Award Data

Arsenic contamination in drinking water is a severe health risk to populations throughout the world, including the United States. In recognition of this threat, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently lowered its water standard for arsenic from 50 ppb to 10 ppb. This change is expected to impact 10 percent of U.S. community drinking water systems. The operators of small water sy ...

Oxides of nitrogen, or NOx, are common air pollutants in congested urban areas. NOx contributes to a variety of environmental problems, including ground-level ozone (smog), acid rain, and visibility impairment. NOx emissions are generated by motor vehicles, industrial facilities, and electric power plants. The Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 required that stationary sources, such as power plan ...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced its intention to regulate mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants because of mercury¿s impact on the health and development of young children and fetuses. The estimated cost of controlling mercury emissions from power plants runs from $2 to $5 billion annually, with a significant fraction of the total dedicated to activated carb ...

This project will design and deliver a high accuracy monitor for the photo-chemically coupled pollutants nitric oxide, nitrogen dioxide and ozone using infrared absorption spectroscopy with quantum cascade (QC) lasers. The target molecules are monitored at air quality stations worldwide using instruments which require frequent calibration and are subject to significant chemical interferences (in t ...

Solid-state light sources promise many advantages over traditional technologies. Among these advantages is the ability to construct a source whose relative spectral distribution can be tuned to better match a desired spectrum. We propose addressing this technical and market opportunity through the development of a novel single-chip semiconductor device which delivers high optical output power (>20 ...

The use of thermal neutrons has been widespread over the past several decades in many investigations such as non-destructive testing (NDT), neutron radiography and macromolecular crystallography. For some applications such as crystallographic diffraction studies, neutrons are scattered over 4o in space and an ideal detector would be able to image the scattered radiation on a spherical surface. Cur ...

Current methods to assess system effectiveness often require the development of prototype systems and costly evaluation studies. Several heuristic approaches exist to support technology selection and implementation services, however a scientifically-basedprocess is needed that will consider the functionality that new technology provides, the missions that these systems will be applied to, and the ...

Effective communications are essential in military operations in urban terrain (MOUT). Leaders must coordinate distributed squads of soldiers in hostile, urban battlegrounds through communication. However, though verbal communications are easy to capture,it traditionally takes days or weeks to analyze and assess this valuable data. Thus, communications analysis has become the province of research ...

Planing hull craft used for high-speed operations in littoral waters pose numerous safety challenges. Failure to adequately negotiate wave conditions may result in injury to the crew and damage to the craft. Our primary goal for this project is to designa comprehensive instructional system that will materially improve boat-handling safety by teaching strategies that can significantly mitigate sh ...

Simulation-based training is a promising instructional approach for training military and civilian first responders. In addition to training in relevant taskwork skills, there is a need for first responder training in cognitively-based skills such assituation assessment and decision making. We are addressing this need by the development of FIRST, a validated training program for first responders ...