Award Data

The SBIR Phase II proposal outlines the approach of Night Crew Labs (NCL) in designing, and developing, and testing a system prototype to perform Global Navigation Satellite System radio occultations (GNSS-ROs) from a high-altitude balloon platform. NCL will continue building from the positive results achieved in Phase I that successfully demonstrated the feasibility of performing balloon-borne GN ...

Phase-1 demonstrated the powerful and unusual remote sensing opportunities available by adding acoustic signal detection to pop-up satellite tags (PSAT). The time and location of spawning define the starting point in the life history of fish. Yet this event, which is of critical importance to fishery researchers and managers seeking to gain an understanding of distinct reproductive populations and ...

Subsurface mooring beacons are used to provide notifications and assist in locating moored assets that have surfaced and are free drifting. Their nominal design is driven by the requirements for offshore use where they need to survive extreme depths and remote deployment, most often using satellite constellations for communication and geo-location. Existing beacons serve their purpose well, but th ...

The presence of fog reduces visibility, contributing to unsafe conditions for many maritime tasks. The current system uses active backscatter and has high power requirements, high maintenance and replacement costs. Areté Associates’ innovative FogViewer system comprises a passive multi-spectral, multi-polarization sensor suite that leverages available degrees of freedom to best characterize the ...

The Bottom Feeder project is designed to prove out the research done in Phase I using a prototype platform. The prototype will be a full size version of the platform designed during Phase I. The Phase I platform was designed to work in two operational configurations, a highly efficient mode and a highly maneuverable mode, with the ability to switch between them while submerged. The platform is equ ...

The team of Makel Engineering, Inc. (MEI), TruWeather Solutions, LLC., and Latitude Engineering, LLC. propose to develop a novel, high sensitivity, fast response, solid state, electrochemical carbon monoxide sensor system for use in small UAVs which is capable of PPB level atmospheric measurements. The sensor is based on a thick film multi-element potentiometric micro sensor approach which has bee ...

We will produce a prototype Capillary Absorption Spectrometer (CAS) capable of measuring dissolved methane in water. The concept utilizes mid-infrared laser absorption spectroscopy within a hollow fiber optic capillary that both confines a gas sample and acts as an optical waveguide. A tunable laser beam propagates through the hollow fiber to a detector with near unity overlap between the beam and ...

Reliance on fishmeal and fish oil is a significant constraint to aquaculture expansion in America, and globally. As U.S. marine fish farming expands, genetic improvements could increase economic performance and decrease ecological footprint. This is critically important to sustainability, scalability and profitability of the industry, and is key to attracting capital investment. Commercial opportu ...

There is currently no low-cost, high performance minimally invasive, bottom-crawling ROV system for monitoring coastal and littoral benthic environments which is also deployable by a single marine researcher. Such a system augmenting divers’ observations would greatly expand the quantity and quality of data critical to managing coastal environments and preserving the economic benefits derived by ...

NOAA and in particular, the National Weather Service (NWS), have an unmet need of a cost feasible small Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) which can support multiple sensing missions which will either directly save lives or indirectly save lives through improved weather forecasts, warnings and public alerts. NOAA has enumerated two dozen valuable applications of small UAS for itself and partners. Toyon ...