2025 Trends in Ship Building Technologies

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Larrie D. Ferreiro

Larrie D. Ferreiro is a naval architect and historian.  He has served for almost fifty years as a naval architect, science director and systems engineer in the US Navy, US Coast Guard, Department of Defense, and in industry; was trained as a British naval constructor at University College London; and was an exchange engineer in the French Navy. He is the author of the MIT Press foundational histories of naval architecture, Ships and Science: The Birth of Naval Architecture in the Scientific Revolution, 1600-1800; and Bridging the Seas: The Rise of Naval Architecture in the Industrial Age, 1800-2000.  He is the 2017 Pulitzer finalist for History, for his book Brothers at Arms: American Independence and the Men of France and Spain Who Saved It. His latest work, Churchill’s American Arsenal: The Partnership Behind the Innovations That Won World War II was published under Oxford University Press in 2022.  Dr. Ferreiro received his PhD in the History of Science, Technology and Engineering from Imperial College London. He teaches history and engineering at George Mason University in Virginia and the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey. He and his family live in Virginia.

Paul Hess

Accordion content.

Amy Austin Holmes, Ph.D.

Amy Austin Holmes, Ph.D.

Research Professor of International Affairs

George Washington University

Dr. Amy Austin Holmes is Research Professor of International Affairs and Acting Director of the Foreign Area Officers Program at George Washington University. Dr. Holmes has published widely on the global American military posture, the NATO alliance, non-state actors, revolutions, military coups, and de-facto states. With more than 15 years global experience conducting research in the Middle East and Europe, including various conflict zones, she is a noted expert on issues of American foreign policy and international security.

Dr. Holmes earned her Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University and previously served as a tenured Associate Professor at the American University in Cairo. She has held Visiting Scholar positions at Harvard University’s Belfer Center, the Weatherhead Center also at Harvard University, and at Brown University’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs. Dr. Holmes is the author of three books and more than 50 articles.

Her first book Social Unrest and American Military Bases in Turkey and Germany since 1945 (Cambridge University Press) analyzed seven decades of American security relations with NATO allies Turkey and Germany. Her second book Coups and Revolutions: Mass Mobilization, the Egyptian Military and the United States from Mubarak to Sisi (Oxford University Press) was informed by her experience of living in Egypt throughout the period of revolutionary upheaval. Her third book Statelet of Survivors: The Making of a Semi-Autonomous Region in Northeast Syria (Oxford University Press) is based on a pioneering field survey of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) she conducted in Northeast Syria over a period of seven years. Dr Holmes is leading a new project that involves the creation of the largest dataset in existence on the Turkish-Kurdish conflict covering four decades, to analyze how it has transformed across time and space.

In addition to her academic career, Dr. Holmes served as an advisor at the U.S. Department of State through a Council on Foreign Relations fellowship, where she first worked in the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, focused on Iraq and Syria.  She then also served on the Turkey Desk in the Office of Southern European Affairs, which covers Turkey, Greece, Cyprus, and Malta. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, she also served as a volunteer lecturer at the Kyiv School of Economics during the summer of 2023, where she taught a course on Global Disinformation.

Derek Novak

Derek Novak

Chief Engineer

American Bureau of Shipping

 

Ronald O'Rourke

Ronald O'Rourke

Naval Affairs Analyst

Congressional Research Service

Ronald O'Rourke received a B.A. in international studies from the Johns Hopkins University in 1980 (Phi Beta Kappa) and an M.A. in international studies from the University’s School of Advanced International Studies in 1981 as its Christian A. Herter (valedictorian) Fellow. He has worked as a research assistant on naval integrated

logistics support issues for American Management Systems, Inc. of Arlington, VA, and as a consultant on defense issues for then Governor Pierre S. du Pont IV of Delaware. Since 1984, he has been a naval affairs analyst for the Congressional Research Service (CRS) of the Library of Congress. He has written numerous reports and articles on naval affairs. His essay, “The Maritime Strategy and the Next Decade (/magazines/proceedings/1988/april/maritime-strategyand-next-decade),’’ published in the April 1988 Proceedings, was the 1988 winner of the Annual Arleigh Burke Essay Contest.

Sharon Squassoni

Sharon Squassoni

Research Professor of the Practice of International Affairs

Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University

Sharon Squassoni's research, writing and policy-making has focused on reducing risks from nuclear energy and weapons for four decades. She has held senior positions at the State Department, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency and the Congressional Research Service, as well as the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Center for Strategic & International Studies, where she led the Proliferation Prevention Program. She is a distinguished graduate of the National War College (1998).  Squassoni sits on the boards of the PIR Center, the Wisconsin Project on Arms Control, the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation and the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center. She co-founded the Climate Security Initiative in 2023. For a full biography, see https://sites.google.com/view/profsharonsquassoni

Bryan Tomer

Bryan Tomer

Director, Advanced Platform Concepts and Integration

Senior Scientific Technical Manager

Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock

Mr. Bryan Tomer was selected in March 2021 as a Senior Scientific and Technical Manager (SSTM) for the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Division in the position of Director, Advanced Surface Ship Platform Concepts and Integration. In this position, Mr. Tomer provides leadership and oversight of the technical work, people, and organizations performing advanced maritime platform concepts, early-stage ship design activities, and technology integration efforts.

Early in his career, Mr. Tomer performed and then led numerous ship concept studies across a variety of naval missions and platform types in support of the Naval Sea Systems Command and Military Sealift Command. He then held a position at the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) where he worked as a subject matter expert for naval platform design and technology integration on OPNAV sponsored Analyses of Alternatives.

Mr. Tomer next worked in the private sector as a Systems Engineering and Technical Assistance support contractor to the Office of Naval Research (ONR) serving as the Chief Technical Consultant to the Director of the Ship Systems and Engineering Research Division.Joining Carderock in 2016, Mr. Tomer has served as a Team Lead for Future Surface Combatants and as a Technical Lead for Special Projects within the Future Ship Concepts Branch (Code 824). He is a graduate of the Florida Institute of Technology with a Bachelor of Science in Ocean Engineering and a Master of Science in Engineering from the University of Maryland.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Carderock Division is the Navy’s center of excellence for ships and ship systems. For more than 100 years, NSWC Carderock Division has helped preserve and enhance the nation’s presence on and under the seas. NSWC Carderock Division is the full spectrum research and development, test and evaluation, engineering, and fleet support organization for the Navy’s ships, submarines, military watercraft, and unmanned vehicles with insight into new concepts and diverse technologies for the nations’ modern fleet. The Division’s expertise includes naval architecture and engineering, electrical and mechanical engineering, computer engineering, Naval materials, structures, and physics, as well as several other maritime concentrations. NSWC Carderock Division’s unique laboratories, modeling and simulation facilities, at-sea-assets, and large-scale, land-based engineering and test sites at our headquarters in West Bethesda, Maryland, and seven detachment locations across the country contribute to the full-spectrum nature of our mission, allowing Carderock Division to continue to prioritize solving key operational problems to meet future fleet needs.

Navy and maritime communities have come to depend on our expertise and innovative spirit in developing advanced platforms and systems, enhancing naval performance, integrating new technologies, and reducing operating costs. For more than a century, NSWC Carderock Division has been at the forefront of technologies vital to the success of the U.S. Navy and Maritime Industry, and will continue to enable and empower tomorrow’s fleet.