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Advanced Spectrally Selective Materials for Obscurant Applications

Award Information
Agency: Department of Defense
Branch: Army
Contract: W911SR-13-C-0072
Agency Tracking Number: A13A-016-0370
Amount: $149,991.00
Phase: Phase I
Program: STTR
Solicitation Topic Code: A13A-T016
Solicitation Number: 2013.A
Timeline
Solicitation Year: 2013
Award Year: 2013
Award Start Date (Proposal Award Date): 2013-09-26
Award End Date (Contract End Date): 2014-03-26
Small Business Information
51 East Main Street, Suite 211
Newark, DE 19711
United States
DUNS: 966110350
HUBZone Owned: No
Woman Owned: No
Socially and Economically Disadvantaged: No
Principal Investigator
 Ahmed Sharkawy
 CTO
 (302) 456-9003
 sharkawy@lumilant.com
Business Contact
 Eric Kelmelis
Title: CEO
Phone: (302) 456-9003
Email: kelmelis@lumilant.com
Research Institution
 University of Delaware
 Mark Mirotznik
 
140 Evans Hall
Newark, DE 19716-
United States

 (302) 831-4241
 Nonprofit College or University
Abstract

As infrared (IR) electo-optical sensors improve in both availability and quality a strong need exists to have comparable improvements in the performance of military obscurants within the IR band. Conventional approaches for creating effective IR obscurants have relied primarily on shaped metal particles with high aspect ratios (e.g. rods, flakes). While efficient it is difficult to create very wideband or spectrally complex responses when using surface plasmon based metal particles. In this effort we will take a completely different approach towards the design of IR based obscurants. Instead of using metal particles we intend to explore the development of all dielectric obscurants that exploit the properties of photonic crystals with integrated nanocavities. We believe this approach can create highly reflective obscurant particles within an entire IR band. Moreover, by introducing defect modes we will show that it is possible to create single or multiple transparent windows within a wideband obscurant band. The all dielectric approach is also amenable to current nanofabrication methods as well as scalable nano-imprinting techniques that can be used to fabricate large quantities of obscurant at a reasonable cost.

* Information listed above is at the time of submission. *

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