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• Emergency Response to COVID-19 in Canada: Platform Development and Implementation for eHealth in Crisis Management

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  From the Abstract: "Public health emergencies like epidemics put enormous pressure on health care systems while revealing deep structural and functional problems in the organization of care. The current coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic illustrates this at a global level. [...] The aim of this study is to develop an innovative web-based solution addressing the seemingly insurmountable challenges of triaging, monitoring, and delivering nonhospital services unleashed by the COVID-19 pandemic. [...] An adaptable crisis management digital platform was envisioned and designed with the goal of improving the system's response on the basis of the literature; an existing shared health record platform; and discussions between health care providers, decision makers, academia, and the private sector in response to the COVID 19 epidemic. [...] The Crisis Management Platform was developed and offered to health authorities in Ontario on a nonprofit basis. It has the capability to dramatically streamline patient intake, triage, monitoring, referral, and delivery of nonhospital services. It decentralizes the provision of services (by moving them online) and centralizes data gathering and analysis, maximizing the use of existing human resources, facilitating evidence-based decision making, and minimizing the risk to both users and providers. It has unlimited scale-up possibilities (only constrained by human health risk resource availability) with minimal marginal cost." This article can also be found here on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e18995/].

  JMIR Publications

  Krausz, Michael, MD, PhD, FRCPc; Westenberg, Jean Nicolas; Vigo, Daniel . . .

  2020-05-15
• Agile Requirements Engineering and Software Planning for a Digital Health Platform to Engage the Effects of Isolation Caused by Social Distancing: Case Study

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  From the Abstract: "Social distancing and shielding measures have been put in place to reduce social interaction and slow the transmission of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). For older people, self-isolation presents particular challenges for mental health and social relationships. As time progresses, continued social distancing could have a compounding impact on these concerns. [...] This project aims to provide a tool for older people and their families and peers to improve their well-being and health during and after regulated social distancing. First, we will evaluate the tool's feasibility, acceptability, and usability to encourage positive nutrition, enhance physical activity, and enable virtual interaction while social distancing. Second, we will be implementing the app to provide an online community to assist families and peer groups in maintaining contact with older people using goal setting. Anonymized data from the app will be aggregated with other real-world data sources to develop a machine learning algorithm to improve the identification of patients with COVID-19 and track for real time use by health systems. [...] Making use of a pre-existing software framework for health behavior change, a proof of concept was developed, and a multistage app development and deployment for the solution was created. [...] This case study lays the foundations for future app development to combat mental and societal issues arising from social distancing measures. The app will be tested and evaluated in future studies to allow continuous improvement of the app." This article can also be found here on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19297/].

  JMIR Publications

  Meinert, Edward; Milne-Ives, Madison; Surodina, Svitlana . . .

  2020-05-06
• Data Mining and Content Analysis of the Chinese Social Media Platform Weibo During the Early COVID-19 Outbreak: Retrospective Observational Infoveillance Study

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  From the Abstract: "The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, which began in Wuhan, China in December 2019, is rapidly spreading worldwide with over 1.9 million cases as of mid-April 2020. Infoveillance approaches using social media can help characterize disease distribution and public knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors critical to the early stages of an outbreak. [...] The aim of this study is to conduct a quantitative and qualitative assessment of Chinese social media posts originating in Wuhan City on the Chinese microblogging platform Weibo during the early stages of the COVID-19 outbreak. [...] Chinese-language messages from Wuhan were collected for 39 days between December 23, 2019, and January 30, 2020, on Weibo. For quantitative analysis, the total daily cases of COVID-19 in Wuhan were obtained from the Chinese National Health Commission, and a linear regression model was used to determine if Weibo COVID-19 posts were predictive of the number of cases reported. Qualitative content analysis and an inductive manual coding approach were used to identify parent classifications of news and user-generated COVID-19 topics. [...] The results of this study provide initial insight into the origins of the COVID-19 outbreak based on quantitative and qualitative analysis of Chinese social media data at the initial epicenter in Wuhan City. Future studies should continue to explore the utility of social media data to predict COVID-19 disease severity, measure public reaction and behavior, and evaluate effectiveness of outbreak communication." This article was originally published on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e18700/].

