Award Data

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 ...

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 ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Sphingolipids are being increasingly recognized as key mediators of inflammatory cascades of critical importance in multiple diseases, including rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. Most importantly, sphingosine 1-phosphate produced by sphingosine kinase (SK) mediates the effects of tumor necrosis factor-1 and interleukin-12, pro-inflammatory cytokines ...

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 ...

This proposal addresses the need for a smart, network-compatible, enhanced head-aimed video sensor system to enable geo-location and target hand-off from robotic platforms. The sensor system provides enhanced remote situational awareness, with specific features aimed towards reconnaissance and surveillance, and target identification and designation missions. This same sensor is also applicable t ...

Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) and Raman spectroscopy are developing rapidly for chemical and biochemical sensing applications. There is an urgent need for high-sensitivity detectors so as to minimize sample quantity and maximize detection range from the source. In most field-deployable spectrometers, a photo-detector array is used for analyzing the spectral contents. The sensitivitie ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): A coupling mechanism with the strength to fix a forcefully contracting muscle to a totally inert prosthesis, or to bone, would meet a serious and common need in clinical orthopaedics. We have explored a new approach t o such a coupling. The hypothesis was that a coupling prosthesis with a low-mass, high-surface configuration designed to transfer force by shea ...

TRS is pleased to propose an in-situ NDE imaging tool for SiC mirror surface damage (SD), sub-surface damage (SSD) and trapped internal stress detection using piezo-composite based micromachined ultrasound transducer (PCMUT) phased array technology. PCMUT technology has been developed at TRS to fabricate high frequency ultrasound transducers with broad bandwidth and high sensitivity. Phased array ...

TRS Technologies, Inc. and Nothrop Grumman Undersea Systems (NGUS) propose to develop and test a single crystal sonar array that adds transmit capability to the currently proposed receive array for the Virginia-class submarine. The goal of this program will be to adapt the added capability to the current form factor, thereby getting maximum return for minimal modifications and interface changes. B ...