What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project 622002 of PE 0602204F. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
-Continue research and development on electronic devices, including efficient radio frequency power amplifiers, power conversion semiconductor technology, and extreme environment applications, with a focus on modeling, characterization, evaluation, and technology demonstrations to facilitate industry transition. -Continue advancing sensing and electronic warfare capabilities by enhancing simultaneous functions, utilizing open architecture for rapid updates, and minimizing size, weight, and power through robust filtering for operation in contested electromagnetic spectrum, while prototyping hardware/software digital emulation, novel sensor processing, digital-at-every-element technology for multifunction microwave and millimeter wave arrays; and, digital beamformer technology for Group 4 uncrewed and attritable aircraft weapon systems. -Continue strengthening resilient radio frequency sensor microelectronics through research and development of assured prototypes by actively assessing threats, improving circuit reliability, validating security, preventing reverse engineering, and utilizing digital engineering; continue effort to build low-power navigation and timing application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) by developing assurance techniques in the microelectronic design process. -Commence research and development of faster, cheaper, and higher-performing microelectronic solutions for size, weight, and power-constrained platforms by developing advanced heterogeneous integration technologies that combine disparate electronic and photonic elements; enabling the development of chip-scale wideband transceiver components with integrated advanced component and thermal management technologies for cost, size, weight, and power-constrained millimeter wave applications.
FY 2027 decreased compared to FY 2026 by $8.734 million due to a reduction in the development of microelectronics heterogeneous integration technologies. This reduction is the result of a strategic realignment of the Department of the Air Force's Science and Technology (DAF S&T) portfolio, which aims to optimize core research areas and improve resource efficiency.
FY2026: the year under way
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
- Continue modeling and technology development of electronic devices efforts in efficient radio frequency power amplifiers, efficient power conversion semiconductor technology, the characterization and evaluation of radio frequency and power semiconductor components, and technology demonstrations to facilitate transition to industry. Initiate research and development on electronic devices for extreme environments. - Continue development of chip-scale photonic/electronic wideband transceiver components with integrated advanced component and thermal management technologies for cost, size, weight and power constrained microwave and millimeter wave applications. - Continue research and development of resilient and assured radio frequency sensor sub-system prototypes incorporating hardware/software digital emulation, novel sensor processing, digital at every element technology for multifunction microwave and millimeter wave arrays, and digital beamformer technology advancements suitable for Group 4 uncrewed and attritable aircraft weapon systems. - Continue research and development of resilient and assured radio frequency sensor microelectronics prototypes by assessing modern threat capability, conducting reliability of complex integrated circuits, verifying and validating security techniques and methodologies for integrated circuit design, protecting critical microelectronics hardware against reverse engineering and exploitation, and applying digital engineering and virtual prototyping to develop resilience and assurance techniques for microelectronic designs.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 8.0 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 35.0 |
| FY2027 | Request | 26.2 |
This activity is 63% of project 622002's FY2027 request and 16% of PE 0602204F's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
5 activities in project 622002
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the project page.