HUNTINGTON, WEST VIRGINIA — May 11, 2022 — In a collaborative effort with researchers and the United States military, the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) and the Civil-Military Innovation Institute (CMI2) awarded Marshall University the first West Virginia project in the Pathfinder Program. The university will head a research project focused on engineering and cybersecurity for technology used by the military.
DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory manages the Catalyst-Pathfinder program with the DEVCOM Armaments Center. The sub-contract was officially awarded in February and runs through August 2022.
“The Pathfinder Project represents opportunities to study challenges encountered by our military and develop solutions to those challenges,” said Dr. David Dampier, Dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Sciences at Marshall University. “This partnership is especially meaningful, in that Marshall University’s academic community plays a critical role in directly supporting the technological needs of Soldiers.”
The Pathfinder Project is a collaboration between DEVCOM ARL and the Morgantown, West Virginia-based Civil-Military Innovation Institute Inc. CMI2 supports these partnerships to rapidly innovate high-impact, research-based technologies, providing a path to commercialization and rapid acquisition of products by the U.S. Army. By creating a project joining researchers and the U.S. military, Pathfinder helps to provide Army Soldiers with a platform to create and produce much-needed technology.
“The collaboration of Marshall University, CMI2, and DEVCOM demonstrates the critical team approach needed to provide advanced technology to our military,” said Arwen Decostanza, Catalyst-Pathfinder program manager, DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory. “These partnerships allow us to work hand-in-hand to identify risks to our military operations and allow researchers to solve such problems.”
Designed to help the Army to integrate better solutions to real problems into the total force, the Pathfinder program is a Congressional initiative executed by DEVCOM that aims to harness the creativity and technical skills of academic and government researchers. Marshall University is the first West Virginia-based institution to be awarded a subcontract as a part of the program.
“The relationship between Marshall University, DEVCOM, and CMI2 brings innovation to West Virginia, as well as collaborative efforts between academia and the Army,” said Cody Clevenger, CMI2 Pathfinder program manager. “This collaboration gets people to the table who can work together to solve these important problems, while strengthening academia and Soldier modernization.”
The DEVCOM Catalyst-Pathfinder Program launched in 2021 with an initial unit focus in the XVIII Airborne Corps at Fort Bragg, North Carolina and has since extended to Montana and West Virginia. Pathfinder partners Soldiers with academic and government researchers in collaborative teams to solve technical issues defined by Soldiers.
