La IARPA, dopo oltre un anno di elaborazione, ha annunciato a fine settembre l'avvio del FUSE (Foresight and Understanding from Scientific Exposition Program), il programma di ricerca dedicato allo sviluppo di capacità automatiche per la mappatura e l'individuazione di nuove tecnologie emergenti. In pratica, una sorta di horizon-scanning automatizzato che possa aiutare gli analisti velocizzando e rendendo più efficiente la loro attività di monitoraggio di nuove tecnologie ad impatto strategico:

"Technical emergence refers to the process whereby innovative ideas, capabilities, applications, and even entirely new fields of study arise, are tested, mature, and, if conditions are favorable, make a significant impact. Those able to "scan the horizon" for the early signs of technical emergence, and take advantage of the resulting capabilities and applications, can gain a significant competitive edge.
Today, the identification and assessment of emerging technical capabilities is a time-consuming, domain-specific, and expert-intensive process. This demanding process is often carried out under severe time constraints on either too much or too little data, with limited reproducible auditing and bias controls, and with limited systematic validation against real world activities. Furthermore, the increasing globalization of science and technology raises the potential for high-impact technical capabilities to emerge in increasingly diverse technical, socio-economic, and geographic areas.
Analysts and Subject-Matter Experts (SMEs) need a reliable, evidence-based capability that allows them to dramatically accelerate the horizon-scanning process and reduce the labor involved to identify specific technical areas for in-depth review. It is essential that this automated capability can nominate both known and novel technical areas based on quantified indications of technical emergence with sufficient supporting evidence and arguments for that nomination (…)".