Award Data

Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) are a dangerous and effective weapon system that today’s military warfighters and innocent civilians regularly experience. IEDs are created with randomly assembled materials and their payloads may include projectiles, biological toxins, and other dangerous items that can cause injury or death to personnel and equipment. Detection and neutralization of these we ...

In cooperation with the Joint Improvised-threat Defeat Organization (JIDO) and the U.S. Army, IMSAR LLC demonstrated its radar systems' ability to successfully detect IED emplacements from the RQ-7B Shadow Unmanned Aerial System (UAS). As part of the Army’s ShadowSAR program, IMSAR operated and maintained these Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) sensors for 4 ½ years in support of Operation Endurin ...

Small multirotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are well suited for sensing and situational awareness missions in closed, confined, and constrained (C3) environments. However, autonomous navigation of small VTOL UAVs is very challenging in C3 environments. Current state of the art navigation methods uses vision and LIDAR to build a map, localize, and plan paths. These methods tend to be computati ...

There is a need to improve the understanding of physical and chemical processes involved in the evolution of chemical warfare agent (CWA) simulant aerosols and vapors that are interacting with combustion, deflagration, and detonation products. However, the measurement of aerosols and vapors is very challenging because of limited knowledge of the photophysics at varying temperatures and pressures, ...

Terrorist use of radioactive nuclear materials via nuclear and/or radiological dispersion devices (dirty bombs) is a serious threat. Therefore, it is crucial to detect proliferation of nuclear material. Critical challenges include: (a) high sensitivity detection of signature emissions from radioactive isotopes, and (b) cost-effectiveness for deployment of sensor networks across large storage facil ...

For applications in DoD satellite systems, devices based on novel nanomaterials offer significant advantages over traditional technologies in terms of light-weight and efficiency. Examples of such novel devices include quantum dot (QD) based solar cells, photodetectors, radars and sensors. However, the response of these devices to radiation effects is not well understood, and radiation effects mod ...

Future high-performance integrated circuits in DoD satellite systems will require non-planar nano-technology devices, such as MultiGate Field Effect Transistors (MuGFET) or FinFET, which can decrease pattern area of logic circuits below 50% of the conventional planar technologies. The International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors predicts that such devices will be the cornerstone of sub-32nm ...

The use of WMDs and IEDs by covert insurgents and terrorists poses a significant risk to U.S. military forces and civilians. The capability to execute rapid forensic DNA analysis to identify individuals who manufactured and transported these threatening devices is of paramount importance to military mission, homeland security and civilian safety. Current DNA forensic analyses are time-consuming, b ...

Sample preparation has been recognized as the single most important challenge to be faced in the development of detect-to-warn (DTW) systems. Available commercial sample preparation technologies are expensive, slow, and require trained laboratory technicians and sophisticated laboratory equipment for operation. Addressing this need, we propose to design, fabricate, and demonstrate a general purpos ...

With the current state of world events, the threat of explosives used against high-value targets is more pronounced than ever before. As a result, simulation of blast events and their effects on structures has become an increasingly vital capability. Current blast simulations on Central Processing Units (CPU) resources require a significant amount of computational time, limiting their overall valu ...