Award Data

Fog and smog reduce visibility at sea, greatly impacting ship navigation and safety. Low visibility marine conditions decrease speed and safety of commercial fleets and increase costs through poor fuel load planning. The COVID-19 pandemic underscored the importance of maritime operations to the supply chain; therefore, decreasing associated cost and risk are of the utmost importance. Applied Ocean ...

"Metron proposes to develop user-friendly software to promote understanding of impacts due to cascading climate hazards and extreme weather events, in collaboration with George Mason University (GMU). Climate and extreme weather (CEW) hazards pose significant risks to life and property. As extreme events become more prevalent, risks associated with cascading, compound events come to the fore, such ...

Viable Gear will provide proof-of-concept for a seaweed-based bioplastic to be used in manufacturing a compostable biotwine for marine equipment, designed to replace petroleum-based plastics. This addresses NOM-SBIR research topic area 9.3, The Changing Ocean - specifically to "support increased protection and restoration of marine and coastal habitats to enhance vital ecosystems", by helping decr ...

The long endurance “StratoSonde” lighter-than-air, uncrewed system combines a low-cost, 5day endurance StratoSonde supports up to 10 micro-dropsondes, which when released from the HAB, descend safely through the entire atmospheric column under a ribbon drogue while reporting observations directly back to the HAB. This project will assess the feasibility of integrating a disposable miniature ae ...

The marine microalgae Chrypthecodinium conhii (C. cohnii) contains high levels of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and DHA synthase enzymes (DSe). Finfish have shown de novo synthesis of DHA when fed a C. cohnii product, KoniSap™, developed by FPN LLC. KoniSap™ is unique to the aqua-feed market as it is produced under low temperature and inert gas to prevent lipid oxidation and avoid enzyme denatura ...

Demand for seaweed products has dramatically increased in the U.S.; however, domestic production from both wild harvests and aquaculture operations only supplies 1% of this demand. To meet demand, expansion of seaweed aquaculture is crucial to protect wild populations from extinction by overharvesting, which impacts entire marine ecosystems. Currently, U.S. kelp aquaculture methods rely on wild ha ...

According to a survey completed by NCAT in 2019, as part of the NCHRP 20‐07 project, 36 DOTs (out of 43 responded) consider fatigue cracking as the most common failure mode that the agency wants to address. However, in the same survey, 34 of the DOTs also indicated that fatigue cracking test is not required in their mix design specifications. This is primarily because a simple, practical, and ro ...

There is a clear need to improve weather forecasting accuracy. The greatest contributions to forecast uncertainty is a lack of meteorological observations over remote areas and areas experiencing pronounced convective activity. StratoSolutions’ new high-altitude balloon (HAB) platform with mini-dropsonde is a disruptive new uncrewed meteorological observation data source able to collect data at ...

The primary objective of this project is to improve awareness, safety and enjoyment for mariners in coastal and inland waters by the creation of a participatory sensor network (PSN) that facilitates sharing of marine observations with other mariners. We are adding a new degree of temporal fidelity to nautical charts and maps. The approach leverages volunteered geographic information to augment con ...

Across the nation, school buses drive our kids to and from school, in rural, suburban, and large cities – all having the same problem: safely transporting school children. This proposal calls out (1) there is no school bus V2X solution that exists in any meaningful scalable way today (2) there is no readily available solution to solve for school children being struck during evening hours when vi ...