Award Data

The proposed Phase II effort investigates innovative finite element formulations, alternative structural modeling procedures and modern parallel computational strategies to improve the computational performance of high fidelity simulation software for modeling the progressive collapse behavior of blast damaged buildings. Its goal is to reduce the time required to compute and visualize high fideli ...

Brown freckled eggs are produced and consumed prevalently in Europe and other part of the world outside of North America. High-speed reliable automated visual detection of defects on these classes of egg products is a technically challenging task due to the color variations of the egg shells themselves, as well as the many forms of potential contaminants.Coherix will enhance its existing high-spee ...

Green June beetle (GJB), Cotinis nitida, is an important pest of grapes, peaches, apples and all brambles. The beetles feed on the ripe fruit and inoculate it with fungi which cause fruit decay. As much as 80% of the fruit can be destroyed. Mass GJB outbreaks occur when the fruit is ready for harvest, thus the growers cannot use insecticide sprays (Pre-harvest and re-entry intervals extend beyond ...

The citrus leafminer (CLM), Phyllocnistis citrella, Stainton (Lepidoptera: Gracillariidae), is an exotic pest of citrus originally found in Florida in 1993 followed by Texas in 1994. Feeding damage by CLM predisposes trees to citrus canker. Loss of citrus crop caused by canker is estimated at 10% of a total $1.3 billion on-tree value for all citrus in the U.S. Until recently, only pesticidal spray ...

The citrus leafminer (CLM) is an important pest of citrus originally found in Florida in 1993 and in Texas in 1994; currently, CLM has spread through most citrus growing regions of the US. Larval-stage feeding results in serious damage to leaves and predisposes trees to citrus canker. Female CLM release their pheromone to attract males for mating. Alpha Scents Phase I research has proved the techn ...

Math and science and the ability to solve problems in those disciplines lie at the heart of technical innovation and economic security in todays global marketplace. It has been shown that the acquisition of higher skill levels in problem solving can have significant effects on labor market success. For students with learning disabilities, access to the quality math and science education that will ...

The goal of this proposal is to develop a recombinant form of the enzyme purine nucleoside phosphorylase (PNP) as the basis for development of simple, reliable, field-usable test kits for available phosphate (also called reactive, ortho, or soluble P). Enzyme-based methods for analytical chemistry have a number of advantages over wet chemistry and instrumental methods, including reduction of sampl ...

700 million gallons of biodiesel were produced by 144 biodiesel plants in the U.S. in 2008, representing only a tiny fraction of the roughly 40 billion gallons of petroleum diesel used for on-road transportation. Batch process biodiesel production plants are commonly used for biodiesel production. However, the upper average overall volumetric throughput of a batch reactor is relatively low; conseq ...

To make biodiesel production profitable, the biodiesel producers are forced to turn to lower cost, waste-based yellow grease. However, the problem with yellow grease is that it contains high concentrations of free fatty acids that pose significant processing problems in the alkali-catalyzed processes. The current two-step commercial processes used to convert yellow grease to biodiesel incur added ...

We propose a new active optical method to measure time-domain waveform of THz pulse in the vicinity of the target in an omni-directional manner. This method utilizes the THz radiation-enhanced-emission-of-fluorescence from laser-induced air plasma to detect the THz field, which enables the standoff sensing for low volatility chemicals using THz spectroscopy. We have demonstrated its capability of ...