The Department of Defense's Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) is looking for a small business to design and develop a uniform that includes sensors woven into the fabric that can measure the health of a soldier, locate a wound, or detect a soldier's exposure to biological or chemical weapons.
The project, called Intelligent Clothing for Rapid Response to Aid Wounded Soldiers, is part of the DTRA's small business innovation research (SBIR) program, which allows high-tech companies with less than 500 employees to create technology for the military, according to a solicitation posted online.
The DoD is looking for a small business to design an intelligent soldier uniform that can monitor overall health and identify if and where a soldier has been wounded, among other capabilities.
The uniform would act as a series of intelligent medical devices and even as a GPS that identifies a soldier's location to hasten the delivery of aid in the field. Currently, a wounded soldier, or one of his cohorts, calls for human medics to provide assistance in the case of injury or exposure to biological weapons, according to DTRA. Intelligent clothing, however, could reduce the amount of time it takes to get help.
"In a situation where a soldier has been hit with either a single bullet or shrapnel from an explosion, or has been exposed to CBRNE (Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear and Explosive) within their surrounding environment, it is critical to quickly evaluate the vital organs that have been impacted and the lifesaving procedures that need to be performed," according to the solicitation.
The design key to the uniform proposed by the DTRA lies in intelligent sensors embedded in the clothing that can perform a range of medically evaluative tasks. These include estimating the depth of penetration of a bullet or shrapnel or its effect on surrounding organs, or identifying a chemical or biological agent in a soldier's blood, saliva, sweat, and even urine, according to the solicitation. The sensors even could find damage done to a soldier's cellular tissue or organs after such as exposure.
The idea to provide sensors in soldiers' clothing to help evaluate their health electronically is not new. The Army tried to do something similar in 2004, with a program called the Future Force Warrior. The goal was to create soldier clothing to transmit physical vital signs back to base, but the program was ultimately cancelled.
More recently, the Army put out a solicitation through its own SBIR program to find a company to design software to create soldier clothing with electronic sensors for communication. Like DTRA's idea, the Army's Design Tool for Electronic Textile Clothing Systems also envisions a wearable network of sensors built into a military uniform, but for communications rather than to evaluate the status of a soldier's health.
The article describes evaluative technologies as opposed to medicinal or healing technologies; meaning, the uniform would tell where you need a band-aid instead of providing a band-aid. At first glance, it doesn't seem like a value-added idea.
When I've had the opportunity to interview infantry and foot-soldiers regarding ergonomic focus groups for new product development, their attitude is largely one of survival over cool technology.In 2007, a large defense contractor launched an initiative called the Connected Warrior, which failed amongst the ranks due to the cumbersome nature of all the extra gear and batteries required. As one soldier bluntly put it, "I get deployed 6 duffle bags of CRAP – and if it ain't bullets or water, I chuck it".
Innovative technologies to help the enlisted men and women must be completely conformable or it will never get adopted.
With the work I do, designs seem to be somewhat evolutionary and not revolutionary.It very well may be the DOD never really thought about having the ability to monitor the well-being of a soldier on the battlefield or maybe the ability to do so is catching up with the need to do.At any rate, it's a great idea although I do agree that added weight from batteries to drive the system might be a real concern.Good reliability would be absolutely necessary to prevent false positives when signals were received.
Battar, the army is actively trying to reduce the number of things a soldier must carry. Adding a device goes against that. Making something they already have do double (or triple!) duty is the right direction.
A uniform that monitors for wounds, AND can power itself via temperature differential, would be a smart design (in both meanings of the phrase).
A chart of a soldier's load weight (all that he is expected to carry, including uniform), plotted against years would show the load slowly creeps up, until it reaches some critical point, at which the army goes on an equipment weight loss program, only to see it creep up again as new features/tools become available.
The average soldier of Vietnam did not have to carry night vision gear (there were exceptions). Now NVG is almost standard issue. The soldiers of WWII and Korea did not have to carry batteries.
Good logical thinjking, TJ. You argued against a device that was featured in Design News only to replace it with another technology that was featured on this site.
Why embed the sensors in the uniform? Why not provide a wearable device directly? For example, a watch that monitors blood pressure and transmits an emergency signal and homing beacon if the blood pressure goes off scale one way or the other (very low blood pressure is a symptom of shock and blood loss).
Easy to hypothesize a context where having your uniform "call home" might equate to "painting a target on your position". But if you consider the benefit to a "Man Down!" of being able to pinpoint the person's location (via a low-signal-strength short-range signal)so no need to search through debris and rubble, yes, you get faster aid. And with many types of wounds, the primary immediate need is to apply pressure to the wound: the UNIFORM could handle that. Assuming some combination of contractile and inflatable fabric, the uniform could form a localized pressure pad and significantly reduce the loss of blood from a trunk wound. The same functionality would enable an intelligent "tourniquet" for wounds to extremities. These various capabilities, in conjunction with the audio capability of the distributed sensors, also enable a virtual "blood pressure cuff".
Realizable goals and constraints accumulate and evolve.
The article says that the smart uniform could "reduce the amount of time it takes to get help." Would the uniform have the ability to autonomously call for help?
Rob, I know of the boot mechanism you describe (saw it featured either here or at Machine Design).
In Robert Heinlein's words: There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. The boot mechanism uses a trooper's own energy. That means in addition to walking, the trooper puts some effort into moving the boot mechanism. A little extra resistance.
I don't see that particular mechanism going very far. It's too external (susceptable to damage). Anything that would sap energy from me (extra resistance to movement) is NOT going to be greeted with enthusiasm.
Think about it. Would you want to wear something that resists your motion after climbing Afghan mountains all day?
The soldiers of WWII frequently jettisoned their gas masks as soon as they could, calling it extra, unnecessary weight.
The better means of powering this clothing would be the cloth that uses temperature differential (outer layer to inner layer) to generate electricity (it was featured here a month or two ago). Combine that cloth with this technology would be a VERY smart thing.
You're right, TJ, the uniform would need a power source. But that could be taken care of by using a device that generates power. The military already has devices that attach to the boot and charge batteries through simple movement such as walking.
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New versions of BASF's Ecovio line are both compostable and designed for either injection molding or thermoforming. These combinations are becoming more common for the single-use bioplastics used in food service and food packaging applications, but are still not widely available.
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