Award Data

Increasing the power density of current jet aircraft engines requires the replacement of conventional high temperature materials by new materials capable of operating at higher temperatures. Ceramics and ceramic matrix composites (CMCs) represent excellent candidates for increased use in hot engine parts due to their ability to withstand temperatures in excess of 2000 C. Due to the complexity of t ...

The Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC) controls engine operation. It is historically mounted on the engine case to minimize the routing length of the sensor and actuator wiring. The FADEC must be maintained below 63°C, while the environment can be as hot as 170°C. The current design uses fuel to cool the FADEC, however, this often limits the allowable ground or flight idle time bef ...

Advanced Cooling Technologies, Inc. (ACT) will develop a Fast Thermal Response Fabric Test Setup for various thermal hazard scenarios involving convection (hot gas impingement by the jet engine exhaust), radiation (fire) and combination of convection and radiation (post-crash fire of aircraft, fire flash or bomb blast). The fabric test setup will (i) measure the thermal response of various clothin ...

The objective of the proposed research aims to develop Reduced Order Models (ROMs) (i.e. POD, HB, combined POD and HB) based upon flight data to better predict the aircraft aeroelastic response at next flight condition, e.g. higher Mach number. By incorporating flight test data and using the highest fidelity computational models in reduced order form we will obtain computational solutions that a ...

Adventium has created a trust-driven engineering solution that will enable assured deployment and control of million-plus scalable lightweight cybercraft to help maintain US freedom of action, and deny freedom of action to our adversaries. Our constraint-based approach reduces uncertainty by identifying robust architectures and configurations that can satisfy mission requirements for large-scale d ...

In order to achieve high performance at acceptable cost, PEM fuel cells are required to work at elevated temperature and low relative humidity (near 0 RH) for extended periods of time. However, to date, no commercial PEMs or publicly reported PEMs can meet these requirements. The objectives of this work are: (1) to develop PEMs that have high proton conductivities (50-100 mS/cm) and low area-spec ...

The first critical step in welding or brazing is cleaning to remove surface contamination. The Air Force has a need for an environmentally cleaning method that has no waste stream, minimal requirements of personal safety protection, and does not impact component integrity. The Arc Scrubber is an emerging non-chemical cleaning technology that utilizes and electrical arc to remove surface contamin ...

Applied Optimization, Inc. [AO] proposes to demonstrate full feature characterization of unresolved RSOs by performing spectral unmixing and time-frequency analysis of its time and spectrally resolved signature in the visible or infrared spectrum. The characterization will be performed step-by-step by following a taxonomy of feature extraction. Materials identification will be performed via spectr ...

Advanced rechargeable battery technology providing higher energy densities and higher specific energies is being sought by the OSD to extend the range and capability of small electronic systems. In this proposal, an anode material is proposed based on carbon nanofiber alloyed with silicon. While many researchers have tested carbon-silicon alloys created through various schemes, these materials s ...

Blade Diagnostics Corporation will integrate a new capability into its Mistuning Inspection Machine so that the effect of aerodynamic as well as structural mistuning can be evaluated when inspecting blend repairs on the F119 1st stage fan. This Smart BlendTM technology will transform the MIM into a virtual engine test for blended blades. Consequently, at the end of this effort a technology will ...