Award Data

The evolution of network-centric environments increasingly provides access to more data and collaborators relevant to decision making. Unfortunately, it also means the decision-maker increasingly needs to efficiently and effectively utilize that data in order to stay competitive. In network-centric warfare the consequences of less than optimal performance can be extremely serious. With the deploym ...

Fully autonomous, taskable robots for use in unconstrained environments are still a dream rather than a reality because of a host of problems, including capabilities of existing sensors, effectors, and control/planning software. Indeed, concepts of operations for robot use require that robots collaborate directly with humans, in relationships similar to bomb squad dogs. Fortunately, enough progres ...

We shall investigate, implement and demonstrate MAVIS, a 3D vision system incorporating robust Real-Time SFM for SMAV application scenarios. Automatic pose determination and extraction of 3D structure of the environment are critical to autonomous navigation and obstacle avoidance of SMAVs in constrained and crowded environments. Extracting such state information under various constraints (low qual ...

A Phase I effort to investigate the use of poly-crystalline Ge-on-Si and strained SiGe alloy grown on silicon for near-infrared photodetectors is proposed. These devices are expected to cover the spectral band that stretches from a wavelength of 0.8 to 1.6 microns. If reasonable performance devices can be fabricated, this will potentially pave the way for the integration of signal processing e ...

This effort will develop the power, communication and launch vehicle (LV) interface systems of a parasitic "drone" satellite to be used in close proximity with a host satellite. The power system will harvest energy from the side lobes of the host satellite's microwave transmissions. The communication system will transfer data with the host through that same microwave frequency, negating the need ...

The remarkable sensitivity, compactness, low cost, low power-consumption, scalability, and versatility of microcantilever sensors make this technology possibly the best solution for container screening. In Phase I, Nevada Nanotech Systems (NNTS) successfully demonstrated all components of a prototype sensor system for measuring the concentrations of unlawful or hazardous materials in shipping con ...

We propose to develop and demonstrate thin-film transistors (TFTs) capable of operation at microwave and millimeter-wave frequencies. These ultra-fast devices are based on a patented metal-insulator tunneling hot electron transistor structure. Comprising thin films of only metals and dielectrics, our TFTs require only low temperature processing and should be inherently compatible with large-area ...

The following phase II proposal is intended to further extend the dynamic range and reduce the form factor of the EA based transmitters fabricated during the phase I portion of this work. The dynamic range proposed and form factor proposed are in excess of any previously obtained and are crucial to future mixed signal WDM photonic systems.

"Astralux is developing a new approach to the active cooling of electronics that is intrinsically very efficient, low-volume and low cost. The electronic cooler is based on the Nottingham effect. In the Nottingham effect, cooling results from theextraction of "hot electrons", somewhat analogous to the common evaporative cooling process. Although the Nottingham cooling effect has been known for ...

"Astralux is developing a new approach to the active cooling of electronics that is intrinsically very efficient, low-volume and low cost. The electronic cooler is based on the Nottingham effect. In the Nottingham effect, cooling results from theextraction of "hot electrons", somewhat analogous to the common evaporative cooling process. Although the Nottingham cooling effect has been known for ...