Award Data

Current-generation heavy-duty diesel engines typically exhibit an engine efficiency of about 45%, the remaining energy used for running auxiliary systems or lost as heat or friction. Heavy-duty vehicles lose on average about 20% of the fuel energy inside the combustion chamber as heat to the coolant and 30% as heat to the exhaust. Increasing the efficiency of diesel engines while simultaneously im ...

Development of liquid transportation fuels from biomass is an essential part of diversifying the U.S. energy portfolio. Algae represents a promising next generation bioenergy source for producing energy from renewable sources because of the fast growth and high oil content of certain algae strains. However, because of very dilute concentrations of algae in the feed and consequently very large vo ...

Development of liquid transportation fuels from biomass is an essential part of diversifying the U.S. energy portfolio. Algae represents a promising next generation bioenergy source for producing energy from renewable sources because of the fast growth and high oil content of certain algae strains. However, because of very dilute concentrations of algae in the feed and consequently very large volu ...

In this Phase I SBIR proposal, SandBox Semiconductor™ proposes to develop an Advanced Manufacturing and Material Measurements software tool called Weave ™ for accelerating and automating SEM image analysis for the semiconductor industry. During the development of a new manufacturing process line for a semiconductor device, tens of thousands of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images are take ...

Statement of the Problem or Situation that is Being Addressed Current and future data centers and high-performance computing (HPC) centers need optical communication links to transmit the aggregate data rates that are generated by servers. For these, applications current optical gears that are designed for telecommunication applications are expensive, take large space and do not match to small for ...

Current and future data centers and high-performance computing (HPC) centers need optical communication links to transmit the aggregate data rates that are generated by servers. For these, applications current optical gears that are designed for telecommunication applications are expensive, take large space and do not match to small form factor, low power and inexpensive transceiver requirements. ...

A STEAMFLOODING/STEAM GENERATION SYSTEM IS PROPOSED FOR DEEP, HEAVY OIL RESERVOIRS. THIS CONCEPT MINIMIZES THE DOWNHOLE HEAT LOSSES, IMPROVES RELIABILITY AND REDUCES THE COST OF STEAM GENERATION. ITS FEATURES WILL MAKE STEAMING OF VERY DEEP WELLS (BELOW 7500 FEET) TECHNICALLY AND ECONOMICALLY FEASIBLE, AND WILL IMPROVE THE ECONOMICS OF SHALLOWER WELL STEAMFLOODING. THIS NOVEL CONCEPT SUPPLIES HEAT ...

Crystalline aluminum nitride AlN) materials have the potential to support a new generation of ultra-high performance power electronics. While great progress has been realized in producing high structural quality AlN substrates, there is currently no viable method for controllably producing electrically conductive AlN device layers on top of such substrates. R&D groups are attempting to develop met ...

Statement of the Problem Isotopologues are a critical tool in monitoring plant hydrobiogeochemical and microbial systems and processes. The most abundant elements utilized and exchanged by plants, microbes and ecosystems are carbon (C), hydrogen (H), oxygen (O) and nitrogen (N), all of which have naturally occurring stable isotope forms that can be used as natural tracers for understanding and int ...

There is currently no cost-effective way to accurately measure the forces and accelerations acting on a drill bit in a hard-rock geothermal well and to then transmit that information uphole to the driller in a timeframe that allows its use in optimizing drilling performance. Consequently, drilling tends to be slow and drill bits suffer short lives, so geothermal wells tend to cost much more than o ...