Award Data

ABSTRACT: Busek Co. Inc. and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) propose to explore the physical limits of ionic liquid propulsion via development of new theory to explain effects of close packing emission density and to predict performance limits. The research is motivated by observations and tests demonstrating that emission from 2-dimensional porous surfaces yields order of magnitude g ...

This Small Business Innovation Research (STTR) project targets the development of novel methodology for the evaluation of a wide range of oxygen carriers, in particular, their attrition resistance, under conditions that broadly account for the process requirements of coal-based chemical looping systems. Existing test protocols and procedures for the evaluation of granular materials do not accurate ...

The ionomer dispersion technology invented at LANL has demonstrated great potential to significantly improve the lifetime of proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells via accelerated stress tests. However, more validation and improvements are needed to make this technology commercially viable for PEM fuel cell-based hydrogen vehicles. The overall project is to further improve and validate this ion ...

Adding thermal insulation to existing building envelopes can be an effective way of reducing building energy use. While most thermal insulation materials are affordable, the cost of installing thermal insulation into existing buildings can be expensive. Real facades are also characterized by many unique elements that affect their rated thermal performance, such as corners, windows, d ...

The combination of X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) with x-ray emission spectroscopy (XES) provides unique diagnostic analysis of both the structure and chemical composition of complex heterogeneous materials. The penetration of X-rays make this method ideal for studying and optimizing material properties under realistic, real time reaction conditions with simultaneous analysis of r ...

The remediation of underground nuclear waste storage tanks and associated disposal cribs and trenches at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) nuclear waste storage facilities, together with the associated needs to characterize and monitor the chemical compositions of the contaminants, presents a major scientific challenge. Several of these storage tanks are leaking, and significant quantities of w ...

NOVA Scientific proposes the development of efficient position sensitive detectors capable of time-tagging epithermal energy neutrons with high accuracy and efficiency. These devices will be able to perform energy-resolved imaging at the pulsed neutron sources and detect every neutron with spatial resolution of & lt; 60 m and timing resolution & lt; 1 s for thermal neutrons and & lt;100 ns for epi ...

Coal-fired power plants are a very large, concentrated, and stationary source of carbon dioxide emissions, and represent the best target to address the problem of increasing CO2 emissions through use of carbon dioxide capture, utilization, and storage technologies. The overall objective of the proposed Phase II research is to continue development of and enhance the hybrid sorbent tec ...

ABSTRACT: LongShortWay Inc, Boston University, and Applied Communication Sciences propose to develop a dynamic multi-sensor learning system that can adaptively detect target types and activities and schedule sensors to optimize the detection rate BENEFIT: Improved detection rate, increase field of view

ABSTRACT: High power and low insertion loss WDM components will be developed. In manufacturing WDM components, solid core fibers in both polarization insensitive and polarization maintaining, will be pursued, along with photonics crystal fiber components. A range of fiber sizes and device specifications will be developed and commercially offered by Q-Peak. The component that we propose to develo ...