Gutierrez, vice president of Hivemind Engineering at Shield AI. “At the heart of this evolution is the shift from platform autonomy, where a system manages basic functions like navigation or propulsion, to mission autonomy, which allows systems to execute complex objectives such as reconnaissance, targeting, or electronic warfare based on real-time data.”
This distinction matters in contested environments where human operators may lose communication with deployed systems. Traditional autonomous platforms can navigate and avoid obstacles, but mission autonomy enables them to make tactical decisions about how to complete their assigned objectives without further human input.
Shield AI’s approach centers on building trust between human operators and autonomous systems through transparency and predictable behavior. “Trust requires more than performance. It demands predictability, safety, and transparent feedback,” Gutierrez explains.
The company has developed real-time mission debrief tools and validation frameworks to help operators understand how autonomous systems make decisions.
The company’s execution of crewed-uncrewed teaming demonstrations – including work with platforms like Firejet and the X-62A VISTA – shows that human-AI collaboration is “real, tested, and building confidence,” Gutierrez says.
Looking across the next 10 years, Gutierrez and Shield AI see the biggest opportunity in coordinated autonomous operations. “Large-scale teaming of autonomous systems and collective intelligence will define the next decade of military capability,” Gutierrez says. “As systems gain edge-level intelligence and can coordinate without centralized control, they’ll operate effectively even when comms and GPS [global positioning system] are denied.”
Shield AI has teamed Hivemind with their MQ-35 V-BAT (vertical takeoff and landing uncrewed aerial system) with Hivemind being the AI pilot, which can make teams of VBATs possible, according to Brandon Tseng, co-founder and president of Shield AI, in a 2024 interview with Military Embedded Systems.
This capability could change military operations by enabling autonomous systems to adapt collectively to battlefield conditions. (Figure 2.)
“AI autonomy shifts the focus from tactical ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] to strategic coordination – enabling systems to adapt to battlefield dynamics and maximize mission outcomes,” Gutierrez adds, calling this “a generational shift in warfare and decision-making.”
Building trust through explainable AI
There is also a generational shift in how AI is perceived and leveraged throughout the military. Raytheon is addressing a fundamental challenge that underlies all military AI applications: ensuring human operators understand and trust AI-powered systems. The defense giant’s approach centers on explainable AI that provides transparency into how systems reach their conclusions.
“Trust is a key aspect to developing human comfort with AI-enhanced systems,” says Dr. Shane Zabel, director of artificial intelligence at Raytheon Intelligence and Space (Dallas, Texas). “Does the human operator understand how the AI-enhanced system will behave across the operational conditions it will be used in, and does the human trust the AI-enhanced system to operate as expected?”
Raytheon’s solution involves AI systems that don’t just provide answers, but explain their reasoning process.
“If the AI-enhanced system not only provides an answer but also provides feedback on how it came to the answer, how accurate the answer is believed to be, and any biases it may have, then humans have more information on which they can establish trust,” Zabel explains.
This transparency becomes even more important as AI capabilities expand to all military domains. Zabel sees edge AI –applications outside cloud or data center deployments – growing across “multiple domains including sea, land, air, space, and cyber” as processing power and data-storage capabilities improve in smaller, lower-power packages.
“Improved device performance in smaller, lower-power applications is a key enabler for enabling newer AI technologies to be applied to edge systems,” he notes, echoing the size, weight, and power (SWaP) considerations that drive much of military technology development.
Beyond combat applications, Raytheon sees notable potential for AI to enhance logistics and supply-chain operations. Zabel points to AI assistants that can help humans increase productivity with certain tasks such as information search and retrieval, document understanding, and language generation, along with visual inspection and optimization tasks.
“These technologies hold the promise to significantly enhance supply-chain and logistics operations capabilities,” he says. “With the AI assisting humans in these areas, we can make our supply chains more resilient, shorten the timelines for maintenance, repair and overhaul operations, optimize the allocation of material and supplies for a given operational tempo, and improve our global operational readiness.”
The company has observed military personnel becoming more comfortable with AI-powered systems as explainability improves, part of what Zabel describes as “a broader societal trend.” This growing acceptance is essential for high-stakes military applications where trust between human and machine can determine mission success or failure.
AI as the foundation for open systems
Integrating AI technology will also rely on open architecture designs that enable interoperability. Wind River (Alameda, California), which is involved in many modular open systems approach (MOSA) initiatives, is positioning AI as the key to making different military systems work better together. The company’s eLxr Pro platform is designed to create AI-ready infrastructure that can adapt quickly to new requirements while supporting the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) MOSA push.
