Award Data

Passive microwave sensors aboard satellites provide valuable information regarding weather conditions by measuring atmospheric attenuation over a broad range of frequencies from 0-200 GHz. Additional ground-based sensors are desirable to provide complementary upward looking measurements that can be used to refine existing attenuation models. Operating over such a large bandwidth, however, places ...

This SBIR Phase I effort will establish the feasibility of fabricating advanced waveguide structures in potassium titanyl phosphate (KTP) capable of efficiently generating 25 to 40 mW of frequency converted light in the 395 to 480 nm. The key innovation in this effort is to utilize KTP waveguides in a single-pass frequency doubling device to efficiently produce the desired laser wavelengths and po ...

This NIST Phase II SBIR effort will two low noise single photon detectors using MgO doped LiNbO3 (LN) periodically poled waveguides and a 980nm (or similar appropriate wavelength) pump to up convert 1550nm photons to 600nm to allow for detection by photomultiplier tube (PMT). The key innovation is using low noise periodically poled waveguides with a long wavelength (1800nm) pump leading to higher ...

Future BMDS interceptor systems require innovative propellants that provide significantly increased performance and, simultaneously, improved safety, insensitivity, and economy. ORBITEC and partner University of Wisconsin-Madison propose to develop a family of ionic liquid propellants to meet these needs. Ionic liquids are inherently non-volatile, stable, and dense, and have a large liquidus ran ...

We aim to design and demonstrate an innovative photonic true time delay solution which alleviates the fundamental problem of cascaded optical switches, and additionally offers several significant benefits. The device uses wideband spatial-spectral (S2) holographic optical memory materials to store and access several broadband time delay gratings. Broadband optical chirps are used to create these ...

An existing low-cost FPGA-based processing platform will be demonstrated with fiber-coupling to single-photon detectors, to perform photon-arrival time stamping with

A stable, well characterized InGaAs materials growth and photodetector fabrication process will be used to fabricate matched photodiodes optimized for balanced homodyne detection. The 1-mm-diameter p-i-n photodetectors will be manufactured back-illuminated with a 5-micron absorber, allowing residual light to reflect off the front-side metal to make a double pass through the active layer. Ultra-hig ...

Voxtel has demonstrated efficient high-speed photon counting with thresholded linear-mode avalanche photodiode (APD) receivers using multi-gain-stage InGaAs/InAIAs APDs. In contrast to Geiger APDs, thresholded photon-counting linear APD receivers are thought not to suffer afterpulsing, and can support maximum count rates (MCR) up to 2 or 3 orders of magnitude faster than Geiger APDs. However, the ...

A radiation-hard, 1064-nm sensitive, single-photon-sensitive avalanche photodiode (APD) detector with photon detection efficiency (PDE) and dark count rate (DCR) superior to state-of-the-art Geiger-mode APDs, and with two orders of magnitude faster maximum count rate (MCR) will be developed. Geiger APDs are constrained by a fundamental tradeoff between DCR and MCR: if the APD is cooled to reduce D ...