Request for Information (RFI) ORBS Bridge Contract

1.0 GENERAL INFORMATION

1.1 THIS NOTICE IS A REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) ONLY.  This RFI is issued solely for information and planning purposes and does not constitute as a Request for Proposal (RFP) or a promise to issue an RFP in the future.  This request for information does not commit the Government to contract for any supply or service whatsoever.  Further, the Air Force is not at this time seeking proposals and will not accept unsolicited proposals.  Responders are advised that the U.S. Government will not pay for any information or administrative costs incurred in response to this RFI.   All other costs associated with responding to this RFI will be solely at the interested party’s expense.  Not responding to this RFI does not preclude participation in any future RFI or RFP, if any is issued.  If a solicitation is released, it will be synopsized on the System for Award Management (SAM) website.  It is the responsibility of the potential offerors to monitor this site for additional information pertaining to this requirement.  Respondents should indicate which portions of their response are proprietary and should mark accordingly.  NOTE:  This RFI is not associated with any previous or ongoing RFPs or Fair Opportunity Proposal Requests issued by the Department of the Air Force (DAF).

1.2 FEEDBACK.  Submission is voluntary.  Respondents are advised that AFRL is under no obligation to provide feedback with respect to any information submitted under this RFI.

1.3 REGULATORY GUIDANCE.  This publication constitutes a Request for Information (RFI) as defined in Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 15.201(e), “RFIs may be used when the Government does not presently intend to award a contract, but wants to obtain price, delivery, other market information, or capabilities for planning purposes.  Responses to these notices are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract.”

2.0 REQUEST FOR INFORMATION

2.1 Goal: The Optical Radiation Bioeffects and Safety (ORBS) program conducts research studies with DE-based devices and systems to deliver accurate, evidence-based information to DoD and industry stakeholders, national and international health and safety standards committees, and the public. The goal is to enable optimal use and maximum safe exploitation of the electromagnetic spectrum for nationalvdefense by protecting personnel and communities and evaluating the applications of DE systems.

2.2 Scope: The Contractor should expect to perform basic to early applied research and advanced technology development and transition. The basic to early applied research will align with the Bioeffects Core Technical Competency (CTC), and the advanced technology development and transition activities will align with the Bioeffects Product Line (PL). Lasers are essential for range finding, precision delivery of munitions, target illumination when combined with night-vision goggle use and are being developed for advanced applications such as missile defeat. Lasers can pose threats to missions or can enhance capabilities for security forces and special operations by visual jamming. To address risks to aircrews, the Contractor shall expand methods to: minimize injury to aircrews; contribute to the establishment of occupational safety standards and flight tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs); define specifications for countermeasures; transition laser eye protection (LEP); enhance safety at ranges; develop procedures for laser injury assessment; and conduct research to determine appropriate technologies for non-lethal weapons (NLW). USAF and joint service payoffs include validation of effectiveness of non-lethal optical technologies, safe use of ranges, compliance with SECDEF policy on laser weapons, data for Electronic Information Security processes, mission planning for laser threats, and LEP acceptable for combat operations.

ORBS technical objectives are categorized under three main functional areas for which technical expertise will be required: 1) Novel Laser Bioeffects 2) Nuclear Flash and LEP 3) DE Modeling, Simulation, and Analysis

Within these functional areas, the Contractor shall characterize the fundamental bioeffects associated with DE technologies, optimize/assess the safety and effectiveness of DE systems, develop and assess dosimetry tools, provide modeling and simulation support to laboratory experiments and DE applications, design and characterize protective devices, investigate DE countermeasures, and provide science-based information to the DoD to support national and international safety standards.

3.0 REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) ABSTRACTS

3.1 CONTENT AND FORMAT

NO CLASSIFIED INFORMATION SHOULD BE INCLUDED IN THE RFI RESPONSE.

               Section A: A cover page (not to exceed a single page) identifying the company or organization, CAGE Number, street address, and the names, emails, company web page URL, and telephone numbers of the point of contact.  In the case of partnerships, please provide the appropriate information for the lead POC. 