  JMIR Publications

  Li, Jiawei; Purushothaman, Vidya; Mackey, Tim Ken . . .

  2020-04-21
• Correlations of Online Search Engine Trends with Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Incidence: Infodemiology Study

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  From the Abstract: "The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is the latest pandemic of the digital age. With the internet harvesting large amounts of data from the general population in real time, public databases such as Google Trends (GT) and the Baidu Index (BI) can be an expedient tool to assist public health efforts. [...] The aim of this study is to apply digital epidemiology to the current COVID-19 pandemic to determine the utility of providing adjunctive epidemiologic information on outbreaks of this disease and evaluate this methodology in the case of future pandemics. [...] An epidemiologic time series analysis of online search trends relating to the COVID-19 pandemic was performed from January 9, 2020, to April 6, 2020. BI was used to obtain online search data for China, while GT was used for worldwide data, the countries of Italy and Spain, and the US states of New York and Washington. These data were compared to real-world confirmed cases and deaths of COVID-19. Chronologic patterns were assessed in relation to disease patterns, significant events, and media reports. [...] This study demonstrates the utility of digital epidemiology in providing helpful surveillance data of disease outbreaks like COVID-19. Although certain online search trends for this disease were influenced by media coverage, many search terms reflected clinical manifestations of the disease and showed strong correlations with real-world cases and deaths." This article was originally published on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [https://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19702].

  JMIR Publications

  Higgins, Thomas; Wu, Arthur; Illing, Elisa . . .

  2020-05-21
• Considerations for Postacute Rehabilitation for Survivors of COVID-19

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  From the Abstract: "Coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the infection caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was first reported on December 31, 2019. Because it has only been studied for just over three months, our understanding of this disease is still incomplete, particularly regarding its sequelae and long-term outcomes. Moreover, very little has been written about the rehabilitation needs of patients with COVID-19 after discharge from acute care. The objective of this report is to answer the question 'What rehabilitation services do survivors of COVID-19 require?' The question was asked within the context of a subacute hospital delivering geriatric inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation services. Three areas relevant to rehabilitation after COVID-19 were identified. First, details of how patients may present have been summarized, including comorbidities, complications from an intensive care unit stay with or without intubation, and the effects of the virus on multiple body systems, including those pertaining to cardiac, neurological, cognitive, and mental health. Second, I have suggested procedures regarding the design of inpatient rehabilitation units for COVID-19 survivors, staffing issues, and considerations for outpatient rehabilitation. Third, guidelines for rehabilitation (physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech-language pathology) following COVID-19 have been proposed with respect to recovery of the respiratory system as well as recovery of mobility and function." This article can also be found here on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19462/].

  JMIR Publications

  Sheehy, Lisa Mary

  2020-05-08
• Knowledge and Behaviors Toward COVID-19 Among US Residents During the Early Days of the Pandemic: Cross-Sectional Online Questionnaire

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  From the Abstract: "The early days of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in the United States brought uncertainty in the knowledge about COVID-19 and what to do about it. It is necessary to understand public knowledge and behaviors if we are to effectively address the pandemic. [...] The aim of this study is to test the hypothesis that knowledge about COVID-19 influences participation in different behaviors including self-reports of purchasing more goods than usual, attending large gatherings, and using medical masks. [...] This study was funded and approved by the Institutional Review Board on March 17, 2020. The cross-sectional online survey of 1034 US residents aged 18 years or older was conducted on March 17, 2020. [...] The results suggest that there is a politicization of response recommendations. Democrats had 30% lower odds of attending large gatherings [...] and 48% lower odds of using medical masks [...] compared to Republicans. [...] A national, coordinated effort toward a pandemic response may ensure better compliance with behavioral recommendations to address this public health emergency." This article can also be found here on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19161/].

  JMIR Publications

  Clements, John M.

