Dr. Jacob Aronson is an Assistant Research Scientist at the Center for International Development and Conflict Management at the University of Maryland. His current research focuses on coercive bargaining between states and between states and non-state actors. He has ongoing projects on airpower and interstate bargaining, the deterrence of nonstate actors, drones and interstate disputes, causal analysis of gray zone conflict outcomes, rebel territorial control and rebel sanctuary, and population return in conflict zones. Currently, he is a researcher at the DoS-funded Conflict Observatory where he works to understand how the conflict in Ukraine impacts our understanding of modern warfare and its consequences for civilians and combatants. In collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution, he is also working on a project that looks at the strategic logic of combatant targeting of cultural heritage sites and the impact this targeting has on conflict processes. He has published on the topic of population displacement, nuclear proliferation, state-rebel military capacity, and instability forecasting. His work is currently supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation. His prior work received support from the Minerva Research Initiative, the Smith Richardson Foundation, and the Smithsonian Institution. His applied work has been briefed to USAID, DARPA, DoS-CSO, and DoD.