Award Data

Aculight proposes to develop a laser source that will enable NIST to perform highly sensitive water vapor detection via cavity ring-down spectroscopy. The source will operate over a wavelength region centered at 1380nm. It will be based upon frequency conversion of a single frequency fiber source using an optical parametric oscillator (OPO).The performance of the source in terms of several critica ...

Improving the quality and intensity of the x-ray beam is an important design goal for every synchrotron installation. Although small, the effects of vacuum windows on x-ray absorption and phase contrast cannot be neglected. Synchrotron x-rays have wavelengths on the order of one Angstrom (1 x 10-10m), the same order of magnitude as inter-atomic distances. These x-rays are used to study many differ ...

Thin film multilayers of nanometer scale thickness are fundamental to the future of electronics and communications technologies. Chemical depth profiling by ion etching techniques are critical to the characterization of these structures. A fundamental problem with current ion etching technologies is that typical ion energies (~1k eV to 20 keV) create extensive damage and intermixing of nanometer t ...

AST is developing a non-invasive methodology to continuously monitor blood glucose concentration. As opposed to employing near infrared spectroscopy, which suffers from limitations of sensitivity, stability, and repeatability, AST employs directmeasurement of glucose, via amperometric sensors, from minute amounts of interstitial fluid obtained transdermally. AST's miniature transdermal sampling ...

The objective of the Phase II research is to utilize the lessons learned from the Phase I risk reduction work to develop a prototype CAD-programmable environment for the development of condition-based maintenance systems for rotorcraft. This developmentenvironment features a CAD scenario modeler for constructing, via click n' drag modeling, fault-to-failure damage models which can account for the ...

The objective of the Phase II research is to utilize the lessons learned from the Phase I risk reduction work to develop a prototype CAD-programmable environment for the development of condition-based maintenance systems for rotorcraft. This developmentenvironment features a CAD scenario modeler for constructing, via click n' drag modeling, fault-to-failure damage models which can account for the ...

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 ...

The proposed research comprises design, analysis, and ultimate fabrication and operation of a microfabricated array of quadrupole mass spectrometers (QMS). The design capitalizes on recent advances in micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) and molecular-beam-epitaxy (MBE) technology so that the device can be mass-produced on a chip. In addition to analyzing a single element QMS in Phase 1, invest ...

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 ...