Sentrycs, the Israeli counter-UAS (counter-unmanned aerial system) company now operating under Ondas Holdings, debuted the Sentrycs Scout at SOF Week in Tampa: a man-portable system that uses Cyber-over-RF (CoRF) technology to detect, track, and take control of rogue drones by reading their command-and-control protocols directly, rather than jamming or engaging them kinetically.

Unlike broadband jammers that disrupt all communications in range, CoRF selectively targets a specific drone while leaving authorized radios untouched; the system also extracts real-time intelligence, including the drone's serial number, operator location, and flight characteristics, supporting faster response decisions.

Built for tactical environments including convoy security, VIP protection, and border enforcement, the Scout is battery-powered, deployable without fixed infrastructure, and optimized for dense urban settings where collateral RF interference poses the greatest operational risk.

Adm. Frank Bradley, commander of US Special Operations Command (SOCOM), told an audience at SOF Week on Wednesday that almost none of the systems currently deployed in combat employ true AI at the tactical edge, pushing back on the pace at which the Pentagon has been embracing autonomous systems.

Bradley argued that human commanders must retain responsibility for lethal decisions because machines cannot be held accountable under the Law of Armed Conflict; he said future AI-assisted targeting must operate with consistent human oversight regardless of technological capability and that any transition to autonomous engagement requires the same standards applied to every prior weapons technology.

He also called for SOCOM to recruit operators who are both technically fluent and combat-capable, describing the ideal future SOF operator as a "geek with a gun," while cautioning that no algorithm can model the unpredictability of warfare and that the command must remain humble about the limits of machine judgment.

Scientists at the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) have developed the kappa(k)Chip, a microfluidic device that screens billions of protein interactions in parallel to identify binding agents with defense applications in chemical detection, pathogen sensing, and materials repair, compressing a month of conventional laboratory work into a single day.

The system is up to 24 times faster and 200 times more cost-efficient than existing screening methods; it is paired with an AI-driven software tool that processes large volumes of image-based experimental data to identify proteins that meet specific Army performance requirements and that the commercial industry does not currently produce.

The kappa(k)Chip was refined over three years with the help of three student interns through ARL's National Security Scholars Summer Internship Program, and the lead researcher says nothing comparable currently exists, positioning the platform to accelerate discovery across a broad range of future military material science needs.

Colorado-based Infleqtion has launched Quantum Spectrum, an atom-based radio-frequency (RF) sensing system that uses Rydberg atoms to continuously detect signals across the full spectrum from hertz to terahertz through a single aperture, offering broader and more consistent coverage than any conventional receiver architecture.

The system is designed for contested electromagnetic environments where adversary jamming degrades traditional RF equipment; by reading the physical response of atoms to electromagnetic fields rather than relying on electronic circuits, Quantum Spectrum avoids the frequency-specific vulnerabilities that jammers exploit.

Infleqtion is conducting field trials and building prototypes toward a scalable family of receivers; the system is being evaluated under a US Army Research Laboratory program called RIQER (Robust, Integrated Quantum Electromagnetic Receiver) for a mobile tactical variant, and is also under evaluation by defense programs in the UK and Australia.

Pentagon Chief Technology Officer Emil Michael told the SOF Week audience on Tuesday that his top priority is giving defense tech vendors, especially small companies, timely decisions on whether their technology has a buyer, calling the current multi-year evaluation process the worst possible outcome for a startup seeking a government customer.

Michael said he is bringing military services in early during vendor evaluations to test technology and immediately signal interest or rejection, a model that could draw on approaches like the Army's Transformation in Contact initiative, which allows companies to test against real operational requirements outside any formal program of record.

On interoperability, Michael said it will be built into nearly all future procurement requirements; he pointed to adversary drone swarms as direct evidence that collaborative autonomy is achievable at scale and a concrete motivation for requiring all future defense technology participants to build interoperability in from the start.

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