ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. -- The Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity received the Dr. Wilbur B. Payne Award for excellence in analysis, which recognizes practical defense decision making and the highest standards of professionalism in research analyst.

J. Brian Kelly, Thomas Colegrove, Tehran Godbolt and Andrew Clark were honored in the small group category for their analysis in support of the Multi-Function Electronic Warfare systems.

MFEW is a family of systems in the pre-technology development phase, which will provide Offensive Electronic Attack, Defensive Electronic Attack and Electronic Warfare Support capabilities to Brigade Combat Teams on a wide range of ground vehicle and air platforms.

"We are talking about the electromagnetic spectrum and the ability to jam communications at war," said Kelly, a mechanical engineer at AMSAA.

"The Offensive Electronic Attack capability would attack the enemy's ability to communicate between one another," Kelly continued. "The defensive electronic attack capability would be able to stop, for example, a signal that could potentially detonate a roadside bomb and Electronic Warfare Support capabilities assist in our intelligence efforts."

The task originated from a Headquarters Department of the Army in January 2011, when the TRADOC Analysis Center (TRAC) requested AMSAA to conduct performance and risk analyses to assist senior leaders in determining the value added of MFEW, if fielded to the warfighter.

"Our analysis considered the range of technologies across aerial, ground mobile, dismounted platforms, fixed site platforms and across multiple scenarios," he continued.

"We assessed industry proposed alternatives [to MFEW] as well as the DoD's current alternatives, whether it is from a quick reaction capability or a program of record that went through the entire procurement or development process," Kelly stated. "This data was then aggregated into performance plots for each variant and against all targets within the scenario and the data was presented to senior leaders to assist in decision making."

There are three layers of scoring criteria for the Dr. Wilbur B. Payne award. The categories are as follows: operation resource quality, military relevance, and how well the analysis assisted senior leaders in the decision making process.

Dr. Wilbur B. Payne was a pioneer in Army Operations Research and the preeminent leader in the field for three decades. Throughout his career, Payne was an enthusiastic advocate for applying methods of science to practical defense decision making, enforcing the highest standards of professionalism, and nurturing and mentoring operations research analysts.