State whether your company is a Small Business such as 8(a), Small Disadvantaged Business, Women-own Business, HUBZone Small Business, Veteran-owned Business, or Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Business.  Also include a statement as to whether your company is domestically or foreign owned.  If foreign, indicate the country of ownership. 

Also provide a short summary statement of the company’s or party’s experience/capabilities and a short summary of the organization’s experience in the areas described above.  This section is not included in the page count.

               Section B:  Technical Summary.  The Government is assessing the current state-of-the-art and potential near-term solutions.  The RFI should reflect an understanding of the three main functional areas for which technical expertise will be required: 1) Novel Laser Bioeffects 2) Nuclear Flash and LEP 3) DE Modeling, Simulation, and Analysis.

The three functional areas and their respective technical objectives are intended to steer the research and development efforts of this program. These areas are also designed to address critical research challenges, advance technological capabilities, and achieve measurable outcomes that support the overarching mission of RHDO. It is expected that across the three functional areas, research efforts will span from the lowest level of biological interaction, i.e., molecular, through the highest level of interaction, i.e., whole organisms. 

In any of the instances where the research/experimentation described references any of various international agreements or entities, applicable export control statutes, to include requirements for licenses, will apply.

1) Novel Laser Bioeffects: Plan and execute high-quality empirical research on the bioeffects of DE laser exposures.

The Contractor shall conduct laboratory and/or field studies to determine the short and long-term bioeffects associated with laser exposures, biological damage mechanisms and thresholds, and laser-tissue interactions for given optical parameters; and shall determine the effectiveness of using optical exposures to produce any militarily relevant behavioral response in humans. In addition, the Contractor shall perform research investigating fundamental visual mechanisms such as color vision, visual acuity, photostress recovery, and visual perception to assess the mission impact of bright light to humans; and develop advanced protection technologies, low-vision models and simulations, threat analysis systems, and special test equipment that measure advanced optical technologies and their countermeasures. Collaborative basic research with US and non-US universities, other government organizations may be anticipated, with potential to promote and expand this area of research. Collaborative research with medical partners may also be anticipated, with potential focus on diagnostic/triage technologies and medical treatment strategies. Technical Objectives are listed below:

a. Operate and maintain the laser systems required to accomplish the research objectives. The Contractor shall operate and maintain numerous laser systems to include but not limited to high energy laser systems (HEL), existing wavelength-tunable high pulse power titanium-Sapphire laser, femtosecond laser systems, multiple high-energy continuous wave (CW) lasers, and tunable nanosecond optical parametric oscillators,

b. Plan and conduct experiments advancing state-of-the-art research and development in biophotonics and its technology applications. Plan and conduct experiments to determine probabilities and thresholds of ocular or skin damage and damage mechanisms from both acute and long-term chronic exposure to ultraviolet, visible, and infrared lasers. The experiments shall include studies at the in-vitro and ex-vivo levels, as well as at the level of both animals and humans (in-vivo), with supporting

computer modeling at all levels. The assessment shall include using advanced imaging techniques for experiments at all three of these levels to determine or extrapolate mission impact on human subjects through post-event evaluation in support of RHDO and customer funded goals.

c. Incorporate the findings from advanced laser-tissue interaction research, including damage thresholds and mechanisms, for validation and possible contribution to the national and international health and safety standards.

d. In coordination with the Integrated Product Team, develop test plans and experiments using these lasers, to expand the knowledge of bioeffects specific to their frequency and pulse width domains. Develop and execute experimental plans, test plans, operate and maintain numerous laser systems (including advanced CW through pulsed femtosecond laser systems) and related test equipment.

e. Assist in the development of tissue and animal use protocols as required to support bioeffects research efforts involving tissue and animals. Experiments should be designed to maximize the potential to extrapolate results and data from animal subjects to humans.

f. Design, develop, and evaluate hardware to exploit personnel susceptibilities based on bioeffects modeling.

g. Perform in-house and on-field HEL-target reflection and bidirectional reflection distribution function (BRDF) measurements to validate and improve laser hazard prediction models and establish/maintain database of measured BRDFs.