  2020-05-08
• Mathematical Modeling of COVID-19 Control and Prevention Based on Immigration Population Data in China: Model Development and Validation

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  From the Abstract: "At the end of February 2020, the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in China had drastically slowed and appeared to be under control compared to the peak data in early February of that year. However, the outcomes of COVID-19 control and prevention measures varied between regions (ie, provinces and municipalities) in China; moreover, COVID-19 has become a global pandemic, and the spread of the disease has accelerated in countries outside China. [...] This study aimed to establish valid models to evaluate the effectiveness of COVID-19 control and prevention among various regions in China. These models also targeted regions with control and prevention problems by issuing immediate warnings. [...] We built a mathematical model, the Epidemic Risk Time Series Model, and used it to analyze two sets of data, including the daily COVID-19 incidence (ie, newly diagnosed cases) as well as the daily immigration population size. [...] Based on the results of the model evaluation, some regions, such as Shanghai and Zhejiang, were successful in COVID-19 control and prevention, whereas other regions, such as Heilongjiang, yielded poor performance. The evaluation result was highly correlated with the basic reproduction number (R0 ) value, and the result was evaluated in a timely manner at the beginning of the disease outbreak. [...] The Epidemic Risk Time Series Model was designed to evaluate the effectiveness of COVID-19 control and prevention in different regions in China based on analysis of immigration population data. Compared to other methods, such as R0 , this model enabled more prompt issue of early warnings. This model can be generalized and applied to other countries to evaluate their COVID-19 control and prevention." This article was originally published on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e18638/].

  JMIR Publications

  Huang, Qiangsheng; Kang, Yu Sunny

  2020-05-25
• Use of the Army in Aid of the Civil Power.

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  The document discusses the use of the U.S. Army to protect the three guaranties of Article IV Section 4 of the Constitution: 1. The guaranty of a republican form of government; 2. The guaranty against invasion; and 3. The guaranty against domestic violence. "By the use of the Army in aid of the civil power is here meant its use under some power granted by the Constitution of the United States, either directly or through the medium of legislation. 'War powers,' independent of the Constitution, whatever they may be, and whether legislative or executive, are no part of this subject. The use-here spoken of has reference to the occasions for the employment of the Army, that is, to the purposes for which it may be used, and not to what it may do in carrying out the use. The occasions had in view are those of resistance to the law not amounting to war, and the subject to which these observations will be more especially addressed is the employment of the Army in executing the laws of the United States and in protecting their instrumentalities of government against unlawful interference."

  United States. Government Printing Office

  Lieber, G. Norman (Guido Norman), b. 1837

  1898
• Left Behind: A Brief Assessment of the Biden Administration's Strategic Failures During the Afghanistan Evacuation

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  From the Executive Summary: "From August 15 to August 31, the United States completed its largest air evacuation. However, this evacuation was marred by a lack of planning, coordination, and communication. The United States failed to establish a clear system of how to contact evacuees and processes to allow them into the airport. The result left American citizens, U.S. legal permanent residents, and Afghan allies abandoned to the fate of the Taliban regime. [...] In conducting interviews for this report, it is clear that despite substantial failures of leadership and foresight, it was junior and mid-level civil servants, Foreign Service and military officers, and enlisted personnel who would help mitigate a number of issues through extraordinary feats. In fact, it was the heroic initiative taken by these people that prevented the evacuation from being even more disastrous than it could have been."

  United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Foreign Relations

  2022-02
• Basic Field Manual: Military Law - Domestic Disturbances

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  "This manual is limited to, a brief presentation of such of the principles of the law governing the employment of Federal military forces; in aid of the civil authorities as the troops in camp or field, in time of war or domestic disturbance, ordinarily may have needed to know and apply. The calling of State troops for use within the State in aid of the civil authorities is governed by the laws of the State concerned, and the limitations and restrictions as, to their authority to act under such State call must depend on the laws of the State. However the general principles and methods of employment of troops and materiel as stated in this manual apply equally to any armed force used for this purpose."

