News & Media

FORT DETRICK, Md. — Two cutting-edge imaging technologies being developed by the Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center will be tested at the Army's flagship persistent experimentation activity in the spring of 2025, providing the designers with valuable hands-on input from Warfighters operating the technologies in real-world conditions.

FORT DETRICK, Md. — For 25 years, the Office of Medical Technology Transfer has worked with inventors, businesses and investors to commercialize and deliver dozens of innovative life-saving devices and medicines for the Warfighter and the public. The heart of MTT's success is an award-winning process for systematically maturing and de-risking first-generation biomedical technologies called Assistive Technology Transfer, or AT2.

Press Release — For Immediate Release

FORT DETRICK, MD – The Defense Health Agency’s (DHA) United States Army Medical Research and Development Command’s (USAMRDC) Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) Senior Research Scientist, Dr. Jaques Reifman has been recognized once again with the Presidential Rank Award. Reifman, the Director of the Biotechnology High-Performance Computing Software Applications Institute (BHSAI), is perhaps the only Army Senior Executive to receive this distinguished honor three times in his career.

FORT DETRICK, Md. — Dr. Jaques Reifman, director and senior research scientist of the Biotechnology High-Performance Computing Software Applications Institute, has been selected to receive a 2024 Presidential Rank Award, making him perhaps the only Army senior executive to receive three such prestigious awards in recognition of his nearly 25 years of applying pioneering research in computational biology to the needs of the nation's Warfighters.

FORT DETRICK, Md. – Dr. Jaques Reifman, director and senior research scientist of the Biotechnology High-Performance Computing Software Applications Institute, has been selected to receive a 2024 Presidential Rank Award, making him perhaps the only Army senior executive to receive three such prestigious awards in recognition of his nearly 25 years of applying pioneering research in computational biology to the needs of the nation’s Warfighters.

Press Release — For Immediate Release

FORT DETRICK, Md. – – The United States Army Medical Research and Development Command’s (USAMRDC) Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) has awarded three research contracts for the development of algorithms to support autonomous documentation of care delivery during tactical combat casualty care (TCCC) environments. The recipients of these Medical Technology Enterprise Consortium (MTEC) Other Transaction Authority (OTA) awards are Applied Research Associates (ARA), Inc., BlueHalo and Crimson Government LLC. All three performer teams will provide key components to support TATRC’s Autonomous Casualty Care (AC2) mission.

Hello Friends and Colleagues! As we’ve marched through this year, Team TATRC continues to amaze me on a regular basis. There’s been a palpable change over the last few months with the ability to get things done and I’m really proud of that. It’s impressive to witness.

June 2024 was a monumental and key month for the Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC), as two long-awaited research support contracts for the AutoDoc project were finally awarded.

The first contract award is with the Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) contractor, The MITRE Corporation. This contract allows the MITRE team to spearhead the efforts to ensure there is data interoperability between the sensors, the data aggregation devices and algorithm developers so that passive documentation and the point of injury (POI) can be achieved in a plug and play fashion.

TATRC has always been a team. Across divisions and across science and staff, people in TATRC go out of their way to assist each other. It’s the culture.

But it really hasn’t been until a couple of “sprints” into our Automating Data Collection in Casualty Care or AutoDoc project, that we were really working as a single, interdependent team.

In the U.S. Army’s Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) at Ft. Detrick, MD, teams of researchers, scientists, and engineers work to push the boundaries of military medicine and explore new ways to aid the warfighter.

Projects such as the Remote Patient Management System (RPMS) and Vision and Intelligent Systems for Medical Teaming Applications (VISTA) are iteratively tested, observed, and improved to be built into more capable technologies.

LTC Rachel E. Morgans has joined TATRC as its newest Deputy Commander! LTC Morgans hails from Reading, Pennsylvania. She began her career 19 years ago after graduating from the Pennsylvania State University with a Bachelor of Science in Nutrition. She commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army Medical Specialist Corps in 2005 before making her way to Fort Sam Houston, TX to attend the Officer Basic Course.