2) Nuclear Flash and LEP: Plan and execute high-quality research on human effects of LEP characterization and performance.

The Contractor shall design and conduct experiments for human effects on performance and LEP characterization and measurements to test and evaluate LEP to counter emerging DE weapons with developing technologies for agile wavelength threats. The Contractor shall perform augmented reality (AR)/virtual reality (VR) laser dazzle experiments to validate and integrate into models for LEP development and wargaming scenarios. The Contractor shall perform field studies to validate laboratory data to provide high-quality protective equipment to the warfighter. The contractor support shall include measuring and modeling performance of demonstration eyewear, tests of eyewear optical quality and physical properties, and laboratory psychophysical vision tests with human subjects to assess the human performance impacts of this eyewear. The Contractor shall perform simulator, ground, and flight tests of the laser eye protection devices, and develop new methods to assess operational effectiveness, develop 3D eyewear models in a software design environment, integrate emerging eyewear designs, and perform on-site prototyping of LEP devices. Technical objectives are listed below:

a. Research, characterize, and evaluate eye protection to counter emerging directed energy weapons, laser systems with advanced technologies for agile laser wavelengths, and nuclear flash.

b. Develop techniques for computer modeling of current protective systems, multiple aircrew helmets, oxygen masks, head forms and other life support equipment.

c. The Contractor shall extend the scientific and engineering databases to enhance capabilities to measure and assess protective measures. These databases include optical properties and physical properties of the protective systems up to and including all necessary parametric data on life support protective equipment. This database also includes performance factors so that it can become a basisfor detailed predictive models of human performance under various operational conditions, with and without the protective systems.

d. Develop a vulnerability model using computer modeling techniques, enabling future validation of newly designed protective systems. Develop optical models predicting personnel susceptibility to optical glare sources. Integrate bioeffects and vision models into a single tool to aid development of eye protection devices and transition the tool to acquisition partners.

e. Perform field evaluation studies of eye protection devices to validate laboratory data and modeling results. Performance evaluations shall be conducted on a non-interference basis under realistic operational conditions to include weapon system trainers, operational aircraft, and other battlefield training situations. The Contractor shall determine, through field experimentation, the human factors and systems compatibility issues between developmental eye protection systems and the aircraft and other operational systems in which the users must function. Human use experimental protocols shall be developed as necessary for field testing.

f. Assist in the development of human use protocols investigating impact of lasers and LEP on human effectiveness, task performance, and personnel susceptibility and vulnerability to single and combined laser sources and threats.

3) Modeling, Simulation & Analysis (MS&A): Enhance existing and develop new MS&A tools and software products related to fundamental laser-tissue interactions, engineering, engagement, and mission level models.

The Contractor shall develop and enhance MS&A tools to mature advanced theoretical and numerical models describing fundamental laser-tissue interactions to include energy propagation, thermal response, thermo-elastic response, damage mechanisms and other multi-physics responses. These numerical tools should inform dosimetric metrics and simulate laser bioeffect experimental findings to demonstrate biophysical understanding. The Contractor shall also validate standards through models of biological responses provided from experimentation. The Contractor shall refine models for LEP development and AR/VR into distributed simulation, and other experimental wargaming scenarios. Software development will include the design and improvement of multi-physics models relevant to the bioeffects of DE exposures across a broad parameter space to include ultrafast lasers, high peak power laser systems, CW, and tunable (e.g., wavelength, pulse repetition rate, and power) laser systems. Models should include the development of safety analysis tools which are capable of predicting DE hazards in multiple simulation environments. This development shall include deterministic HEL range safety, based on the ANSI Z136.1 standard, as well as probabilistic risk methods delineating severity and probability of hazard. The Contractor shall also perform research on the propagation and interaction of DE and kinetic energy (KE) to predict exposure thresholds, through computational physics models that integrate existing thermodynamics and electrodynamics methods. The Contractor shall develop and deliver a software development plan for mature software models prior to implementation. This plan should include model-based systems engineering (MBSE), traceability of system goals, key functional features, critical stakeholders, system architecture design, and a test plan for verifying correctness of functional capabilities, to include potential verification and validation of the software. The architecture must be at a level of detail sufficient to show functional flow and identify data interface requirements between system functional components and verify ability to integrate components into larger scale products. This plan must enable planning for future modification of the system and include justification for design decisions. Each of the above modeling, simulation, and analysis tools may fall into one or more of the modeling levels: Physics, Engineering, Engagement, and Mission. These categories define a specific scope of fidelity and intended use of the system. Technical Objectives are listed below:

