Gaps

Environmental Health & Protection

Heat Exposure
  • Performance and injury predictions
  • Return to duty criteria following heat injury
  • Microclimate cooling
  • Technologies for optimal hydration status management
Altitude/Hypoxia Environments
  • Performance and injury predictions to hypoxia
  • Technologies to support sustained operations at high altitudes
Multi-environmental Stressors
  • Performance and injury predictions for mixed extreme environments in training and operations
Arctic Operations
  • Performance and injury predictions during cold weather operations
  • Performance degradation in manual dexterity to cold climates
  • Cognitive performance degradation in cold climates
Toxicant Exposure
  • Accurate dose information for exposure to industrial chemicals, mixtures and material hazards
  • Technologies and wearable devices to assess exposures to environmental chemicals and toxic material hazard
Biomarker Panels to Assess SM Impact
  • Toxicant environmental health hazards
  • Industrial chemical mixtures found in dense urban environments
Acute and Chronic Health Effects Linked to Response-Biomarkers
  • Biomarker detection of exposure threats
  • Biomarkers of prediction for adverse SM health outcomes

Injury Prevention & Reduction

Training and Operational Environments
  • Improved understanding of the physiological mechanisms underlying musculoskeletal injuries
  • Advanced technologies for real-time assessments outside of the clinic
  • Physical fitness training strategies to reduce the risk of injury from load, jolt, vibration, etc.
  • Countermeasures to mitigate injury risk potential for exploitation in training environments
  • Development of injury criteria for Personal Protection Equipment against blunt, blast and ballistic trauma threats
  • Injury criteria and medical performance standards to protect against hearing loss, vestibular injury, and ocular facial injury
  • Standards and criteria to identify when Warfighters are capable to Return-to-Duty (RTD), fully able to perform demanding tasks

Physiological Health & Performance

Fatigue Mechanisms and Countermeasures
  • Novel mechanisms in understanding/manipulating sleep for performance and health
  • Ability to monitor biologically- and medically-relevant sleep architecture in an ecologically-relevant, open architecture manner for management of Warfighter fatigue, attention and readiness
  • Non-pharmacological manipulation of alertness and sleep
  • Use of VALIDATED wearables for Sleep as an indicator/predictor of performance, safety and health
  • Management of Circadian rhythms
Nutrition Solutions, Countermeasures and Strategies
  • Nutrition solutions to optimize recovery and sustain the Joint Warfighter under extreme conditions
  • Nutritional interventions for mission reset and injury recovery -- countermeasures for physical and cognitive degradation following military operations
  • Protection strategies to mitigate operational stress
  • Tailored, modular ration components to improve readiness
Physiological Basis of Resilience and Cognitive Readiness
  • Sustain robust cognitive function in Service members under acute operational psychological/physiological stressors
  • Promote adaptability to novel, militarily-relevant demands and improve cognitive function in Service members over the course of a training cycle or career

Psychological Health & Resilience

Service Member Resilience
  • Evidence-based approaches to protect, maintain, optimize and enhance Service member and Family psychological fitness/readiness
  • Evidence-based individual and group strategies to promote resilience to operational stressors and enhance psychological health and readiness
  • Resilience training approaches that leverage technologies and accelerate learning and skills acquisition
  • Operationally relevant metrics for Total Force Fitness domains (e.g., social, spiritual, psychological, behavioral)
Behavioral Health
  • Objective tools and technologies to better prevent, diagnose, and treat mental health issues such as suicide and substance abuse
  • Non-self-report real-time assessment technologies of psychological well-being and status
  • Telemedicine and mental/behavioral health approaches that overcome barriers/challenges
  • Identification/validation of biomarkers for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Translational efforts on the diagnosis and psychiatric/psychotherapeutic treatment of PTSD
  • Promote provider adoption and fidelity in practice of evidence-based interventions for restoration of psychological health