TATRC’s Medical Modeling Simulation, Information, and Visualization (MMSIV) group has added a new member to their team! Research Coordinator, Mr. Mark Spears, is the latest addition as part of the effort to expand data collection initiatives to the San Antonio area. Mr. Spears will be responsible for coordinating, conducting and overseeing data collection at Joint Base San Antonio.

Functional Team Overview:

The Science and Technology Innovation Management and Synchronization (STIMS) functional team at the Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) possesses a unique blend of expertise, experience and access to accomplish the organizations singular mission: Automation of casualty care. The STIMS was established in May of 2023, during a major restructuring of the organization.

TATRC’s Medical Modeling, Simulation, Information & Visualization (MMSIV) team commenced its first off-site data collection event at our partner site located at the U.S. Army Medical Center of Excellence (MEDCoE) this past May. This major MMSIV milestone marks the first time that data has been collected for the Autonomous Casualty Care Porfolio / AutoDoc since the project kicked off.

Did you know that hemorrhage is the leading cause of preventable death on the battlefield, where more than 90% of combat casualties die before ever reaching a medical treatment facility? However, it is challenging to identify trauma casualties at risk for uncontrolled bleeding at the point of injury from those who are injured but may not be at risk for hemorrhage.

KISSISSMEE, Fl. – There is no doubt that science will change to meet the needs of the Warfighter and the future fight. This was a key takeaway from insights shared by researchers and scientists at the Department of Defense’s 2024 Military Health System Research Symposium held August 26-29.

KISSIMMEE, Fla. — When researchers at the U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command's Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center wanted to test the capabilities of their new Remote Patient Management System in real-world conditions, they worked with MRDC's Experimentation Integration Cell to arrange participation in Project Convergence Capstone 4, a major joint multinational experimentation exercise organized by the Army Futures Command that took place in California earlier this year.

Press Release — For Immediate Release

FORT DETRICK, Md. – The United States Army Medical Research and Development Command’s Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center has awarded two research contracts for the development of novel sensor suite configurations to support passive data collection and autonomous documentation of care delivery during tactical combat casualty care (TCCC) environments. The recipients of these Medical Technology Enterprise Consortium (MTEC) Other Transaction Authority (OTA) awards are Applied Research Associates (ARA), Inc and Moberg Analytics. Both teams will provide key components to support TATRC’s Autonomous Casualty Care (AC2) mission.

In the seconds Major Gen. Paula Lodi took to pass a burgundy command flag to the man facing her in Fort Detrick’s auditorium Wednesday morning, she completed her first act as the new commanding general of the U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command and Fort Detrick.

Novel capabilities to collect casualty care data in hyper-realistic battlefield conditions.

Press Release — For Immediate Release

FORT DETRICK, Md. – The United States Army Medical Research & Development Command’s (USAMRDC) Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC) has awarded a research contract to Ragged Edge Solutions (RES), LLC, via a Medical Technology Enterprise Consortium (MTEC) Other Transaction Authority (OTA) award as a key component of their Autonomous Casualty Care (AC2) mission.

FORT DETRICK, Md. — Over 200 attendees from across the Department of Defense, Congress and industry were treated to discussions and demonstrations of the next generation of military medical devices currently under development by the U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command during the third annual Capability Days event, May 21-22 at Fort Detrick.

Human-Technology Teaming on the Future Battlefield
Like the concept of automating the “kill chain” that executes lethal force faster than the enemy, the “survival chain” can be automated to accelerate critical decisions about casualty care and maximally preserve combat power (see figure 1).1 The accelerated execution of this medical construct through automation requires an uncomfortable paradigm shift for the Military Health System (MHS) that has achieved heroic casualty outcomes over the past twenty years of war but now faces a reckoning from challenges posed by large-scale combat operations against near-peer adversaries.

Representatives from TATRC’s Medical Modeling, Simulation, Information and Visualization (MMSIV) team along with the Medical Robotics and Autonomous Systems (MedRAS) group participated in the DARPA Triage Challenge (DTC) Kickoff Meeting in November of 2023 that took place at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) conference center in Arlington, Virginia.

