Transitioning Brain Research - Neurotechnology in National Security and Defense - page 21

The technological implications of CR-NR represent advances not just of degree but
of kind and will therefore reshape how we think about both humans and machines.
Such understanding, involving individual and group cognition, is far more personal
and opens many more unexplored issues than most other topics of technology
transition. Additional steps are needed, therefore, to tune transition processes to bet-
ter address the consequences of such new science in operational practice.
SUMMARY
Brain research offers extraordinary potential for expanding human performance in
a wide range of national security endeavors, and new, as-yet unforeseen capa-
bilities will emerge as new knowledge of neural function is gained. It is because
knowledge about the human mind is growing so rapidly, however, that additional
efforts at mutual education—among the research, S&T, acquisition, and user
communities—are so essential; converting brain research results into operational
capabilities requires the contributions of many agents. The need for a broad, col-
laborative approach to transitioning such science from the laboratory to national
security capabilities is apparent when matching the potentially disruptive products
of the research enterprise to hard engineering and acquisition requirements and to
current operational demands.
Brain research holds significant potential to advance national security in original,
fundamental ways. The applications discussed here were selected to bring a subset
of issues into focus; certainly, other applications such as training, cognitive enhance-
ment, improved social interaction, and health care present additional issues that must
also be debated and resolved before useful products are realized. The common points
of all these applications are that cognition and neuroscience researchers must navigate
a practical and structured transition process if the products of the laboratory are to
be realized as tangible human capabilities and that brain research discoveries may
require elaboration of the transition process itself, to anticipate potentially disruptive
consequences to operations. Early engagement around these topics among research-
ers, government transition communities, and users will, however, develop the concep-
tual foundation needed for significant advances in national security capabilities.
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Booher, H. 2003. Handbook of Human Systems Integration . Hoboken, NY: Wiley.
Canton, J. 2004. “Designing the future: NBIC technologies and human performance enhance-
ment.” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1013:186-198.
Defense Acquisition University. 2005a. Introduction to Defense Acquisition Management , 7th
ed. Washington, DC: Defense Acquisition University.
Defense Acquisition University. 2005b. Manager ' s Guide to Technology Transition in an
Evolutionary Acquisition Environment , 2nd ed. Washington, DC: Defense Acquisition
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Defense Research and Engineering. 2007. Strategic Plan . Washington, DC: Office of the
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