The challenge Wind River is trying to solve is fundamental: Military systems from different contractors often can’t talk to each other effectively, making upgrades expensive and time-consuming. The company believes AI can change that by serving as a translator and coordinator between different systems.
“eLxr is a purpose-built distribution that can address the realities of the aerospace, defense, and government industry that is finally solving the capability-agnostic roadblocks that have
plagued the community, such as security vulnerabilities [and] unrealistic [equipment] end-of-life expectations,” says Dr. Justin Pearson, senior director of architecture and business growth for aerospace and defense at Wind River.
The platform builds on open-source software but adds commercial support to help defense customers deploy secure, reliable systems across different environments. It is designed to support not just today’s AI applications but future developments that Pearson describes as “Agentic AI and Physical AI.”
AI will do more than just help military systems follow open standards – it can accelerate the entire process. “AI systems built with open standards can be modularized and deployed across heterogeneous hardware platforms, aligning well with MOSA’s emphasis on interoperability,” Pearson explains.
Pearson envisions AI serving as “an intelligent glue layer that enables plug-and-play capability across vendors and systems.” Instead of spending months integrating systems from different manufacturers, AI could instead help them work together automatically, reconfiguring components as needed and predicting when parts need maintenance or replacement. Rather than focusing on individual applications like target recognition or autonomous navigation, AI’s biggest impact is coming from speeding up how the military develops and deploys new capabilities, Pearson says.
“The entire acquisition life cycle needs to have complementary AI strategies associated and [must] remain agile enough to react to what information humans end up validating from the AI output itself,” he notes.
In other words, AI’s greatest military value may not be in replacing human decisionmakers, but in helping the entire defense system adapt and evolve faster than ever before. MES
Sponsored by New Wave Design and AMD
Companies considering a migration to AMD’s Versal Adaptive System on a Chip (ASoC) for their next-generation processing requirements in radar, EW, or sensor fusion applications: The Versal ASoC family offers immense heterogenous compute capabilities supporting DSP engines, programmable logic, and next-generation AI Engines. This webcast considers the potential pitfalls a program may face as it migrates to this latest generation of silicon. Also explored: the challenges of migrating to Versal ASoC and risk-reduction techniques FPGA engineers and data architects can use to minimize both schedule and technical risk. (This is an archived event.)
Watch this webcast: https://tinyurl.com/2s44nxy9
Enabling artificial intelligence in military systems
By Mike Southworth
By applying electronics thermal-management expertise with a range of proven module and chassis-level cooling technologies –such as conduction, forced air, air-flow-through (AFT), and liquid-flow-through (LFT) – advanced processing and communications solutions can operate in harsh extended temperature environments and deliver the new capabilities enabled by artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) to the tactical edge.
Military system integrators are exploring how they can best leverage the power of artificial intelligence (AI) at the edge of the battlefield. When considering use cases for AI in aerospace and defense, people naturally first think of examples they are familiar with – such as generative AI – as exemplified in a ChatGPT application. With generative AI, the user can ask a computer a question or request it to do a task, after which the computer will search through its library of data and return an answer or complete the requested action. Generative
AI has become a prominent feature used to simplify Internet searches in web browsers from Google and Microsoft.
When it comes to military use, AI is not limited to generative AI or large language models (LLM), but is also being used for a wide variety of applications, such as mission readiness, image recognition and target detection, autonomy, and predictive maintenance. The U.S. government is using AI to help locate and identify adversaries, leveraging the technology’s ability to find patterns
and identify things far better than can be accomplished with the human eye alone. With AI-enabled health and usage monitoring systems (HUMS), data can be analyzed to predict maintenance issues, informing operators when to pull equipment out for maintenance before a problem becomes critical. This condition-based maintenance approach, compared with regularly scheduled maintenance, can prevent costly, premature replacement of equipment and significantly improve platform mission readiness.
For autonomous platforms, such as unmanned aircraft, maritime vessels, and ground vehicles, AI helps keep humans out of harm’s reach by instead putting machines in the line of fire. Autonomy is a burgeoning growth area being funded by the U.S. and foreign governments, for which technology is quickly evolving. Historically, to achieve true self-driving vehicles, for example, it has been necessary to deploy high-end data centerclass AI processors. In a traditional data center, however, that amount of performance requires the use of racks full of power-hungry equipment. One of the major challenges facing defense system designers is how to deliver highperformance embedded computing for AI at the tactical edge while at the same time optimizing size, weight and power (SWaP). Examples of some current U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) programs of record funded to drive deployable AI capabilities in the battlefield include Project Maven (AI target detection system), the U.S. Army’s Tactical Intelligence Targeting Access
Node (TITAN) ground station, Human-Machine Integrated Formations (HMIF), XM30 fighting vehicle program, Robotic Combat Vehicle (RCV), and the U.S. Air Force’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) programs. (Figure 1.)
