Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab conducting Pentagon study on women in combat roles

The Pentagon has picked the Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory to take over a yearslong study on the effectiveness of women in combat roles.

It’s not clear why the U.S. Department of Defense moved the study to Hopkins APL from the Institute for Defense Analyses, an Alexandria, Virginia-based nonprofit. A Defense Department spokesperson confirmed that Hopkins APL was conducting the study but declined to answer any further questions.

Advocates for civil rights and for women in the military worry that the study was moved to cherry-pick a researcher at APL who wrote a 2015 study that highlighted the negative effects of integrating women into Marine Corps combat units.

The study by Yevgeniya “Jane” Pinelis has been cited by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who’s voiced opposition to women in combat roles and implemented strict sex-neutral fitness standards for such units.

Advocates, meanwhile, are seeking more information from the Defense Department about the study, its intent and why it was transferred to APL, even filing a federal lawsuit to force a response to a Freedom of Information Act request.

“Since it’s come to light, we’ve gotten no transparency about why the study is being undertaken,” said Gillian Thomas, senior counsel of the ACLU Women’s Rights Project, which filed the lawsuit along with the Service Women’s Action Network and other groups.

Pinelis’ previous study was “widely criticized for its flawed design and biased analysis,” according to the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The lawsuit followed an August Freedom of Information Act request for public records that the Defense Department has yet to fulfill. Under federal law, the department must respond to the request within 20 business days to say whether it will grant, partially grant or deny it.

“It’s a matter of national security to understand why the Pentagon is considering, potentially compromising women’s ability to serve,” Thomas said.

The new Pentagon study was first announced in a December 2025 memo by Anthony Tata, who serves as the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness. It was assigned to the Institute for Defense Analyses, which operates federally funded research and development centers.

Tata wrote that the initiative aims to evaluate the “operational effectiveness” of mixed-gender units since restrictions on women serving in combat positions were lifted about a decade ago, according to NPR, which first reported the review. Leon Panetta, a former defense secretary under President Barack Obama, called for women to be integrated into combat units in 2013 and gave the military until the start of 2016 to implement the policy.

The review comes amid several dramatic shifts in the armed forces since President Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office. Hegseth has led what he calls the Department of War since Trump appointed him secretary of defense in January 2025. In the last year, he’s faced backlash for promoting fewer women and minorities in senior military positions, issuing guidance that prevented official resources from going toward identity-related events, eliminating women-centered programs and committees, and calling for re-evaluations of what qualifies as harassment in the U.S. military.

The Johns Hopkins University is the biggest recipient of defense contracts among the 15 research centers the Pentagon funds, largely due to the Applied Physics Laboratory, located off Route 29 in Laurel.

The laboratory was founded in 1942 as the federal government worked to mobilize scientific resources to address wartime challenges. In the university’s June financial report, Hopkins cites the “U.S. Department of War” as responsible for about 70% of APL’s revenue during the 2024 and 2025 fiscal years.

APL’s contract work ranges from evaluating missile systems to assessing submarine technologies and space systems. In the fiscal year ending in June 2025, the laboratory generated about $2.8 billion, about a third of the university’s revenue, according to financial documents.

Over the last decade, the Defense Department has awarded about $12 billion in contracts to APL, per audited financial statements.

The advocates’ lawsuit cited questions about the researcher chosen to lead the review and APL’s lack of expertise in studying occupation-specific performance.

Representatives for APL did not respond to requests for comment, nor did Pinelis.

Pinelis has spent the majority of her career studying the military, including two stints at APL and years at the Defense Department and the Marine Corps, according to her LinkedIn. Hegseth repeatedly cited her 2015 study on mixed combat units in a chapter of his book “The War on Warriors.”

Her 2015 study has faced criticism for containing a potentially biased and small pool of participants, including male and female Marines with inequitable experience and training.

“To midstream be yanking it away and giving it to someone with this public track record is concerning to say the least and we think an explanation is owed,” Thomas said.