Award Data

Fires in dry bays of military aircraft present a significant hazard that must be addressed with advanced fire suppression systems. The USAF is interested in concepts that do not require power or active sensing of fire for proper operation. ADA Technologies, Inc. has been developing fine water mist fire suppression technology for the past 10 years, and proposes a solution for this problem that inco ...

Both DOD and NASA have future missions that require the launch and deployment of an increasing number of single spacecraft, as well as multi-craft constellations. The desire to minimize cost and ensure the robustness of these high value assets has givenrise to the need for on-orbit inter-satellite communications that provides redundancy and fault tolerant satellite-to-satellite communications. T ...

There is a need to monitor the structural health of aerospace components operating in extreme temperatures ranges (e.g. -60 to +300C) and with high accelerations. Ideally the sensors employed for this task should be passive (i.e. not powered through batteries), permanently placed on the critical components and transmit the relevant data to a remote data processing center wirelessly.  Albido is pr ...

Polymers in space are subjected to various threats including hyperthermal oxygen atoms, UV and VUV photons, and ions.  These threats can degrade the polymer and lead to static charge accumulation.  This Phase II proposal will build on the Phase I work which demonstrated that inorganic films grown by atomic layer deposition (ALD) can protect polymers such as Kapton, Teflon and PMMA.  Al2O3 ALD f ...

Aqwest proposes to develop an advanced thermal management for cooling of electronic components using a variable conductance heat sink (VCHS) offering unparalleled capabilities in high-heat flux handling and temperature control. The project will produce a cooling system with the following benefits to wide band gap amplifiers and high-power laser diodes (HPLD): 1) Heat flux handling > 1200 W/cm2 2) ...

Astralux, in collaboration with the University of Colorado, proposes to develop high-power SiC microwave bipolar transistors for use in pulsed RF transmitters. More specifically, the performance goal is a 4H-SiC bipolar junction transistor (BJT) withpulsed power up to 650 W, single stage power gain up to 12 dB and bandwidth up to 3 GHz. The advantages of bipolar devices over Si-based devices inclu ...

This program develops a system that s capable of measureing to high accuracy and at high speeds two dimensional deformations of structural panels supporting antennas. The development of this system will serve to enhance imaging capabilities of radars.The system relies upon single and multi-axis fiber grating strain and temperature sensor technology that can be interrogated by high speed, high sen ...

In order to measure multi-axis strain fields and strain field gradients interior to composite materials, it is necessary to be able to measure both transverse axes of strain and axial strain. In addition, these sensors should be capable of measuringstrain gradients. Blue Road Research has developed a multi-axis fiber optic grating sensor that can be used to meet these requirements. This proposa ...

This Phase I SBIR will develop a methodology for monitoring the performance of composite cryogenic tanks through a system consisting of fiber grating strain sensors that will be integrated into the tank. The methodology will be developed through analysis,experimental testing of a demonstration article and subsequent evaluation of the results to check analysis. Blue Road Research will employ tech ...

This Phase I SBIR will develop a fiber grating sensor system that is capable of locating and assessing damage on a composite rocket motor casing. Blue Road Research will use arrays of single and multi-axis fiber grating strain sensors to perform bothlocalization and detailed assessment of the damage using a series of fiber grating demodulation methods that allow multiplexing of large number of se ...