Embedded systems engineers currently have a wide range of AI-enabling device types to choose from, including technology from NVIDIA, Intel, AMD, Microchip, and more. These devices include discrete central processing units (CPUs), graphics processing units (GPUs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), or integrated system-on-chip (SoC) or system-on-module (SoM) devices that combine general-purpose processing with AI acceleration engines in a single package. A good example of the latter is NVIDIA’s Jetson/IGX processors that pair ARM processors with Tensor/CUDA-core GPUs. Similarly, Intel and AMD have robust x86 CPUs + GPU SoC devices in the Core, Atom, and EPYC product lines, with some SoCs also integrating dedicated AI neural processing units (NPU). AMD also has powerful adaptive system-on-chip (ASoC) devices in its Versal line that combine FPGA logic, DSP engines, Arm CPUs, and AI cores in a single device. Further, radiation-tolerant RISC-V CPU-based SoCs from Microchip, capable of advanced machine learning (ML) and time-sensitive networking (TSN), are now entering the market to enable the deployment of AI applications in space.
Recently, Intel has publicly shared its strategies to integrate AI into all of its processors intended for use at the edge, thus addressing low- and mid-level inferencing needs. For high-end AI training and inference workloads, system designers generally rely on GPU architecture from NVIDIA. As reported during 2024, NVIDIA held a 94% market share for GPUs in the datacenter market. NVIDIA is now one of the most valuable companies on the planet because of its very strong GPU/AI story.
Keeping high-power AI workload servers cool is a major issue. Traditionally, fans have been used, but as performance has risen, so have power requirements: Currently, approximately 60kW to 120kW per rack for NVIDIA Blackwell GPU architecture. In response, the increase in power has driven adoption of advanced cooling approaches at the data center, such as liquid cooling and immersion-cooling technology. Similarly, to enable deployment of power-hungry sensor processing devices at the tactical edge, new cooling methods beyond conduction or air cooling are now being deployed. Within the SOSA [Sensor Open Systems Architecture] and VITA standards communities, approaches for liquid-flow-through (LFT) and air-flow-through (AFT) cooling applied to OpenVPX architectures have substantially increased the amount of watts per card slot that can be effectively cooled, enabling the use of ~300W boards in
applications that would have historically been limited to plug-in cards (PICs) that dissipate a maximum of ~150W.
At NVIDIA’s most recent annual GTC event, CEO Jensen Huang cited NVIDIA’s advancements to support 800 Gb optical networking at the data center, speeds far exceeding the capabilities of today’s embedded systems at the edge. For deployed VPX systems, the data throughput bottleneck has traditionally been the backplane connectors and optical transceivers, since VPX RT3 connectors and extended temperature optics are limited today to 100 Gigabit (100G) across a backplane. For example, VPX RT3 connector technology has been foundational for the Fabric100 VPX ecosystem to support 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) and Gen4 PCIe interconnects, which is critical for integrators and systems architects to build today’s most advanced modular open systems approach (MOSA)-based sensor processing and AI/ML inferencing solutions.
100G and beyond …
To go beyond 100G performance in VITA-based edge systems, an emerging new standard called VITA 100 will utilize a new MultiGig HD connector from TE Connectivity that supports double or even four times the current backplane throughput, with support for up to 400GBase-KR4 (up to 53 Gbaud per lane) and PCIe 6.0 interconnects. VITA 100 is likely to be adopted by early 2026. In data centers, while the maturity of PCIe 6.0 and higher-speed optical interconnects are providing strong capabilities for AI processing systems, state-of-the art commercial components are constrained to narrow temperature ranges and benign environments.
For today’s advanced OpenVPX systems, VITA 46 technology supports up to 28 Gbaud per channel, where four-lane 25 Gbaud interfaces support 100 Gbps throughput. Optics
are not limited by VITA standards, but optical transceiver technology is limited when operating across extended temperature ranges. As optics technologies evolve, higher speed interfaces will be possible for extreme edge environments. Several SOSA aligned modules, such as the VPX3-536 and VPX6-476, feature blind-mate VITA 66.5 Style D optical connectors to support high data rate 100G optical interfaces over the VPX backplane.
The McHale Report, by militaryembedded.com
Editorial Director John McHale, covers technology and procurement trends in the defense electronics community.
