DHS Minority Serving Institution (MSI) Programs

This chapter highlights seven (7) DHS programs/research that involved faculty and students at Morgan State University, a Minority Serving Institution (MSI) that was linked to a DHS Center for Excellence. The programs were developed in part from partnerships and collaborative efforts from researchers and principal investigators at Morgan State University and several DHS Centers of Excellence. Researchers from Morgan State University submitted summaries of their DHS-funded programs and activities. In addition, information was gathered from DHS Websites pertaining to their collaborative work with a DHS Center of Excellence (COE). This chapter emphasizes the importance of collaborative research and programs that support the overall mission of DHS in providing opportunities for MSIs to work with COEs in DHS priority research areas. These efforts have enhanced faculty as well as students at Morgan State University with regard to education, research, professional development, and training related to a DHS priority research.

Frienemies

The working relationships between Native American tribes, the states, and the federal government have been strained for centuries. These intergovernmental interactions have led to a fragmented system whose attempt to deliver public service is consistently met with opposition. One area where this has become increasingly evident is within homeland security and emergency management policy. Guided by Agranoff (2012), this study used a cross sectional survey to gather information about the beliefs tribes held about the various aspects of their working relationships with states and the federal government within the context of homeland security and emergency management.

The Center for Secure and Resilient Maritime Commerce

The DHS National Center of Excellence in Maritime Security's (CSR) Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) work develops and applies emerging technologies in support of layered surveillance. The layers include satellite-based wide area views, HF Radar systems providing over-the horizon situational awareness, and near-shore and harbor sensing utilizing underwater acoustic technologies. Integration of these systems accomplishes vessel detection, classification, identification, and tracking. Applications for end-users including U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have demonstrated the delivery of actionable information in operationally relevant settings. The Center won the DHS S&T impact award two years in a row for its role in providing vital data during the US Airways plane landing on the Hudson River and during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Furthermore, research in port resiliency has yielded a port disruption planning tool, the Port Mapper, that assisted government leadership during the closure of the Port of NY/NJ by Hurricane Sandy. Work at the Center is focused on delivering MDA data streams from emerging and advanced technologies into the hands of the operators in ways that are compatible with command decision support systems.

Critical Infrastructure Higher Education Initiative

As an essential element of homeland security, critical infrastructure protection requires a professional, highly educated workforce and community of leaders at all levels of government and in the private sector. Yet there are few structured and comprehensive higher education programs in critical infrastructure protection. This case study reviews an education initiative that partners the U.S. Department of Homeland Security with the Center for Infrastructure Protection and Homeland Security at the George Mason University School of Law in an effort to develop and distribute critical infrastructure protection courses and materials that will become part of a comprehensive, unified approach to homeland security education.

Visual Analytics for Students and Teachers (VAST) Model at a Minority Serving Institution

This chapter focuses on a model for the teaching and learning of STEM by undergraduate students, teachers, and faculty at Morgan State University that focuses on visual analytics. This project represents an interdisciplinary approach to the teaching and learning of STEM at a Minority Serving Institution funded by the Department of Homeland Security. The chapter also outlines salient strategies associated with challenges at the university. In addition, the chapter discusses partnerships developed with Visual Analytics for Command, Control, and Interoperability Environments (VACCINE), a DHS Center for Excellence at Purdue University that supports DHS priority research in the area of visual analytics.

Command, Control, and Interoperability Center for Advanced Data Analysis

The purpose of this chapter is to summarize and give an overview of the educational and research programs of the Command, Control, and Interoperability Center for Advanced Data Analysis (CCICADA) in an integral way. CCICADA is based at Rutgers University and is one of the components of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Center of Excellence (COE) Center for Visualization and Data Analytics (CVADA). CVADA is co-led by Rutgers University and Purdue University. Purdue's Visual Analytics for Command, Control, and Interoperability Environments (VACCINE) Center and Rutgers University's CCICADA Center were established as a DHS Homeland Security Center of Excellence in 2009. Although Purdue's focus is on visualization sciences, and Rutgers' focus is on data sciences, these two CVADA components are working closely on a number of activities, projects, and programs (Command, Control, and Interoperability Center for Advanced Data Analysis, 2013).

Detecting Electronic Initiators Using Electromagnetic Emissions

The accurate and timely discovery of radio receivers can assist in the detection of radio-controlled explosives. By detecting radio receivers, it is possible to indirectly infer the presence of an explosive device. Radio receivers unintentionally emit low-power radio signals during normal operation. By using a weak stimulation signal, it is possible to inject a known signal into these unintended emissions. This process is known as stimulated emissions. Unlike chemical traces, these stimulated emissions can propagate through walls and air-tight containers. The following case study discusses methods for detecting and locating two different types of radio receivers. Functional stimulated emissions detectors are constructed, and their performance is analyzed. Stimulated emissions are capable of detecting super-regenerative receivers at distances of at least one hundred meters and accurately locating superheterodyne receivers at distances of at least fifty meters. These results demonstrate a novel technique for detecting potential explosive threats at stand-off detection distances.

Conclusion

The previous chapters in this book demonstrate how collaborative research linked to DHS Centers for Excellence support the overall mission of DHS, while at the same time support research by faculty and students at institutions of higher education. The value added and success of these programs highlight the importance of developing effective partnerships that can lead to quality research experiences for faculty, students, and teachers. In addition, the research highlighted stresses the importance of developing a strong workforce that begins long before students make the transition to institutions of higher learning. It is important that early career faculty researchers, experienced researchers, as well as undergraduate and graduate students understand DHS research priority areas that can effectively support the overall mission of DHS. The collaborative research that is linked to other federal and state agencies is important in addressing complex security issues that have an impact on the general public.

Maritime Security Summer Research Institute

In its efforts to respond to national workforce imperatives and central to its mission as a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Center of Excellence in Port Security, the Center for Secure and Resilient Maritime Commerce (CSR), led by Stevens Institute of Technology, has created an intensive summer research program tailored to undergraduate and graduate-level students. The Summer Research Institute (SRI) is designed to engage multidisciplinary student teams in rigorous, hands-on research in collaboration with the Center's researchers and industry and government partners. The research fields include maritime security, remote sensing technologies, emergency response and management, and Marine Transportation System (MTS) resilience. The program aims to enhance the professional development of students while increasing their interest in advanced academic study and careers in the maritime/homeland security domain.

The Challenges of Obtaining Credible Data for Transportation Security Modeling

The National Transportation Security Center of Excellence (NTSCOE) was established in August 2007 to develop new approaches to defend, protect, and increase the resilience of the nation's multi-modal transportation infrastructure, and to create education and training programs for transportation security. The Center for Transportation Safety, Security, and Risk (CTSSR) at Rutgers University, an NTSCOE institution, developed models that address multi-modal resilience of freight and transit transportation networks. Data collection processes for each project presented significant hurdles for the research team in developing credible and accurate modeling tools. For any given data need, the potential exists for data gaps, collection, and processing errors, publication and use restrictions, and the need to obtain the most timely information. These challenges must be foreseen by researchers and practitioners in order to better accommodate potential restrictions on both data collection and dissemination while still providing users with a tool that improves decision making.