  United States. Government Printing Office

  1941-02-06
• Modeling COVID-19 Latent Prevalence to Assess a Public Health Intervention at a State and Regional Scale: Retrospective Cohort Study

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  From the Abstract: "Emergence of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) caught the world off guard and unprepared, initiating a global pandemic. In the absence of evidence, individual communities had to take timely action to reduce the rate of disease spread and avoid overburdening their health care systems. Although a few predictive models have been published to guide these decisions, most have not taken into account spatial differences and have included assumptions that do not match the local realities. Access to reliable information that is adapted to local context is critical for policy makers to make informed decisions during a rapidly evolving pandemic. [...] The goal of this study was to develop an adapted susceptible-infected-removed (SIR) model to predict the trajectory of the COVID-19 pandemic in North Carolina and the Charlotte Metropolitan Region, and to incorporate the effect of a public health intervention to reduce disease spread while accounting for unique regional features and imperfect detection. [...] Our SIR-int model for estimated latent prevalence was reasonably flexible, highly accurate, and demonstrated efficacy of a stay-at-home order at both the state and regional level. Our results highlight the importance of incorporating local context into pandemic forecast modeling, as well as the need to remain vigilant and informed by the data as we enter into a critical period of the outbreak." This article can also be found here on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19353/].

  JMIR Publications

  Turk, Philip J.; Chou, Shih-Hsiung; Kowalkowski, Marc A. . . .

  2020-06-19
• Security Against Renewed German Aggression: Statement by William L. Clayton, Assistant Secretary of State before the Subcommittee on War Mobilization, Senate Committee on Military Affairs, June 25, 1945

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  "In all questions affecting the treatment of Germany, the Department of State has one paramount objective-security against a renewed German aggression. And security can be assured only so long as there is agreement with our Allies on the basic principles of the treatment of Germany. We have reached that agreement as far as the basic objectives of the occupation of Germany are concerned. […] The task of destroying the economic basis of German aggression is one that requires vigorous, simultaneous action along a number of lines. I am very glad to discuss this morning those three aspects of this problem on which your committee has asked me to report. These are the serious problem of Axis economic penetration in Latin America, the problem of tracking down and frustrating German efforts to hide abroad a stake for another gamble of aggression, and the question of the treatment of German cartels, combines, and technology."

  United States. Government Printing Office

  Clayton, William L.

  1945-06-25
• National Security Organization: A Report to Congress by the Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government, February 1949

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  "World conditions demand that the United States maintain a strong National Security Organization. This need results directly from the total disruption of the old balance of power among nations, and from new forms of communications and warfare which have impaired America's ocean-moated isolation. Ours is a need for defense and our military strength must be predicated upon the degree of menace which we face. At present outlook, the United States' need far a strong Military Establishment is obvious. In the past, the United States has maintained merely a nominal Army and Air Force, and its Navy has been sharply limited. The assumption was that war, and international crises which could result in war, would be rare and that there would always be ample time to build a strong military force around this permanent cadre. Now the United States, in the forefront of world affairs, must continuously deal with political and economic pressures."

  United States. Central Intelligence Agency

  1949-02
• Tracking Social Media Discourse About the COVID-19 Pandemic: Development of a Public Coronavirus Twitter Data Set

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  From the Abstract: "At the time of this writing, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic outbreak has already put tremendous strain on many countries' citizens, resources, and economies around the world. Social distancing measures, travel bans, self-quarantines, and business closures are changing the very fabric of societies worldwide. With people forced out of public spaces, much of the conversation about these phenomena now occurs online on social media platforms like Twitter. [...] In this paper, we describe a multilingual COVID-19 Twitter data set that we are making available to the research community via our COVID-19-TweetIDs GitHub repository. [...] We started this ongoing data collection on January 28, 2020, leveraging Twitter's streaming application programming interface (API) and Tweepy to follow certain keywords and accounts that were trending at the time data collection began. We used Twitter's search API to query for past tweets, resulting in the earliest tweets in our collection dating back to January 21, 2020. [...] Since the inception of our collection, we have actively maintained and updated our GitHub repository on a weekly basis. We have published over 123 million tweets, with over 60% of the tweets in English. This paper also presents basic statistics that show that Twitter activity responds and reacts to COVID-19-related events. [...] It is our hope that our contribution will enable the study of online conversation dynamics in the context of a planetary-scale epidemic outbreak of unprecedented proportions and implications. This data set could also help track COVID-19-related misinformation and unverified rumors or enable the understanding of fear and panic--and undoubtedly more." This article was originally published on the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Public Health and Surveillance website: [http://publichealth.jmir.org/2020/2/e19273/].

