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This article focuses on a new wave of concepts that has emerged from the U.S. Air Force quest for unmanned Hunter-Killer aircraft. But most of the aerospace industry's responses, from Northrop Grumman, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Aurora Flight Sciences and Lockheed Martin, remain shrouded in mystery. Northrop Grumman aggressively spun up two designs, an unmanned version of Scaled Composites' Proteus research aircraft and a smaller, Global Hawk look-alike. Aurora Flight Sciences and Israel Aircraft Industries teamed on an armed version of a turboprop twin-boom, 8,500-lb.

The article reports on the decision of the U.S. Navy to select a Northrop Grumman to design its new surveillance unmanned aerial vehicles. The decision appears to secure the company's foothold as that service's preferred unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) provider. The April 22, 2008 announcement also stamped out Lockheed Martin's attempt, as a prime contractor for a General Atomics Aeronautical Systems' Predator-derived design, to break into the Navy Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) UAV market.

The article reports that Lockheed Martin Corp.'s Skunk Works division is secretly developing a stealthy, long-endurance unmanned aircraft for penetrating deep inside hostile airspace to collect intelligence. The division is perceived as lagging rivals Boeing and Northrop Grumman Corp. in the unmanned aerial vehicle field. By early next year at the latest, the company is expected to announce that, with the U.S. Air Force's backing, it is building one or more demonstrators of what the Pentagon has newly designated as an unmanned aircraft system.

General Atomics Corp. and Lockheed Martin Corp., teamed for the U.S. Navy's broad-area maritime surveillance unmanned aircraft competition, are set to upstage arch-rival Northrop Grumman Corp. by demonstrating a new vehicle next spring, perhaps as early as February. A version of Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk is not slated to conduct its demonstration until 2006 in a $150-million, the U.S. Navy-financed program. General Atomics and Lockheed Martin will use their own funding in a move calculated to put their competitor on the defensive.

Not a lot has been written about new products from the company Lockheed Martin Skunk Works during the last couple of years, but aerospace officials say the advanced projects company has produced prototypes of a classified, unmanned aerial vehicle, built strictly as an intelligence-gathering aircraft, that "has been used" operationally over Iraq. The aircraft is described by a U.S. Air Force official as a derivative of the "DarkStar" (Tier 3-minus) program that was canceled after the demonstration aircraft was test flown and then declared operationally unsuitable. The new Lockheed Martin Skunk Works unmanned aerial vehicle is "highly reliable," in part because of a much improved flight control system.

Offers information on the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) miniature aircraft called `DarkStar,' that was built by Lockheed Martin company. Size of the aircraft; How this type of aircraft can be used; Reference to the prototype MicroStar; Projected costs of the aircraft; Schedule date for the development of the UAV; Views of Jeff Harris program manager for Lockheed Martin.

This article reports on a partnership between the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office and Central Intelligence Agency to search for long-term surveillance with operationally flexible unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) at a fraction of the cost demanded by space-based sensors and communication nodes. Agency officials expected to examine Lockheed Martin's prototype DarkStar derivative used in Iraq, a new General Atomics design that probably will be called the Predator C and a new Boeing design that is not based on its military-oriented X-45C UCAV.

The article focuses on Lockheed Martin's Minion Unmanned Vehicle is being designed with an even stealthier radar cross section than the F/A-22 Raptor and F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The initial concept of operations is that a two-ship formation would launch and control four vehicles. Since F/A-22s have only one crewman, it is likely that one pilot would monitor the vehicles while the other maintained situational awareness of threats on the airborne battlefield. Nonetheless, the pilot workload is expected to be less than that required for an AIM-120 air-to-air missile launch.

Outlines the plan of Lockheed Martin to put directed-energy weapons on its unmanned air vehicle concepts in the U.S. Competition of the company with the Navy-backed X-47 unmanned combat air vehicle of Northrop Grumman and the X-45 of Boeing; Features and capabilities of the weapons; Variants of high-power microwaves.