a. Physics-Level Modeling: Employ standard scientific computational languages, physics-level modeling to include the development of first-principal theories, mechanistic models and advanced computational approaches which describe laser-tissue interactions, laser-material interactions, molecular dynamics, cell membrane dynamics, and the evaluation of physiological response factors. The Contractor shall have the ability to protype/modify models and methodologies using a range of scientific computing languages (e.g., C++, MATLAB, Python, FORTRAN, R, etc.) to develop new capabilities and proof-of-concept analysis. The Contractor shall implement into higher-level languages and languages optimized for high-performance computing (HPC) architectures. As part of the HPC support, the Contractor shall also maintain and administer high-performance workstations and small-scale HPC systems running Linux-based operating system. Leveraging experimental data, these high-fidelity numerical and analytical models integrate the latest data available on dynamic tissue properties and interaction modes to produce a multi-physics level model of tissue response to DE exposure to further inform highly dynamic bioeffects systems. Analytical and semi-analytical solutions to the complex dynamics of laser-tissue interactions should be pursued as a fundamentally sound alternative to more computationally expensive numerical approaches. Analysis is a component of this modeling, requiring the creation of specialized data analysis techniques and synthesis for outputs from large-scale data sets.

b. Engineering-Level Integration of Models: Encapsulation of near-real-time algorithms in standard C++ and other common production code languages. This shall include the translation of codes from a variety of individual prototypes into standard production code languages. The activities require the skills for integration of models in a variety of environments (Linux, MS Windows, etc.) and the ability to re-write complex mathematical representations in standard production languages. The Contractor shall also maintain and administer in-house high-performance computing resources running Linux-based operating system. Specific engineering-level modeling efforts include research and characterization of HEL effectiveness by developing new laser safety procedures and safety analysis tools to predict and analyze hazardous zones for HEL and (potentially) kinetic systems. The engineering-level simulation codes shall also include the implementation of radiometric principles from light propagation and scatter, to estimates of dosimetry. These types of models include range safety tools and engagement analysis tools (e.g. IWEA) and are run as desktop applications.

c. Engagement-Level Models: Engagement-level modeling includes integrating engineering level models into various simulation architectures (e.g. Endgame Framework, end-to-end frameworks, weaponeering tools, etc.) for engagement-level assessment of the effects of lasers and broadband light on the battlefield. These architectures focus on shooter-to-target and primary and secondary collateral effects engagement scenarios. This type of modeling may include DE/KE hazard model integration into high fidelity weapon analyses for operational risk calculus. These types of tools may be desktop applications, or applications that run in a distributed environment.

d. Mission-Level Models: The Contractor shall integrate engineering and engagement-level models into various established mission-level simulation environments (e.g. Advanced Framework for Simulation, Integration, and Modeling (AFSIM), distributed simulations, etc.) for use in mission-level studies of the personnel effects and risks of lasers and broad-band light on the battlefield. The Contractor will support transitions from AFRL through integration of new analysis models and tools to customer platforms. These architectures focus on many-versus-many entity simulation scenarios. This type of modeling may include DE/KE hazard model integration into operator-in-the-loop battle management systems. These types of tools may be desktop applications, or component utilities that run in a distributed environment.

