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The authors identify ways to improve the U.S. Space Force's (USSF's) capability requirements development to help USSF achieve its core mission in the face of rapidly developing adversary capabilities in space.

This report documents an analysis, conducted in response to the California Public Banking Option Act, of the feasibility of a program aimed at facilitating basic financial transactions for unbanked and underbanked Californians.

This report shares efforts to develop decision support frameworks for assessing the costs and benefits of digital engineering in defense weapon system programs.

The authors of this report describe a tool designed to help U.S. Department of Defense decisionmakers select from the many available approaches to promote and protect critical technologies and their associated industrial base.

Billions of dollars from industry have been poured into the development of electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft for future urban mobility. Air Force Research Laboratory founded Agility Prime to shape and accelerate the eVTOL market. In this report, the authors evaluate the utility the U.S. Air Force (USAF) might get from eVTOL aircraft, how much influence the USAF has on technical development and supply chains, and options to transition emerging commercial technology to the USAF to recommend an eVTOL strategy for the USAF. This research involved a literature review, expert discussions, operational modeling, aircraft performance modeling, electric charging and battery modeling, strategic modeling, and case studies. The main outputs are measures of eVTOL military utility, forecasted military market share, the future eVTOL supply chain geography, and feasible transition routes that the USAF could use to adopt eVTOL aircraft. Among the findings is that, while eVTOL aircraft could likely benefit select USAF missions, eVTOL aircraft are unlikely to be transformational to the USAF. Furthermore, injecting capital into eVTOL firms is not likely to have Agility Prime's desired effect of shaping the domestic eVTOL industry. The authors recommend that Agility Prime focus on two lines of effort: one for small-scale operational use and live experiments, and another to foster and continue collaboration with eVTOL companies in pursuit of autonomous flight. This research was completed in July 2022. It has not been subsequently revised.

The Fiscal Year 2021 National Defense Authorization Act directed the Department of Defense (DoD) to provide a report on plans for closing the College of Information and Cyberspace (CIC) at the National Defense University and addressing the broader needs in the department for the types of education the college provided. DoD provided a response in April 2021 that outlined the original options considered for the college but deferred questions regarding the role for CIC and the department's needs for cyberspace and information education for a follow-on study that RAND's National Defense Research Institute conducted. This report examines how DoD educational institutions operating at the graduate level, including CIC, are currently addressing cyberspace and information education in their curricula, the potential demand across the department for this education, and how CIC can contribute to fulfilling this demand, as well as what role it should play more broadly in supporting other DoD educational institutions and DoD components.

Researchers considered a future in which corporate cryptocurrency (crypto), a type of fungible digital token sponsored by multinational corporations, is in widespread use in a manner that is widely seen to serve the public interest. Researchers convened internal experts and external stakeholders to envision such a future and identify strategic approaches to evolving technological and economic trends underpinning this future. This analysis pays special attention to the balance of global benefits and risks that corporate crypto presents. The report should be of interest to policymakers, businesspersons, technologists, and advocates working on the future of money and payments at the global level.

Publishers Weekly called Jim Harrison "an untrammeled renegade genius," a poet who performed "absolutely brilliant and outrageous things with language."