SIGMA+ Program Overview

The SIGMA program began in late 2014 as an effort to significantly advance scalable detection capabilities against radiological and nuclear (RN) weapons of mass destruction (WMD) threats from non-traditional, clandestine attack vectors. SIGMA developed and networked thousands of high-capability, low-cost detectors to demonstrate large-scale, continuously streaming physical sensor networks for the RN interdiction mission. SIGMA capabilities have been tested and operationalized with federal, state, and international partners. Further information about the SIGMA program can be found at the following links:  

https://www.darpa.mil/program/sigma
https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2017-03-01
https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2016-10-11
https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2016-08-23  

The SIGMA+ initiative will build on SIGMA’s successes by developing a persistent, real-time, early detection system for the full spectrum of chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosives (CBRNE) WMD threats at the city-to-region scale. Specific targeted capabilities for each threat mode will focus the envisioned sensor, advanced intelligence analytics, and adversary modeling developments under one shared infrastructure and ubiquitous mobile sensing strategy. 

While the SIGMA+ initiative will consist of three integrated thrusts (sensors, network, and large field trials), this initial Proposers Day and anticipated BAA will focus only on the sensors thrust. This includes research and development efforts for the physical sensors themselves as well as sensor-level algorithms. For chemical and explosives threats, the network will be extended to include scalable chemical detection in order to identify production safe houses and illicit labs in a wide urban area from their effluents, allowing interdiction before an attack. For biological threats, SIGMA+ will develop novel methods, either environmental or human-sensing based, for improved real-time detection of attacks. The effort aims to provide days earlier attack detection and a system sensitivity ten times greater than the current state of the art, allowing a much wider range of attacks to be detected and geo-located earlier, maximizing the effectiveness of counter-measures and prophylaxis.

The network thrust will be addressed in an anticipated later BAA.