Award Data

Recent advances in electromagnetic technology clearly lend themselves to application in space-based data storage/retrieval systems. Commercial data storage systems provide low cost, long-life operation and strong logic/control systems, but employmechanical bearings that limit their resistance to shock and life expectancy. A similar system ruggedized for space via integrated magnetic motor-bearing ...

The advancement of shock mitigation technology is critical to the protection of fuzes in future penetrating weapons that are smaller and faster than current weapons. The first objective of this project during Phase II is to continue the research anddevelopment of three shock mitigation approaches, and apply them to develop a mount or housing that protects the most susceptible component of a fuze, ...

For companies engaged in the development of new antenna designs, antenna measurement systems represent a huge initial cost, and a significant barrier to entry into the market. Antenna measurement systems typically use a frequency domain Vector NetworkAnalyzer (VNA) and anechoic chamber or large outdoor range. The cost of such systems starts at around $300,000, which is more than most small compani ...

Under this Phase II SBIR effort Kestrel Corporation proposes to demonstrate the advantages of a distorted grating based wavefront sensor for measuring wavefront aberrations under propagation conditions that simulate the high levels of aberrations found inan Airborne Laser (ABL) application. The proposed technique was conceptually demonstrated during Phase I laboratory experiments where the sensor ...

Oceanit has successfully shown in Phase I that highly accurate (sub-arcsecond) observations are obtainable utilizing a relatively low-cost COTS system. These highly accurate angular observations can be introduced into the orbit determination process as asupplement to high-quality range data. These improved angular observations help resolve the geometric ambiguity of range-only orbit determinatio ...

Future DoD cryogenic cooling applications include space missions with relatively large cooling demands. These include space-based lasers, orbital transfer vehicles requiring cooling of stored fuels, and space-based platforms using large arrays of infrareddetectors. Loads for these applications will range from several watts to tens of watts. Temperatures of interest are between 10 and 100 K. Cu ...

Imaging LADAR systems are critical to autonomous guided munitions. The objective of this program is to demonstrate a solid-state, eye-safe, 3-D staring imaging LADAR receiver. This state-of-the-art focal plan array LADAR receiver will combine a 1.55micron photodetector and an internal gain photodetector with a 3-D imaging readout circuit using an innovative manufacturing process. The resulting ...

The need exists to generate high fidelity electromagnetic planewave environments over large assets for the purpose of testing avionics systems on full-size aircraft in anechoic chambers. In the Phase I effort, we conducted simulations of a PlanewaveGenerator (PWG) architecture that used a genetic algorithm to determine an excitation vector for a phased array that in turn creates an incident field ...