  JMIR Publications

  Chen, Emily; Lerman, Kristina; Ferrara, Emilio

  2020-05-29
• Biomedical Research: Observations on DOD's Management of Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs

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  From the Introduction: "The Department of Defense (DOD) is among the United States' largest federal sponsors of biomedical research, which contributes to discoveries of new drugs, vaccines, medical services, and other approaches for preventing, diagnosing, and treating diseases, conditions, and injuries. [1] For fiscal year 2021, Congress appropriated nearly $2.4 billion for the Defense Health Program for research, development, test and evaluation, which includes biomedical research. [2] Of that amount, about $1.5 billion funded DOD's Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (CDMRP), including 36 research program areas such as cancers, alcohol and substance abuse disorders, and spinal cord injury. [3] CDMRP has grown since its initial appropriation of $210 million in 1992 (about $367 million in fiscal year 2021 dollars) to fund a breast cancer research program."

  United States. Government Accountability Office

  2021-11
• Maximum Use of Civilian Communications Capabilities for National Security

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  From the introductory Staff Study section of this analytical study: "The civilian communications industry in the United States, with a plant value of over 7 billion dollars, employing over 1/2 million skilled communications men, and rapidly expanding, is capable of furnishing sufficient skilled and experienced personnel in wartime to meet practically the entire Armed Forces and industrial requirements. […] Signal Corps experience in both recent Wars has demonstrated and proven the value and benefits of military utilization of civilian industrial trained and experienced technicians as implemented through the 'Affiliation' principle. […] Current programs leading toward a utilization of this civilian skilled manpower reservoir, principally through the 'Affiliation Program', can ultimately utilize only a minor fraction of the segment of this group of personnel which would be available to the Armed Forces in wartime. Current program limitations and implementing experiences indicate a definite need for a more comprehensive program of civilian skilled personnel utilization. […] Since there exists in the Signal Corps a positive wartime requirement for trained and skilled civilian communications personnel; since there exists within the civilian communications industry a sufficient force of this category of personnel to meet practically all wartime manpower requirements; and since current programs provide for only a minor utilization of this civilian capability; - the urgency of the problem warrants consideration of a plan designed to achieve maximum utilization of this capability."

  U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. School of Advanced Military Studies

  Heltzel, William E.

  1947-11-19
• Congressional Budget Office Cost Estimate: S. 2102, Supporting Expanded Review for Veterans in Combat Environments Act of 2021

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  This is the Congressional Budget Office Cost Estimate as ordered reported by the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs on July 28, 2021. From the Document: "S. 2102 would require the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to extend eligibility for mammographic screenings to any veteran who, after September 11, 2001, served in locations associated with exposure to toxic substances or who served in Southwest Asia during the Persian Gulf war. Under current law, the department provides mammograms to veterans who are 40 or older. The bill would expand eligibility for mammographic screening for post-9/11 veterans who are under 40 years of age. All veterans from the Persian Gulf War are now at least 48 years of age and eligible for mammograms from VA under current law."

  United States. Congressional Budget Office

  2022-01-28
• Federal Civil Defense Administration Annual Statistical Report for Fiscal Year 1957

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  "The Federal Civil Defense Administration was created by the Federal Civil Defense Act of 1950, Public Law 920, 81st Congress, which was passed January 12, 1951. […] From the time FCDA was created, programs have been developed and have gone forward to discharge these responsibilities. Since early 1953 the Agency has also had responsibility for coordinating Federal assistance to the States in major natural disasters, under authority of Public Law 875, 81st Congress. This is the third Annual Statistical Report published to show in summary form the progress made in several aspects of civil defense in the United States and particularly in the programs carried on directly by FCDA. Interim Statistical Reports were published at the end of each quarter during the past year to provide more current data on some of the programs. […] Each part is subdivided into a number of items with charts and tables giving statistics on a related group of matters pertinent to civil defense operations and programs. Unless noted otherwise, the source of all material is the FCDA National and Regional Offices. In nearly all cases, the information reflects program status as of June 30, 1957."

