To the last drop
Every year the loss of a well-trained soldier on the battlefield costs the state more and more. The pile of financial guarantees that have to be paid by the defense departments of different countries, as well as the inevitable reputational losses from the death of servicemen, force us to look for new approaches to warfare. On the one hand, they are flirting with robotics - it is no coincidence that unmanned aerial vehicles have become a real mainstream lately. Still, training a good pilot is very expensive, and the "inhuman" aircraft is much cheaper than an inhabited one - it is not so pity to lose it. Despite progress in the robotization of celestial technology, ground-based systems are still far from widespread automation or at least the transition to remote control. Therefore, they will try to improve the infantryman by other means - so that he fights more effectively, dodges bullets, does not get tired and does not get sick. Initially, various exoskeletons should become assistants in this matter, but with the currently existing technologies for accumulating energy, they can perform their functions for a limited time. In addition, it is unclear how long such an exoskeleton can work, say, at temperatures below minus 20 degrees. Be that as it may, the most energy efficient fighter is a well-trained, physically strong and healthy man. But even now, with the most optimal training regime and nutrition, the military seems to have hit the ceiling of human abilities. And, if we discard all the medicinal trash that turns fighters into drug addicts, then it seems that the only way out for the "advanced settings" of the body is to upgrade the genotype.
In January 2019, DARPA, the forge of all the newest in the American military sphere, launched an MBA (Measuring Biological Aptitude) program. The approximate timeframe for the project is limited to four years. Respected firms were attracted to the MBA: the research cluster of the giant General Electric - GE Research, the Florida Institute for Human Machine Cognition and the Livermore Laboratory. Lawrence.
At the moment, DARPA is very vague about the main directions of the team's work. It is clear that GE Research is working on special miniature sensor needles that read a lot of body parameters at different moments in a soldier's life. The second analytical instrument will be a dental patch being developed at the Institute for Human Machine Cognition. Livermore Laboratory coordinates the work of the departments, analyzes and summarizes the results. A set of microneedles, which, it seems, the Americans will stuff their soldiers with, will make it possible to remotely monitor the psychophysiological state of servicemen. And at the most crucial moments of the battle, the subunit commander, based on the readings of the sensors, will decide who to throw into the attack, and who is better to temporarily withdraw to the rear for recovery. Most likely, human consciousness will not be able to work with such a stream of data so quickly, therefore, artificial intelligence will still issue recommendations to the commander about the nature of the battle. That is, to indirectly manage human resources.
In a lengthy discussion of the goals of DARPA, the analysis of the relationship between the human genotype and its phenotype (external manifestations) is especially highlighted. That is, the Americans are trying to develop mechanisms for more effective implementation of the genetic potential inherent in a person - to enhance the expression of genes necessary for a fighter. For this, according to representatives of DARPA, 70 experimental subjects will take into account all the nuances of the body during periods of physical exertion, stress and rest. Psychologists will test subjects for intelligence, memory capacity, attention, and learning ability. Of course, the genome will be carefully scanned for everyone and correlated with phenotypic traits. If useful "fighting" genes are found that for some reason "sleep", that is, do not express, researchers will look for a way to make them work. Here DARPA, it seems, has generally swung at the fundamental problem of studying the most complex mechanisms of information transfer from genes to external phenotypic traits. Will the three institutes be able to solve this problem? The question remains open. After all, for several decades the leading genetics of the world have been struggling with this with varying degrees of success. As you know, with a constant set of genes in the phenotype of different individuals, a huge variety of external traits can be observed.
In the first phase of the work, scientists will look for a useful "design" of the ideal soldier. To do this, they weigh the most successful fighters of the US Army with sensors, highlight the most characteristic signs (for example, a low heart rate in a stressful situation) and, after analysis, begin to search for the genetic prerequisites of the phenomenon. At the same time, special attention will be paid to highly specialized professionals: snipers, sappers, pilots, reconnaissance officers and operators of complex equipment. As bonuses to the Measuring Biological Aptitude program, there will be a universal career guidance program for working with US Army recruits. For example, a young man came to enroll in a flight school. Everyone is good: his health is excellent, he is smart, and psychologically stable, but a couple of genetic markers show that the future cadet will show himself much more successfully in the case of a UAV operator or a sniper. All that remains is to correctly convince the future military man that he is not a "flyer" at all.
This whole story looks very beautiful from the outside, however, given the rich history of US military pharmacology, there are thoughts that DARPA is still considering other scenarios for the development of the program. Separate products of the project can be both chemicals that enhance the work of individual groups of genes, and outright genetic doping. Fortunately, sports medicine has accumulated sufficient competencies in this regard.
Genetic doping
Technologies for improving the physical indicators of athletes and accelerating rehabilitation after competitions have long since switched from purely chemical doping to the rails of genetic improvement. One of the most important advantages of genetic doping is its almost complete secrecy from WADA officers. The first and only case of the use of this type of doping in sports was the use in 2003 of the repoxigen drug from the pharmaceutical company Oxford BioMedica. Trainer Thomas Springstein tried it on his minors, for which he was criminally liable. The drug repoxigen, by the way, was not intended for gene doping, but was a cure for anemia, containing a gene (enclosed in a viral vector) for erythropoietin. Now, on the sports horizon, there is no scandalous news about the exposure of another athlete indulging in injections of other people's genes. This is because it is virtually impossible to expose this: in some cases, doctors have learned to build up individual muscle bundles by local injections of genetic material. But in order to track this, the WADA officer needs to take a blood sample from the injection site, and this, of course, is impossible. At the same time, all self-respecting sports powers have accumulated considerable banks of genetic data of outstanding athletes, which, of course, are stored not only as a legacy to descendants. Therefore, sports genetics and pharmacology, as well as the completion of the resonant project "Human Genome", created all the conditions for further modification of military personnel.
The progressive decrease in the cost of screening the human genome also plays into the hands. Already, about 200 genes are known that are responsible for the physical abilities of a person, which, with the proper level of desire, can be well dispersed in a specific individual. Yes, of course, the military also needs genes for cognitive activity, but a couple of years of research will be enough to track them. Let's just list a few of the most important biomarkers that are factors in the success of an athlete: the ACE gene or "sport gene", different forms of which are responsible for endurance and speed-strength qualities; the ACTN3 gene - an important factor in the success of physical training, is responsible for the structure of muscle fibers; the UCP2 gene regulates fat and energy metabolism, that is, it allows the body to burn "fuel" more efficiently; genes 5HTT and HTR2A are responsible for serotonin in the body - the hormone of happiness. In general, the nature and scale of the achievements of sports geneticists allows us to draw the following conclusions. First, it looks like the ceiling in sports gene doping, if not reached, is about to be reached. And researchers with pharmaceutical companies need new markets. Second, the US military is becoming ideal consumers of gene doping technologies in connection with the Measuring Biological Aptitude initiative. Most likely, within the framework of the study of the processes of gene expression in the human phenotype, the issues of adaptation of sports technology to the military sphere are considered. And microneedle sensors can be very useful here.
Of course, no one talks about the widespread invasion of combat genetically modified armed cyborgs with the Stars and Stripes flag, but a qualitative increase in the combat capabilities of the US Army may well take place in the foreseeable future.