e. Optical Radiation Safety Desktop Analysis Tools: The Contractor shall provide analysis and analysis tools in coordination with the 711 HPW/RHDO Optical Radiation and HEL Safety team to certify the safe use of optical systems on test and training ranges throughout the Air Force. The Contractor shall help develop, mature, validate, and apply modeling software and analysis to perform laser hazard evaluations and HEL weapon collateral effects modeling that are used by policy-making bodies to formulate safety recommendations based on current ANSI standards (ANSI Z 136.1), AF regulations (AFI 48-139), DoD regulations (DODI 6055.15, CJCSM 3230.01), and ACGIH policy, and shall develop and maintain the research information database, analyze the contents of the database, and develop methods of improving the efficiency of responding to information requests. Conduct research in the instrumentation of outdoor range tests for the purpose of assessing collateral hazards associated with the use of these HEL Initiative Systems. Develop test plans and safety plans for tests.

f. Development, Security, and Operations (DevSecOps): The Contractor shall fulfill proposed software development lifecycle methodology, emphasizing DevSecOps principles, continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD), robust version control, automated testing strategies, and security-by-design practices. It must also address the use of modern development tools and environments to ensure maintainability, scalability, and secure deployment across various platforms (desktop, distributed, cloud). The Contractor is expected to utilize structured, FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) data management practices, potentially using cloud-native data platforms, and robust metadata standards to facilitate data sharing and long-term archival. The Contractor shall explore and, where appropriate, integrate advanced computational methods, including Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) techniques to enhance model predictive capabilities, optimize simulation performance, and accelerate data analysis.

g. Non-lethal weapons (NLW)/scalable effects weapons (SEW): The Contractor shall conduct simulation and analysis research to determine appropriate technologies for NLW and SEW applications. The Contractor shall conduct, and document efforts involving human effects analyses on candidate NLW and SEW systems, and risk assessments on candidate systems. The Contractors shall develop and/or modify models to characterize the physiological and psychological effects of NLW and SEW payloads, and support field test planning and data interpretation for NLW and SEW systems.

The abstract shall not exceed 5 pages including figures. All abstracts may be single spaced with a font no smaller than 11 pt font. All responses to this announcement must be addressed to POCs, as discussed in Section 6.0 of this announcement.  Responses should be submitted in Microsoft Office Word or PDF format.

3.2 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION.  The submitted documentation and content thereof becomes the property of the U.S. Government and will not be returned.  It does not commit the Government to reply to information received. 

3.3 PROPRIETARY INFORMATION.  This notice is part of Government market research.  Information received from this request will be considered as sensitive and will be protected as such.  Any company or industry proprietary information contained in responses should be clearly marked by paragraph, so that publicly releasable and proprietary information are clearly distinguished.  Any proprietary information received in response to this request will be properly protected from unauthorized disclosure.  The Government will not use proprietary information submitted from any one source to establish the capability and requirements for any future acquisition, so as to inadvertently restrict competition. 

4.0 SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS:

Government representatives may or may not choose to meet with vendors responding to this RFI.  Such discussions would only be intended to get further clarification of potential capability to meet the requirements. 

5.0 POINT OF CONTACTS:

5.1 Non-Government Advisors. Non-Government advisors may be used in the evaluation of responses and have signed non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) with the Government.  Additional NDAs will not be required.  Instead, a response to this RFI will be considered an implicit acknowledgement and acceptance of the fact that non-Government advisors will be assisting the Government in this process.  The Government understands that information provided in response to this RFI is presented in confidence and may contain trade secret, commercial or financial information, and it agrees to protect such information from unauthorized disclosure to the maximum extent permitted or required by

18 USC 1905 (Trade Secrets Act);

18 USC 1831 et seq. (Economic Espionage Act);

5 USC 552(b) (4) (Freedom of Information Act);

Executive Order 12600 (Pre-disclosure Notification Procedures for Confidential Commercial Information); and

Any other statute, regulation, or requirement applicable to Government employees

5.2 Agency Contacts: RFI responses should be submitted electronically, via email (or a DoD SAFE link can be provided).