  United States. Federal Civil Defense Administration

  1957
• Effects of Catastrophic Events on Transportation System Management and Operations: Comparative Analysis

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  "In order to provide a better understanding of how the surface transportation system is both affected and utilized in an emergency situation, the U.S. Department of Transportation Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Joint Program Office and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Office of Operations commissioned a series of six case studies examining the effects of catastrophic events on transportation system management and operations: 1. Blackout, New York-New Jersey-Connecticut Metropolitan Area, August 14, 2003 2. Blackout, Great Lakes Region, August 14, 2003 3. Terrorist attack, New York City, September 11, 2001 4. Terrorist attack, Washington, D.C., September 11, 2001 5. Rail tunnel fire, Baltimore, Maryland, July 18, 2001 6. Earthquake, Northridge, California, January 18, 1994 Each of the events resulted in substantial, immediate, and adverse impacts on the transportation system, and each has had a varying degree of influence on the longer-term operation of transportation facilities and services in its respective region. This comparative analysis summarizes the surface transportation activities associated with these catastrophic events and the lessons learned from each. The case studies have provided material for a series of Transportation Response and Recovery Workshops developed by the FHWA and held in major metropolitan areas around the country."

  United States. Department of Transportation. Research and Special Programs Administration

  DeBlasio, Allan J.; Zirker, Margaret E.; Regan, Terrance J.

  1958-01-01
• Defense Infrastructure: DOD Should Better Manage Risks Posed by Deferred Facility Maintenance, Report to the Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support, Committee on Armed Services, U.S. Senate

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  From the Highlights: "DOD manages facilities worldwide with an estimated aggregate plant replacement value of about $1.3 trillion. Sustaining these facilities involves maintenance and repair to keep them in good working order. Deferring maintenance can lead to deterioration, potentially affecting DOD's ability to support missions. GAO [Government Accountability Office] was asked to review DOD facility sustainment. This report examines the extent to which (1) DOD's cost factors for estimating its facility sustainment funding requirements are comparable to those of other federal agencies and fully account for DOD's sustainment costs; (2) DOD's facility sustainment funding aligns with its funding goals; and (3) DOD has a deferred maintenance backlog and a process for managing any such backlog. GAO reviewed documentation and interviewed officials about DOD's process for estimating facility sustainment funding requirements and managing deferred maintenance; analyzed funding and deferred maintenance data for FY2017 through FY2020; and contacted a non-generalizable sample of 12 DOD installations from six DOD components to discuss facility sustainment."

  United States. Government Accountability Office

  2022-01-31
• Civil Defense Today

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  "In the preattack phase in civil defense we have only two tools to work with. We have never had more than two, and, as far as I can see, we never will have more than two. Those two tools are simply the utilization of space and the utilization of shielding. To gain space you put distance between yourself and the explosion of the bomb, or the point where you assume the bomb will be exploded, the neighborhood you assume it will be exploded in. That simply becomes evacuation. This business of evacuation is an interesting one. I started talking about it back in 1953. You have to keep your calendar a little bit in mind when you talk about concepts of this type. We try to think back to what we knew about these things in 1953, because obviously I wasn't smart enough to know in 1953 what I know in 1957. Neither was anybody else in the world at that time."

  Industrial College of the Armed Forces (U.S.)

  Peterson, Val

  1957-02-25
• Review of U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Fiscal Year 2021 Drug Control Budget Formulation Compliance Report

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  From the Document: "The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) Circular, 'National Drug Control Program Agency Compliance Reviews,' requires National Drug Control Program agencies to submit to the ONDCP Director by February 1 of each year a detailed accounting of all funds expended for National Drug Control Program activities during the previous fiscal year. At least every 3 years, the Office of Inspector General is required to review the report and provide a conclusion about the reliability of each assertion made in the report."