Latency is another important systemarchitecture consideration for enabling AI at the edge. When users are dependent on time-sensitive sensor data, they require the lowest latency possible in order to process, ingress, and egress data inputs and outputs. One approach for reducing latency is to eliminate bottleneck data flows through the CPU’s memory, which can introduce detrimental delays to system performance. Facilitating faster data flows, some GPU technologies and network adapters are now capable of porting remote direct memory access (RDMA) memory over PCIe or Ethernet. For network-based applications, the RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE) network protocol can enable remote direct memory access across an IP network. NVIDIA GPUs support GPU Direct RDMA over PCIe so users can interface sensor data over the PCIe expansion plane without having to go through host CPU memory. When high-speed sensor data can be processed without delay, faster data inferences can be applied through AI models to keep warfighters safer and more effective in their missions.
In addition to optimizing throughput between cards and sensors, system integrators also need to ensure resilient, secure network connectivity between boxes and edge platforms, to enable the safe sharing of situational-awareness data gleaned from AI inferencing in the battlefield. Compared to a fixed data center, AI processing at the tactical edge presents vastly different communications due to mobility and environmental conditions. This fact is compounded by distrust/disconnection from public infrastructure. AI processing nodes should be architected
to mitigate contested environments and protect against attempts by adversaries to hack, spoof, jam, and tamper with sensitive mission data.
While it would be ideal for warfighters to have access to the same high-performance processing capabilities that are available at a data center and directly port enterprise-level software applications into their embedded systems, physical SWaP and ruggedization constraints for electronics deployed at the edge may drive important tradeoff decisions. These tradeoffs can be somewhat offset, however, through the use of new highly efficient AI accelerator engines and software optimization of machine learning (ML) algorithms. There is a common sentiment that “Today’s AI is the worst you’ll ever use,” implying that AI technology is rapidly evolving and improving, and that we should not assume that it is as powerful or as efficient as what we’ll be deploying next year, next week or even tomorrow. To make today’s AI models work more efficiently and faster at the tactical edge, it’s essential to optimize the hardware and software they run on.
Further, as AI applications become better able to take advantage of the latest floating-point format accuracies –including FP4 – and leverage simulation environments to refine model training prior to deployment, computational demands at the edge can be significantly reduced. For software, that means instead of reinventing the wheel or starting with a bloated software model, smaller AI software footprints can be utilized and optimized to enable the warfighter to re-purpose and do more with the same piece of hardware. NVIDIA now considers itself a software company (with more software engineers than any other role), underscoring the importance of the extensive software libraries and frameworks it supports for AI enablement today. These software tools can be readily ported from enterprise rack servers and then optimized for embedded edge machines.
The archetype for military applications is to look to the state-of-the-art in the commercial world and determine how to adapt it. The embedded systems industry is certainly following that approach by improving cooling, interconnect speeds,
and data-flow efficiency, while optimizing software and leveraging access to the highest performance devices from AI chip vendors with the best performance per watt to enable AI processing. By applying the electronics industry’s thermal-management expertise with a range of proven module and chassis-level cooling technologies – such as conduction, forced air, AFT, and LFT – advanced processing and communications solutions can operate in harsh extended-temperature environments and deliver the new capabilities enabled by AI/ML to the tactical edge. MES
Mike Southworth is Senior Product Line Manager, C5ISR, for Curtiss-Wright Defense Systems. He has 20+ years of experience in technical product management and marketing communications leadership roles. Mike holds an MBA from the University of Utah and a Bachelor of Arts in Public Relations from Brigham Young University.
Curtiss-Wright Defense Systems • https://www.curtisswrightds.com/
Rugged copper connector interface combined with fiber optic cable
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RAOC: A rugged active optical cable for military, commercial air, and industrial applications
By Dr. William Bain
Military decision-makers require timely, precise insights to address threats and manage logistics in complex, evolving missions.
Digital twin technology – combined with generative artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities – is emerging as a transformative defense tool, providing military leaders, commanders, and mission planners with the enhanced situational awareness needed to make more informed decisions.
Defense operations involve thousands of interacting assets, including troop deployments, asset logistics, and adversarial threats, all of which evolve from minute to minute. Mission leaders require new approaches to process the growing volumes of real-time streaming data and make faster, better-informed decisions.
Traditional batch-processed analytics introduce delays that are incompatible with the high-tempo demands of modern combat operations. A software technology called real-time digital twins addresses this challenge by continuously tracking and analyzing real-time information about individual assets, predicting changes, and alerting commanders. This technology enables military teams to simultaneously monitor thousands of battlefield assets, reliably detect anomalies, and make more strategic decisions under pressure.
