SERDP Principal Investigators recently presented a paper on their award-winning research at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Applied Vehicle Technology (AVT) Symposium on Munition and Propellant Disposal and its Impact on the Environment, October 17-20, 2011, in Edinburgh, Scotland. This research was recognized with The Technical Cooperation Program (TTCP) Achievement Award (2010) for significantly advancing the knowledge and understanding of the environmental fate and ecotoxicology of energetic materials to improve the ecological risk assessment of testing and training ranges at defense installations in TTCP nations. Scientifically-based Environmental Tolerance Values and bioaccumulation data for explosives, propellants, and related energetic materials were developed in this project as part of TTCP Key Technology Area 4-32 collaborative research “Development of Environmental Tolerance Values for Defense Sites Contaminated with Energetic Materials.”

TTCP Achievement Awards were presented to U.S. scientists Drs. Roman Kuperman, Ron Checkai, and Mike Simini (U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center); Dr. Mark Johnson (U.S. Army Public Health Command); Dr. Guilherme Lotufo (U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center – Environmental Laboratory); and Dr. Thomas Hawkins (Air Force Research Laboratory). The Honorable Zachary Lemnios, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, as well as Dr. David Honey, U.S. TTCP Principal, and James Short, U.S. TTCP Deputy, presented the awards at the Scientific Achievement Awards Ceremony held in the Hall of Heroes, The Pentagon, April 21, 2011. Canadian scientists Drs. Geoffrey Sunahara and Jalal Hawari (National Research Council of Canada) and Drs. Sonia Thiboutot, Guy Ampleman, and Sylvie Brochu (Defence Research and Development Canada – Valcartier), represented by Dr. Sunahara, were recognized at a TTCP awards ceremony in Ottawa by Dr. Marc Fortin, Assistant Deputy Minister (Science and Technology), Department of National Defence, and Chief Executive Officer, DRDC.

TTCP is an international organization that collaborates in defense scientific and technical information exchange; program harmonization and alignment; and shared research activities for the five nations—Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The Scientific Achievement Awards program was established to honor the outstanding achievements of TTCP scientists and engineers on the basis of excellence, relevance, productivity, exceptional quality of science, defense impact, and collaboration. 

Research recognized by TTCP and presented at the NATO Symposium incorporated results from SERDP projects Development of Toxicity Benchmarks and Bioaccumulation Data for N-Based Organic Explosives for Terrestrial Plants and Soil Invertebrates (ER-1416), Environmental Fate and Transport of a New Energetic Material, CL-20 (ER-1254, ER-1256), Development of Ecological Toxicity and Biomagnification Data for Explosives Contaminated Soil (ER-1221), and Determining the Bioavailability, Toxicity, and Bioaccumulation of Organic Chemicals and Metals for the Development of Eco-SSLs (ER-1210). The results of these projects were made internationally available in the book Ecotoxicology of Explosives.