  United States. Department of Homeland Security. Office of Inspector General

  2022-01-27
• Challenges in Computational Social Modeling and Simulation for National Security Decision-Making

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  "On October 26th and 27th, 2010, Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) organized an interdisciplinary workshop in which participants from a range of institutions and research backgrounds presented and discussed papers on a range of topics related to the development and use of computational social science (CSS) in national security decision-making. Computational social science refers to the use of computational modeling and simulation approaches, including agent-based, social network, discrete event, and systems dynamics methodologies, to study behavioral, cultural, and social dynamics. CSS has long roots in computer science, artificial intelligence, and quantitative social science. Over the past decade, CSS methods have captured the attention of the national security community as a source of analytic and decision-support technologies for a range of challenges, from counterinsurgency to terrorism." Note: This document has been added to the Homeland Security Digital Library in agreement with the Project on Advanced Systems and Concepts for Countering WMD (PASCC) as part of the PASCC collection. Permission to download and/or retrieve this resource has been obtained through PASCC.

  Sandia National Laboratories; United States. Defense Threat Reduction Agency

  Gieseler, Charles; McNamara, Laura A.; Trucano, Timothy Guy

  2011-06
• Public Views on Multiple Dimensions of Security: Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, Energy and the Environment: 2007

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  "We analyze and compare findings from identical national surveys of the US general public on nuclear security and terrorism administered by telephone and Internet in mid-2007. Key areas of investigation include assessments of threats to US security; valuations of US nuclear weapons and nuclear deterrence; perspectives on nuclear proliferation, including the specific cases of North Korea and Iran; and support for investments in nuclear weapons capabilities. Our analysis of public views on terrorism include assessments of the current threat, progress in the struggle against terrorism, preferences for responding to terrorist attacks at different levels of assumed casualties, and support for domestic policies intended to reduce the threat of terrorism. Also we report findings from an Internet survey conducted in mid 2007 that investigates public views of US energy security, to include: energy supplies and reliability; energy vulnerabilities and threats, and relationships among security, costs, energy dependence, alternative sources, and research and investment priorities. We analyze public assessments of nuclear energy risks and benefits, nuclear materials management issues, and preferences for the future of nuclear energy in the US. Additionally, we investigate environmental issues as they relate to energy security, to include expected implications of global climate change, and relationships among environmental issues and potential policy options."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Jenkins-Smith, Hank C.; Herron, Kerry G.

  2007-12
• Strategic Analysis of Complex Security Scenarios

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  "Many advanced technical tools are available to prevent attacks on national infrastructure. Nevertheless, while traditional analyses of security problems have succeeded in producing good technical solutions, they have often ignored the human factor integral to these problems. Human attackers (who may be individuals or state-level attackers) expend substantial effort to breach security because they have the incentive for doing so. People involved in implementing security follow individual incentives, which need not align with global security concerns; consequently, desired security solutions are often implemented poorly, or not at all. This complex interplay between individual incentives and global (organizational and/or national) goals can be modeled and analyzed using game theoretic techniques. By analyzing not only what is possible, but also what is motivated, a holistic approach to security problems can be developed, informing policy and providing tools to policy makers. We study game theoretic models that unify several current incentive-based approaches to security, and develop simulation-based and mathematical optimization methods for analyzing such models that exploit the high-performance computing capabilities at Sandia."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Vorobeychik, Yevgeniy

  2012-09
• Inherently Safer Technology Gaps Analysis Study

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  "This project consisted of an analysis of the current state of knowledge for improving safety regarding toxic industrial chemicals, including an examination of current and state-of-the-art techniques and technologies capable of increasing safety and security in production, transportation, storage, and use of hazardous chemicals. The primary goal was to improve national security through improved safety by providing a foundation for a comprehensive evaluation of the current state of knowledge surrounding the source and production methods of the 'Release -- Toxic' chemicals in DHS CFATS [Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards] Appendix A list of chemicals of interest. Additionally, this project assisted in the data gathering and development of the CSAC IST [Chemical Security Analysis Center Inherently Safer Technology] Metrics. This involved an in-depth effort to understand specific chemical processes followed by a conceptual effort to redefine the Chemical Release Reduction Modifier that was included in the original Index."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Foltz, Greg W.; Paap, Scott M.; Anstey, Mitchell R.