Real-time digital twins are softwaredefined, in-memory representations of battlefield assets that ingest continuous streams of live telemetry and sensor data. They process incoming messages in milliseconds using contextual information about each data source for deeper analysis and can apply predictive modeling from machine learning (ML) and generative artificial intelligence (AI) to detect subtle anomalies. Running on a scalable, in-memory computing
platform, real-time digital twins combine and visualize data from multiple assets, providing commanders with enhanced situational awareness and faster insights into emerging issues.
Tactical advantage through predictive analytics
Real-time digital twins provide the ability to anticipate threats by analyzing historical movement patterns, terrain data, and live surveillance to predict hostile tactics. By ingesting and analyzing aerial drone and satellite surveillance, digital twins can track and visualize the movement of hostile military units, aircraft, and artillery assets on the battlefield, enabling commanders to make rapid, data-driven decisions based on evolving enemy actions.
This technology can also assist advancing military vehicles by detecting vulnerabilities, mapping alternative routes, and reducing operational risks to prevent ambushes or delays. Additionally, realtime digital twins support planning by identifying historical movement patterns and predicting potential future threats. Using these tools, military commanders can adjust convoy timing, reroute units, or mobilize reinforcements based on predictive insights, thereby improving survivability and enabling near-real-time adjustments to plans while under operational stress.
Enhancing continuous monitoring and visualization
Real-time digital twins can integrate generative AI (Gen AI) to provide enhanced continuous monitoring and anomaly detection, improving situational awareness for field commanders. By ingesting and assessing aggregated data from a population of digital twins, Gen AI can detect anomalies representing strategic threats and evaluate the histories of asset changes to identify subtle but critical developments.
Beyond detection, Gen AI accelerates decision-making by creating real-time data visualizations that highlight areas requiring immediate attention. Personnel can request these visualizations using natural language prompts, reducing dependence on technical query techniques.
Figure 1 | Satellite imagery and AI-driven image analysis can integrate with digital twin software to create a real-time operational view for military commanders.
Gen AI can also proactively suggest and generate visualizations as it processes battlefield dynamics, for example, to identify unexpected troop movements. Together, these capabilities enable military teams to analyze and respond to threats more efficiently.
Figure 1 illustrates how satellite imagery and AI-driven image analysis integrate with digital twin software to create a real-time operational view for commanders.
Maintaining mission readiness requires reliable, well-maintained equipment and uninterrupted supply chains. Digital twins shift defense logistics activities from reactive to predictive by continuously analyzing sensor data for early indicators of failure or degradation. This approach enables military teams to assess equipment conditions in real time, identify wear-and-tear patterns, and proactively replace components or dispatch maintenance crews before failures occur.
Rather than waiting for breakdowns, digital twins leverage ML models to predict equipment failures, reducing costly downtime and maintaining operational readiness. For instance, the U.S. Navy has adopted digital twin technology to improve diagnostics and minimize mission delays associated with unplanned maintenance.
Real-time digital twins can also analyze battlefield supply chains, identifying disruptions before they escalate into critical issues. They can track ammunition levels for individual artillery pieces and initiate resupply operations in real time. By using digital twin technology combined with Gen AI-driven visualization tools, commanders can maintain a clear operational picture and act swiftly to sustain readiness.
Machine learning enhances digital twins by continuously analyzing incoming telemetry, detecting subtle patterns, and improving prediction accuracy through automated retraining. While currently used to predict equipment failures, these capabilities can extend to analyzing enemy asset movements, supporting proactive defense strategies.
components, safety is paramount. DO-178C is an essential functional safety standard that provides guidance on the airworthiness of airborne systems and helps developers address any safety issues early and often.
This white paper details the ins and outs of DO-178C; the military and defense industry advantage of applying DO-178C; compliance with the standard; Design Assurance Levels (DALs); key software planning processes in DO-178C; and how to enforce and accelerate DO-178C compliance using static analysis.
By training on historical battlefield conditions, ML algorithms embedded within digital twins could predict unexpected enemy troop maneuvers, giving commanders advance warning of evolving threats. As live data streams in, digital twins can automatically retrain these ML algorithms, refining their predictions and ensuring defense strategies remain responsive to real-time developments. This continuous learning process strengthens military agility and resilience in dynamic operational environments.
Figure 2 illustrates how AI-driven image analysis and digital twin software with embedded ML work together to deliver continuous asset tracking and real-time visualization for commanders.
