Award Data

The ever-decreasing size of the electronic microchips and the ever-increasing density of electronic components required to support future Air Force platforms are creating the problem of substantial localized heat generation that can impair component operation. State of the art thermal interface materials (TIMs), that are used to dissipate heat from the source to the spreader in a microchip, are se ...

Developments in micro/nano technologies are leading the way to a new fleet of micro air vehicle (MAV) airframes. However, the unavoidable and ultimately the mission-limiting issue for all of these new systems will be on-board power. The lightest-weight current lithium-polymer batteries don’t provide sufficient energy densities and impose a variety of operational limitations that are unacceptab ...

Lithium-ion batteries have become the industry standard for use as rechargeable secondary batteries in space vehicles. Although substantial advancements have made in this class of batteries of late, substantial limitations still exist in: energy and power densities, operational temperature limits, safety, and most importantly lifecycle and lifetime performance. To address this need, ADA Technolo ...

Micro air vehicles (MAV) are envisioned to play a substantial role in carrying out critical missions for the Nation’s future military force. However due to their small size, deficiencies in critical technologies may limit the operational performance of future MAVs. Arguably, on-board power may be the most mission-limiting issue facing future MAVs. To address this need, ADA Technologies, Inc. ...

Morphing air vehicles are characterized by an ability to dramatically alter their airfoil characteristics to maintain optimal aerodynamic efficiency over a broad flight regime thereby broadening their mission profile over an equivalent fixed-wing vehicle. Essential to enabling these vehicles is a wing skin that is highly compliant in-plane for wing morphing while being highly stiff out-of-plane to ...

Cyberspace superiority is a prerequisite for effective operations in all other warfighting domains. To maintain cyberspace superiority, there is a need for effective Command and Control (C2) tools to observe, plan, and execute cyber operations. Visualization is a key enabler of C2 but new approaches are required to address cyber security data sets. A principal challenge is the complexity of this d ...

Aerodyne Research, Inc. (ARI) and The University of Massachusetts at Amherst will collaborate to develop a novel technique for efficient mass spectrometric analysis of high molecular weight analytes such as proteins and polymers. Laser desorption and ionization with minimal analyte fragmentaton will be carried out on metal nanoparticle substrates in a particle beam sampled by Aerodyne’s proprie ...

Agiltron and the University of Massachusetts Lowell will develop a transformational terahertz (THz) imager based on Agiltron’s established optical readout photomechanical imaging technology. The photomechanical imager contains a MEMS-based focal plane array that transduces THz radiation into a visible signal for capture by a high-performance CCD imager. By leveraging the advances made in the fie ...

The proposed innovative in-fiber beam expansion technology and the all inorganic micro-optic fiberoptic device designs intrinsically have advantages in power handling, speed, insertion loss, reliability, and potentially cost as compared with other approaches. Our approaches overcome all the major hurdles in high power 2m fiberoptic device fabrications without trading-off of optical performance ...

We propose to develop a combination Tip-Enhanced Raman Scattering and Shear-Force Microscopy (TERS-SFM) instrument to study the composition and morphology of nanoparticles, surfaces, and biofilms on any substrate material. The instrument developed during Phase I will rely upon Scanning Tunneling Microscopy combined with TERS (TERS-STM) to test the effects of various excitation wavelengths and tip ...