  2012-08
• Towards Risk-Based Management of Critical Infrastructures: Enabling Insights and Analysis Methodologies from a Focused Study of the Bulk Power Grid

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  "This report summarizes research on a holistic analysis framework to assess and manage risks in complex infrastructures, with a specific focus on the bulk electric power grid (grid). A comprehensive model of the grid is described that can approximate the coupled dynamics of its physical, control, and market components. New realism is achieved in a power simulator extended to include relevant control features such as relays. The simulator was applied to understand failure mechanisms in the grid. Results suggest that the implementation of simple controls might significantly alter the distribution of cascade failures in power systems. The absence of cascade failures in our results raises questions about the underlying failure mechanisms responsible for widespread outages, and specifically whether these outages are due to a system effect or large-scale component degradation. Finally, a new agent-based market model for bilateral trades in the short-term bulk power market is presented and compared against industry observations."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Laviolette, Randall A.; Richardson, Bryan T.; Cook, Benjamin K.

  2008-01
• Verification and Validation of Social Science Simulations: Some Thoughts for Consideration in National Security Applications

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  "Threats to national security have become increasingly complex and adaptive involving the intersection of technical, operational, and human considerations. Non-state actors that use non-traditional means of attack such as terrorism and the threat of acquisition or use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) are of particular concern, as the numbers of actors, their potential repertoires of behaviors, and the dynamic, co-evolutionary nature of their actions with those of other actors compound the problem space enormously. The expansion along these several dimensions has encouraged the emergence of many new modeling approaches, as well as the innovative application of existing methods across domain spaces, to support transdisciplinary data collection, analysis, and decision support. The direct inclusion of social sciences in particular, and (although to a lesser extent) the humanities in the threat analysis endeavor introduces new concepts, frames of reference, and language to what historically was a field structured around the physical and engineering sciences." Note: This document has been added to the Homeland Security Digital Library in agreement with the Project on Advanced Systems and Concepts for Countering WMD (PASCC) as part of the PASCC collection. Permission to download and/or retrieve this resource has been obtained through PASCC.

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Hayden, Nancy Kay

  2007-07-13
• Design for Resilience in Infrastructure Distribution Networks

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  "The recognition that resilience is a critical aspect of infrastructure resilience has caused the national and homeland security communities to ask 'How does one ensure infrastructure resilience?' Previous analysis methods have primarily focused on system recovery activities following the occurrence of a disruptive event. In this report, we expand on those methods by including pre-disruption investment options, in addition to post-event recovery activities, as means to infrastructure resilience. The report describes a stochastic optimization model for designing network infrastructure resilience to a variety of uncertain potential disruptions. The model seeks investment-recovery combinations that minimize the overall cost to a regional distribution network. A set of numerical experiments illustrates how changes to disruption scenarios probabilities affect the optimal resilient design investments."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Vugrin, Eric D.; Turnquist, Mark A.

  2012-07
• Development of Chemiresponsive Sensors for Detection of Common Homemade Explosives

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  "Field-structured chemiresistors (FSCRs) are polymer based sensors that exhibit a resistance change when exposed to an analyte of interest. The amount of resistance change depends on the polymer-analyte affinity. The affinity can be manipulated by modifying the polymer within the FSCRs. In this paper, we investigate the ability of chemically modified FSCRs to sense hydrogen peroxide vapor. Five chemical species were chosen based on their hydrophobicity or reactivity with hydrogen peroxide. Of the five investigated, FSCRs modified with allyl methyl sulfide exhibited a significant response to hydrogen peroxide vapor. Additionally, these same FSCRs were evaluated against a common interferrant in hydrogen peroxide detection, water vapor. For the conditions investigated, the FSCRs modified with allyl methyl sulfide were able to successfully distinguish between water vapor and hydrogen peroxide vapor. A portion of the results presented here will be submitted to the Sensors and Actuators journal."

  Sandia National Laboratories

  Brotherton, Christopher M.; Wheeler, David R.

  2012-05