Real-time digital twins integrated with AI and ML deliver real-time visibility and predictive intelligence. By continuously
Read this white paper: https://tinyurl.com/6v2pdpm5
updating and analyzing live battlefield data, these systems empower commanders to detect threats faster, act with greater precision, and improve mission resilience.
As adversaries become increasingly agile and conflicts grow more data-driven, realtime digital twins will be central to enabling superior battlefield intelligence, enhanced readiness, and mission success. MES
SPEAKOUT
Dr. William Bain is founder and CEO of ScaleOut Software, which has been developing software products since 2003 designed to enhance operational intelligence within live systems using scalable, in-memory computing technology. Bill earned a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Rice University. Over a 47-year career focused on parallel computing, he has contributed to advancements at Bell Labs Research, Intel, and Microsoft. He also holds several patents in computer architecture and distributed computing. Bill founded and ran three companies prior to ScaleOut Software: The most recent, Valence Research, developed web loadbalancing software and was acquired by Microsoft Corporation to enhance the Windows Server operating system.
ScaleOut Software
https://www.scaleoutsoftware.com/
In today’s high-frequency world, performance, reliability, and precision are non-negotiable. Whether in defense systems, aerospace platforms, advanced test instrumentation, or telecommunications infrastructure, semi-rigid coaxial cables stand out as the benchmark for signal integrity and shielding performance. With their solid metallic outer conductor and consistent internal geometry, MicroCoax® semi-rigid coaxial cable construction provides exceptional shielding, ultra-low attenuation, and tight impedance control, making them the go-to choice for RF and microwave engineers.
Available in a wide range of diameters – from 0.013" to 0.390" – and with characteristic impedances spanning 5 to 100 ohms, Micro-Coax semi-rigid cables are built to accommodate the most demanding designs. MIL-DTL-17 qualified options ensure proven performance in mission-critical environments such as satellite payloads, radar systems, and electronic warfare platforms. Advanced low-loss and ultra-low-loss versions lower attenuation by up to 20% and withstand temperatures up to 250 °C, while dimensionally stable PTFE dielectrics deliver superior thermal consistency and installation reliability. Featuring the smallest diameters, tight bend radii, and formability for efficient packaging, these cables also offer rugged construction that resists jacket abrasion in harsh environments. Micro-Coax offers a wide selection of semi-rigid cables with materials and finishes tailored to meet application-specific requirements:
• Copper and silver-plated options for standard RF and microwave systems
• Aluminum-jacketed versions for weight-sensitive aerospace platforms
• Stainless steel constructions for medical or cryogenic environments
• Non-standard impedance cables for specialized circuitry and component integration
In addition to off-the-shelf varieties readily available in distribution, custom cable configurations can be produced to accommodate unique electrical, mechanical, or environmental needs – whether it’s a specific dielectric, polymer jacket, or connector system.
From mission-critical avionics to high-speed lab instruments, semi-rigid coaxial cables are the trusted standard for engineers who demand the highest level of performance and precision. When performance is critical, semi-rigid coaxial cables deliver. Micro-Coax® is a registered trademark of Amphenol CIT.
Rad-hard
By Chandra Hackenbruch
Radiation-tolerant and radiation-hardened components used in space systems must meet stringent radiation, temperature, and mechanical tests in order to succeed in mission-critical applications. Along with resilience, long-term cost effectiveness is one of the advantages of radiation-tolerant and radiation-hardened devices, as their use reduces the risk of mission failures and guarantees against the need for replacement and repair.
Power systems are integral to achieving reliable and successful space missions, but the harsh and unforgiving environment of space presents extreme environmental and operational challenges that space designers must mitigate. The relentless exposure of radiation from cosmic rays and solar flares poses a serious threat to electronic components, making the choice between radiation-tolerant parts, radiation-hardened components, and commercial-grade power components a critical decision in space power design.
Navigating and mitigating the dangers of radiation
Space is a treacherous landscape littered with high-energy particles that can wreak havoc on electronic circuits. High-energy particles produced by radiation have three main sources:
› Trapped radiation: particles (protons/electrons) from the sun and solar wind
› Transient galactic cosmic radiation (GCR): ionized atoms originating outside the solar system
› Solar particle events: particles created by solar flares and coronal mass ejections
These high-energy particles caused by radiation can cause several damaging effects on electronics. One is termed total ionizing dose (TID), which is characterized as an accumulated charge over a mission lifetime. TID causes hole-trapping (generated by radiation exposure) leading to voltage threshold shifts in metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs). For example, an N-channel MOSFET will exhibit a
negative Vth shift, whereas a P-channel MOSFET will exhibit a positive shift in Vth when exposed to long-term radiation. (Figure 1.)