The complex intelligent systems that create the interconnected digital world of today rely on effective data integration. Quick and reliable transmission and storage of data between devices is just one part of this equation. The shared data must also be written and stored in a standard data format such that it is understandable across a system. Imagine attempting to read a book written in a different language. The original writer may have written an amazing piece of literature (such as the TATRC Times FY24Q2 Newsletter!), but to you, it just appears to be nonsense.

We are off to the races! Since our last update, TATRC has been a whirlwind of activity. Never have I witnessed the organization humming along like such a finely-tuned engine – we have transformed. For most of its history, TATRC’s primary function was execution management: receiving proposals, awarding funds to external entities and ensuring the completion of that research. Now we are an organizational team focused on a mission and we are all working together to accomplish it through programmatic research (Figure 1).

Last Fall, TATRC commenced a new Autonomous Casualty Care (AC2) research portfolio with an initial objective of creating an innovative, trustworthy, reliable solution to passively collect data for autonomous care, also known as AutoDoc. Determined to aid, and not distract the combat medic in high-stakes environments, TATRC intends to create a combined sensor suite capable of collecting DD Form 1380 data fields to replace the historical methods of manually collecting tactical combat casualty care (TCCC) data.

Omar Badawi, PharmD, MPH, FCCM is the latest new hire to join TATRC, serving as the Data Scientist for the newly established Data Science section! As our Data Scientist, he will be working cross functionally to support the rest of TATRC and develop a data strategy that will improve our ability to achieve our mission of fusing Data, Humans, and Machines into trustworthy solutions that optimize medical performance and casualty outcomes.

Mr. Keo Pich is the latest addition to TATRC’s mighty Medical Robotics & Autonomous Systems (MedRAS) group. Keo is a seasoned professional with strong and extensive experience in project management. Originating from Cambodia, he relocated to the United States 15 years ago to pursue broader opportunities.

Ms. Tiffany Quach is the latest new hire to join TATRC’s Medical Modeling, Simulation, Information and Visualization (MMSIV) team! As a Human Factors Engineer, she is working in our NEXUS lab to collect data, run simulations, and provide user experience design recommendations for various projects. She has recently graduated from the George Mason University with a master’s degree in psychology concentrating in Human Factors and Applied Cognition.

Mr. Peter Chung joins team TATRC as a Software Developer & Researcher working within the Medical Robotics & Autonomous Systems (MedRAS) group. Mr. Chung will specifically be supporting our AutoDoc initiative which collects data from sensor suites for automating the process of filling out a tactical care combat casualty card, and Medic CDSS (Clinical Decision Support System), which provides real-time care guidelines to assist in trauma casualty assessment, management and disposition assistance.

Ms. Taylor Somers has joined team TATRC as our new Travel Coordinator & Budget Analyst. She is no stranger to government travel and has been here on base for the last 3 and ½ years as a contractor in an Executive Assistant role. Taylor has over 10 years of experience arranging travel for Government personnel in the Defense Travel System.

Exposure to blast-pressure waves from explosive devices poses a serious threat to Warfighter health and well-being, potentially leading to brain injury and cognitive deficits. Even a mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) can affect an individual’s physical functioning and mental health. Despite advances in our understanding of the detrimental effects of blast exposure on brain health, we still lack criteria that allow us to screen Service Members for brain injury after a blast exposure and establish procedures to ensure safe operational and training environments.

As you may have heard, TATRC is well underway in re-focusing its efforts on the Automating Casualty Care (AC2) portfolio. Its first project known as ‘AutoDoc,’ focuses around establishing a viable set of sensors, algorithms and infrastructure needed to collect data passively and reliably in casualty care environments and to use that data to document care.

FORT DETRICK, Md. – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has cleared a first-of-its-kind artificial intelligence-powered smartphone application developed by the U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command’s Biotechnology High Performance Computing Software Applications Institute that uses vital-sign data from trauma patients to assess their risk of hemorrhage.

