Munitions

For military snipers, acquiring moving targets in unfavorable conditions, such as high winds and dusty terrain commonly found in Afghanistan, is extremely challenging with current technology. It is critical that snipers be able to engage targets faster, and with better accuracy, since any shot that doesn’t hit a target also risks the safety of troops by indicating their presence and potentially exposing their location.

Enemy surface-to-air threats to manned and unmanned aircraft have become increasingly sophisticated, creating a need for rapid and effective response to this growing category of threats. High power lasers can provide a solution to this challenge, as they harness the speed and power of light to counter multiple threats. Laser weapon systems provide additional capability for offensive missions as well—adding precise targeting with low probability of collateral damage. For consideration as a weapon system on today’s air assets though, these laser weapon systems must be lighter and more compact than the state-of-the-art has produced.

The Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) Deployment Office (LDO) is a partnership of DARPA, the United States Navy (NAVAIR), and the United States Air Force to provide an improved offensive anti-surface warfare capability to the fleet on a compressed timeline.

Explosively formed jets (EFJ) and fragments and self-forging penetrators (SFP) are used for precision strike against targets such as armored vehicles and reinforced structures. Current technology uses chemical explosive energy to form the jets and fragments. This is highly inefficient and requires precise machining of the metal liners from which the fragments and jets are formed.

The Precise Robust Inertial Guidance for Munitions (PRIGM) program is developing inertial sensor technologies to enable positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) in GPS-denied environments. PRIGM comprises two focus areas: development of a navigation-grade inertial measurement unit (NGIMU) based on micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) platforms, and basic research of advanced inertial micro sensor (AIMS) technologies for future gun-hard, high-bandwidth, high-dynamic-range, GPS-free navigation.