Another radiation effect on electronics is called single-event effects (SEE), which result from fast heavy-particle collisions from galactic cosmic rays (GCR) and solar particle events. These effects can be destructive or nondestructive. An example of a destructive event would be singleevent gate rupture (SEGR), which occurs when a charge, often deposited by an incident particle, builds up in the dielectric material around the gate of a device, such as a power MOSFET. This accumulation creates a strong localized electric field. If this field becomes intense enough to surpass the dielectric’s breakdown voltage, it creates a permanent lowresistance path through the gate oxide,
Figure 1 | Schematic of N-channel MOSFET illustrating the basic effect of total ionizationinduced charging of the gate oxide. Normal operation (a) and post irradiation (b) show the residual trapped positive charge (holes) that produces a negative threshold voltage shift. Image courtesy “Harsh Environments: Space Radiation Environment, Effects, and Mitigation,” Richard Maurer et al.
resulting in device damage known as SEGR. An example of a nondestructive event would be single-event transient (SET), in which energized particles can cause sudden and temporary changes in voltage or current conditions for a deployed electronic part. These effects can lead to performance degradation, unpredictable malfunctions, and, in the worst cases, total system failures.
Commercial-grade components, designed solely for use on Earth where the atmosphere and magnetosphere provide significant shielding, simply do not possess the resilience required to withstand the extreme conditions of space. These devices lack the specialized design considerations, advanced materials, and rigorous testing protocols that are characteristic of radiation-tolerant and -hardened components. Because there is no opportunity for repair or replacement in the depths of space, every aspect of a space system must thus be engineered for utmost reliability. Therefore, commercial components are often inappropriate for space systems.
Radiation-tolerant versus radiation-hardened: a critical distinction
Low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites reside within an altitude range of approximately 160 km to 2,000 km (99.42 miles to 1,242 miles) above Earth’s surface. This orbital regime places them within the significant protective influence of the Earth’s magnetosphere. The magnetosphere acts as a natural barrier, largely deflecting high-energy particle fluxes, such as cosmic rays and Van Allen belt radiation. The magnetosphere’s inherent shielding mechanism substantially mitigates the probability of radiation-induced component degradation in LEO satellites compared to those in more distant orbits. For spacecraft in LEO, the typical annual radiation dose rates vary significantly based on orbital inclination. In low-inclination orbits, these rates generally fall between 100 and 1,000 rad(Si)/year. (Figure 2.)
However, for higher inclination orbits, the dose rates increase considerably, ranging from 1,000 to 10,000 rad(Si)/year, primarily due to a greater exposure to trapped electrons. The inner Van Allen belt is the primary source of trapped protons where the energy range can be between 10MeV up to 50 MeV. Radiation-tolerant components are designed to endure these radiation levels in low Earth orbit. Because the environment in LEO is less harsh and mission life is shorter than higher orbits such as geosynchronous orbit (GEO) and medium Earth orbit (MEO), space designers can use cost-optimized materials, like plastic. Rad-tolerant parts are also manufactured on high-volume production lines, making them ideal for large-scale satellite constellations.
The MEO and GEO satellites are located within the altitude range of 2,000 km and 35,790 km (1,242 miles to 22,239 miles) above the earth’s surface. At this altitude satellites radiation sources emanate from the inner and outer Van Allen belts, where proton energy can be 80MeV and above. Satellites in these orbits can experience radiation dose rates of 100 Krad to 1 Mrad over a 10 to 15-year mission.
Radiation-hardened components are engineered specifically to resist damage from high levels of radiation, ensuring their unwavering reliability in the harshest environments. To ensure long-term resilience against radiation effects, these components are subjected to stringent manufacturing and testing protocols. Radiation-hardened parts are typically assembled in ceramic packaging, which provides an extra layer of protection against radiation and other challenging space effects such as thermal fluctuations, vibration, and the vacuum of space. These characteristics make radiation-hardened parts ideal for longer space missions in the extremes of deep space where reliability is critical and failure is not an option.
Both radiation-tolerant and -hardened options demonstrate superior durability and advanced protective measures that are not just beneficial for space missions, but are also essential for the integrity of vital systems aboard satellites and spacecraft.
Rad-hard/rad-tolerant and enhanced reliability
Whether missions to Mars, deployment of satellites into low Earth orbit, or deepspace exploration, the requirement for systems that can endure certain radiation environments without succumbing to failure becomes vital. A power-supply failure can jeopardize not only individual satellites but entire networks, leading to monumental financial losses and thwarted scientific advancements.
