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Domestic Nuclear Detection Office: Joint Analysis Center

Staffed with personnel from the Departments of Defense, Energy, Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Joint Analysis Center (JAC) will provide status tracking for the United States Government Global Nuclear Detection Architecture.

With a direct conduit from the alarm source to national assets for spectrum analysis, the Joint Analysis Center will provide 24/7 response for radiological alarm resolution and provide the capability to marry intelligence, illicit activity, and threats with a known radiological architecture that will provide total situational awareness to decision makers. The JAC facilitates the USG Interagency Nuclear Decision Protocols to adjudicate nuclear detection events.

Situational Awareness

The JAC achieves situational awareness through visibility into deployed components, access to information, and historical data. Information is received from deployed radiological/nuclear detection assets, radiological/nuclear related events, the global nuclear detection architecture, the NRC and Agreement State Material Licensing Data, and historical data on all detection events, illicit and legitimate.

Alarm Adjudication

The Joint Analysis Center provides state, local, and/or tribal organizations a direct link to technical reachback for alarm adjudication. Technical reachback is performed by the Department of Energy’s National Laboratories.

Information & Analysis

The Joint Analysis Center consolidates intelligence reports, law enforcement information and technical data across the interagency to facilitate an understanding of the Global Nuclear Detection Architecture and its performance. Data-mining and analysis conducted of nuclear detection assets, events, and the operating environment facilitate after-action reviews of events and allow for the implementation of lessons learned.

Information Sharing

The Joint Analysis Center facilitates the information flow on radiological detection events between the interagency and state and local entities. Passing information both up to the federal level and down to the local level, the JAC ensures that appropriate action is taken to resolve alarms.

Operations Support Directorate

The Operations Support Directorate within the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office is responsible for establishing and operating a real-time situational awareness and support capability by monitoring the status of, and collecting information from, both overseas and domestic detection systems through the Joint Analysis Center and other programs. Operational support services include the development of protocols and standards, as well as a technical support infrastructure, or reachback, to ensure appropriate expertise is in place to support prompt alarm resolution.

This page was last modified on October 15, 2007