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2022 National Security Education Program Colloquium

Hosted by the Hume Center for National Security and Technology

colloquium

Date: Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Time: 9AM - 6:30PM

Location: Squires Student Center, Commonwealth Ballroom

290 College Avenue

Blacksburg, VA 24060

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About the 9th Annual National Security Education Program Colloquium

The 9th annual National Security Education Program (NSEP) colloquium, sponsored through our Intelligence Community Center for Academic Excellence (IC CAE) grant, will be full of exciting student and faculty presentations related to ongoing research and experiential learning programs from across multiple departments and colleges at Virginia Tech.

The theme of this year's colloquium will be "The Future of National Security", and will showcase our students' continued endeavors to become the next generation of national security leaders. Additionally, the colloquium will include a panel discussion on "Required Skills for Future Graduates Interested in National Security Careers."

The morning sessions will begin with presentations from our Workforce Development student teams working with CACI, MITRE, and Raytheon which will focus on artificial intelligence, machine learning, cybersecurity, and software defined radio communications.

After a panel discussion with partners from industry, government, and academia, the student presentations will continue.  The Hume Center IC CAE Research Fellowship Team Presentations will feature students working with our industry partners Leidos, BAE Systems, ManTech as well as VT faculty in Geography and Political Science.

After lunch, we will focus on Hume Center Student Experiential Learning Teams.  We are highlighting exciting research happening within the Virginia Tech National Security Institute, including programs such as MEEP: Materials & Advanced Manufacturing in Applied Electromagnetics, OSINT Framework Development for Countering Disinformation, Automated Cyber-Attack Detection and Mitigation under Non-Stationarity using Operating Envelopes, and Development of an EMCCD space camera for a 6U CubeSat spacecraft.  

We are honored to host Ms. Sue Gordon, as our Keynote Speaker. Ms. Gordon is the Former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and is now a Director at CACI International. She will speak on "National Security in a Digital World".

As the Hume Center continues to foster the cutting edge education and research for the leaders of tomorrow, we look forward to you joining us for this exciting event.

Please join us for a day of invigorating presentations, panel discussions, and speakers on April 12, 2022. For additional information, please contact the National Security Education Program, nsep@vt.edu.

 

April 12, 2022  
9:00 a.m.
Welcome from Eric Paterson
9:00 a.m. 
Workforce Development Program Presentations
  • 9:00 60 GHz Pulse-Doppler Radar for High Resolution Tracking
  • 9:15 A Reinforcement Learning Approach to Enemy Containment via Autonomous Swarms
  • 9:30 Use & Abuse of Personal Information – Data Processing
9:50 a.m. 
Panel – Required Skills for Future Graduates Interested in National Security Careers
  • Moderator: Gretchen Matthews, PhD: Professor, Department of Mathematics; Director, Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI) Southwest Virginia, Virginia Tech

Panelists

  • Stephanie Beard, Engineering Manager, CACI
  • Nazaret Berhane, Program Manager, IC Center for Academic Excellence, Office of the Director for National Intelligence (ODNI)
  • Mike Burns, Associate Director for Talent, Central Intelligence Agency,
  • Kevin Keating, Senior Advisor to the Deputy Director of CIA for Science and Technology, Central Intelligence Agency
  • Robert Kurtz, Engineering Fellow, Raytheon Technologies
  • Gordon LoPresti, Director of Hardware Engineering, Northrop Grumman
10:50 a.m.
BREAK
11:00 a.m.
Hume IC CAE Research Fellowship Team Presentations
  • 11:00 Dataset Classifiers Feature Extraction (Leidos)
  • 11:15 High-Speed AUV with Wideband Acoustic Communications (HAWC) (BAE Systems)
  • 11:30 An Exploration of Quantum Computing Applications and Resources (ManTech)
  • 11:45 Security issues in the coastal zone: Insights from the literature (VT Geography Dept.)
  • 12:00 Chinese Process of BRI and Debt Trap Diplomacy (VT Diplomacy Lab)
  • 12:15 A Novel Approach to Modular Cubesat Concept and Design (Northrop Grumman)
12:30 p.m. 
LUNCH
1:30 p.m.
Experiential Learning Research Teams
  • 1:30 A RF Machine Learning focused AI Software 'Gym' for Jamming/Anti-Jamming Applications
  • 1:45 Use & Abuse of Personal Information – Data Collection
  • 2:00 Materials and Structures for Embedded Antennas in Airborne Vehicles
  • 2:15 OSINT-in-a-Box: Combating Disinformation in Communities of Color
  • 2:30 Automated Detection and Mitigation of Cyber-Attacks
  • 2:45 What’s the problem? An NLP approach to examining U.S. Cybersecurity Topics
  • 3:00 Development and Validation of Efficient Design Tools for Hypersonic, Air-Breathing Engines
  • 3:15 Development of an EMCCD space camera for UV spectroscopy: probing NO in the polar night
  • 3:30 Development of an EMCCD space camera for a 6U CubeSat spacecraft
4:00 p.m. 
Concluding remarks from Ehren Hill; Student Poster Session and Reception
5:30 p.m.
Introduction of Keynote Speaker, Glenn Kurowski
5:35 p.m.- 6:30 p.m. 
Keynote Address - Sue Gordon “National Security in a Digital World”

If you have any questions, please contact Colleen Bartos (cbartos@vt.edu) or Ehren Hill (ehren@vt.edu)