Award Data

The recent performance increases in graphics processing units (GPUs) have made graphics cards an attractive platform for implementing computationally intense applications. With their numerous parallel computational pipelines and SIMD architecture, modern GPUs can outperform high-end microprocessors by one to three orders of magnitude, depending on the problem. Most work to date at EM Photonics a ...

Leveraging Phase I SBIR successes, in Phase II, a single photon sensitive LIDAR receiver will be fabricated and delivered to NASA. In Phase I, high-gain, electron-initiated avalanche photodiodes (e-APDS) were designed, manufactured, and characterized over a range of temperatures. The e-APDs, sensitive from 1064 nm to 4300 nm, were fabricated in single-layer p-type HgCdTe films grown using liquid p ...

Reduced mass materials are critical to the success of aerospace systems. Thus, large air and space structures can benefit from lightweight composite materials. However, their adoption is impaired by the lack of a robust, cost-effective fabrication process, principally because the autoclaves used to consolidate composite laminates are so expensive for large parts. This program develops for US aeros ...

There is a significant and growing NASA requirement for small efficient space communications amplifiers in the range of five- to 50-watts at 20 GHz and above. These powers are too high for solid state technology. Traveling wave tubes, on the other hand, are not very efficient at these low power levels as currently constructed. Also, their price per-watt is high, as is their size and weight per-wat ...

NASA's Ultra Long Duration Balloon and Aerobot programs are seeking innovative and cost effective solutions to provide: high strength to weight composite envelope materials; efficient cost-effective seaming and fabrication techniques; deployment and inflation of balloon envelopes in planetary atmospheres; and innovative balloon design concepts. The proposed 3DR technology can meet all these challe ...