Though radiation-tolerant and -hardened components may entail a higher initial investment compared to their commercial counterparts, they offer invaluable long-term
cost efficiency by minimizing the risk of mission failure and the financial toll of replacement and repairs. Investing in robust technology upfront is a wise strategy to shield against the economic impacts of potential radiation-induced failures. Over the lifespan of a space mission, the savings generated by using reliable components can prove substantial.
Adhering to compliance standards guarantees a level of reliability that commercial parts can neither replicate nor compete with. The space industry is governed by stringent standards that dictate the use of components in aerospace applications. Renowned programs such as NASA’s guidelines and the European Space Agency’s mission requirements underscore the necessity of employing radiation-tolerant and -hardened components in both government and commercial space missions.
Rad-hard and -tolerant going forward Integration of radiation-tolerant and radiation-hardened components in space power design must be a priority. Their enhanced reliability, resilience against radiation-induced failures, and alignment with industry standards are essential to the success of past, present, and future space missions. By investing in specialized technologies, the industry paves the way for safer and more successful operations in the challenging theater of space, ultimately propelling humanity’s exploration of the cosmos.
MES
Chandra Hackenbruch is the Senior Product Marketing Manager for Space Products at Infineon Technologies, driving business strategy for the satellite space industry through market analysis, customer engagement, and product roadmap development. She has more than 24 years of experience in product marketing, project management, and manufacturing support; she also dedicates time to training, mentoring, and university recruiting to foster future talent.
Infineon • https://www.infineon.com/
Each issue, the editorial staff of Military Embedded Systems will highlight a different organization that benefits the military, veterans, and their families. We are honored to cover the technology that protects those who protect us every day.
By Editorial Staff
The Camaraderie Foundation is a 501(c)(3) foundation that was founded on the mission of providing healing for the invisible wounds of war and military service through counseling and emotional plus spiritual support for all military service members, veterans, and their families.
The foundation’s services range from relationship support for military families and personal confidential counseling to mental and physical health and wellness services, in person or virtually. All services are free to the recipients.
Other programs include Family Fun Days, which offer a relaxed environment for families to connect, strengthen bonds, and create lasting memories together; the Battle Buddy program, which offers peer-to-peer support so that service members and veterans can share their experiences, insights, and resources while navigating the challenges of transition to civilian life; and caregiver spouse support groups, which offer a safe space for spouses to express their thoughts and obtain guidance from others who understand their unique journey.
Another program is Mentor Leadership Program, a transition assistance program designed to guide and support military service members, veterans, and their spouses as they navigate the journey from military to civilian life. The foundation’s experienced mentors provide invaluable guidance in areas such as career planning, personal development, and community integration with the end result of fostering personal growth, boosting confidence, and equipping participants with the skills and resources necessary to thrive in their new situations.
Although the foundation is based in Florida, it maintains a network of more than 600 counselors all over the world; wherever the veteran or their family members are located, the services follow them as they move from place to place.
For additional information, visit https://www.camaraderiefoundation.org
Sponsored by Mercury
Whether “the edge” is defined as where the sensor gathers the data or where the enemy is engaged in any domain, military systems at the edge require data integrity. It is imperative that every software or hardware component in these edge systems encrypt, process, and disseminate information securely.
In this webcast, Dr. John Mellott, Fellow Chief Engineer for Secure Processing at Mercury Systems, discusses best practices for enabling data encryption and security in military edge systems using commercial technology to keep costs low. (This is an archived event.)
Watch this webcast: https://tinyurl.com/bm294k3e
Watch more webcasts: https://militaryembedded.com/webcasts/archive/
By
Ian Beavers, Peter Delos, Brian Reggiannini, and Connor Bryant, Analog Devices, Inc.
Direct RF sampled systems are evolving to encompass broader capabilities, allowing them to capture a wider bandwidth all in a single Nyquist zone. Sampling from 2 GHz to 18 GHz concurrently enables more sophisticated options to monitor a larger spectrum, without issues of frequency band aliasing. Quadrature interleaving offers a novel solution to expand sampling bandwidth without the complexities of managing double rate clocks, clock inversion, or doubling the data output.
Part 1 of the white paper described the interleaving objectives, discusses errors creating interleaving artifacts, and introduces the range of 40 GS/sec analog-to-digital converter (ADC) options using the AD9084. Part 2 explores the quadrature sampling option, along with a quadrature correction mechanism in detail.
Read the white paper: https://tinyurl.com/2s4brb6z
Get more white papers and e-Books: https://militaryembedded.com/whitepapers