When Ethan Quist was a child, he liked to build things using LEGO and other construction toys. In middle school, he discovered that he also enjoyed math and science. During his senior year in high school, he took a computer science class that challenged and excited him.

Officials with WellSpan Health — which is based in York County, Pa. — said this week that they are preparing to use drones to deliver prescriptions and medical supplies to patients’ homes.

Scientists are investigating the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to support medics in triaging patients that visit hospital emergency rooms.

JONESBORO, Ark. (KAIT) - Veterans from across the region completed several electronic surveys for the Veterans’ Suicide Prevention Project.

Nearly 100 military veterans completed the surveys for the project. Arkansas State University’s Masters of Athletic Training Program hosted a two-day surveying event at the Beck Center for Veterans on Friday, Feb.16, and Saturday, Feb. 17.

Lawmakers on Thursday questioned Department of Veterans Affairs officials on how to better employ artificial intelligence technology to ensure faster and more equitable health care and benefits for veterans.

On January 31, 2024, The Borden Institute, an esteemed entity affiliated with the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command and U.S. Army Medical Center of Excellence, unveiled a groundbreaking textbook series: 'Combat Medic Specialist Fieldcraft-Fieldcraft II.'

ARLINGTON, Va. — Soldiers in the coming years may use artificial intelligence to predict when and how to resupply troops and rely on swarms of automated watercraft and drones to get those supplies to personnel spread across vast distances.

WOBURN, Mass. Autonomous-system company Scientific Systems reports a successful demonstration for the U.S. Army of an autonomous, peer-to-peer collaboration and orchestration of commercial satellites and uncrewed aerial systems (UASs) that included closed-loop control of all associated multidomain sensors and exploitation services.

Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States have successfully showcased their prowess in integrating advanced autonomy and artificial intelligence (AI) during a recent trial in South Australia.

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO, Texas — Lt. Gen. R. Scott Dingle relinquished his position as the U.S. Army Surgeon General and Commanding General, U.S. Army Medical Command to Lt. Gen. Mary K. Izaguirre in a ceremony hosted by Gen. Randy George, Army Chief of Staff, on Jan. 25.

With this approval, DroneUp is now authorized to start BVLOS operations immediately at Riverside Health System facilities. This development is a crucial step towards a broader deployment of BVLOS drone deliveries at various locations nationwide, both with existing and potential new customers.

Edge's GY 300 drew the crowds at Abu Dhabi drone conference as unmanned systems enter the mainstream.

A new type of drone helicopter that can operate in rough terrain, fly to remote locations and deliver payloads of up to 300kg has been unveiled at a major exhibition in Abu Dhabi.

Rapid and effective emergency response is of paramount importance. Whether it’s a natural disaster, a medical emergency, or a search-and-rescue operation, time can often make the difference between life and death. Traditional emergency response methods are vital, but they are only sometimes fast enough to address the urgency of certain situations.

Developed by researchers at the University of Sheffield, this revolutionary technology has the potential to be a life-saving intervention in high-risk places.

In environments deemed too hazardous for doctors to access, the use of robot medics becomes a crucial solution.

A Yale University School of Medicine ER clinical informatics expert offers a deep dive preview of his HIMSS24 educational session that will show how artificial intelligence and CDS can boost emergency care.

Deployment of artificial intelligence for point-of-care clinical decision support is in its nascency. Despite the media attention and proliferation of AI studies, translation to clinical practice is rare.

The Defense Department’s responsibility to its active and veteran service members extends to their health and well-being. One organization driving innovation for patient care is the DOD’s Uniformed Services University.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can be found in nearly every industry, driving what some consider a new age of innovation – particularly in healthcare, where it is estimated the role of AI will grow at a 50% rate annually by 2025.

In the rapidly evolving landscape of military medicine, the integration of autonomous drones and robotic technology marks a turning point, heralding a transformative era in battlefield care.