Award Data

Through previous grant awards from IES, researchers developed Graspable Math, a tablet-based intervention where middle and high school students create and manipulate complex expressions for basic operations as well as equations and equations systems and inequalities. In this project, the team will develop a prototype of Graspable Math Activities, an app with novel kinds of algebra practice and ass ...

A receiver system for use in LIDAR consisting of an optical filter and optical spectrometer based upon two-photon absorption is proposed. The filter and spectrometer both use dispersion from excited state transitions of atomic rubidium to create a birefringent medium. The birefringent medium of the optical filter rotates the polarization of light so that it is transmitted through crossed polariz ...

The nondestructivecharacterization of advanced composites, such ascarbon-fiber reinforced polymers (cfrp), by electromagnetic means iswell established [6]-[24]. What isneeded to advance the state of the art are sophisticated inversionalgorithms that allow layup and impact damage to be determined inlocalized regions, which means that the more traditional methods ofmodel-based inverse methods must ...

According to the decadal report titled, Life and Physical Sciences Research for a New Era of Space Exploration, a Report, "...the AHB Panel would be remiss if it did not strongly recommend an animal centrifuge capable of accommodating rats/mice at variable gravity levels." Furthermore, the panel stated, “...research on animal models will be constrained without the ability to manipulate the gravi ...

PCKA is partnering with researchers at Purdue University to develop an Autonomous Power Controller (APC) for mission-critical microgrids to supply electric power in a highly autonomous and secure manner to accomplish mission objectives. The APC consists of a centralized controller connected to an array of local component controllers. The centralized controller will be capable of optimal generation ...

An opportunity to boost energy efficiency in homes and buildings exists through the design of functional radiative properties in glass and other building materials. Current surface materials ignore or take first-order approaches to complicated spectral behavior, leading to sub-optimal properties. The sensitivity of material properties to microscale surface structuring creates a design challenge ...

With retirement of the space shuttle program, microgravity researchers can no longer count on bringing experiment samples back to earth for post-flight analysis. Locker-sized processing facilities, which were typically transported up to and down from the International Space Station during the shuttle era, quite simply consume too much volume, mass, and power to be accommodated as part of both the ...

The Multi-specimen Variable-G Facility (MVF) is a single locker sized centrifuge facility for life and microgravity sciences research on the International Space Station. The MVF is a rear breather EXPRESS Rack payload that leverages many of the existing subsystems of flight proven (STS-108) Avian Development Facility (ADF) thereby reducing costs and time to flight for new scientific capability. ...

The overall objective of this research project is to investigate an autonomous and online control structure for finite-inertia power systems (dc and ac) with a real-time system simulation embedded within the control. The dual use aspect of this research will be demonstrated by focusing simultaneously on model development for both spacecraft power systems and terrestrial micro-grids. Both of these ...

Flow rate measurements for cryogenic propellants are required for spacecraft and space exploration systems. Such a requirement has been hampered by lack of fast and accurate instruments among existing technologies. This proposed project will develop a mass flow measurement system for non-conducting cryogenic propellant flow to meet the NASA's need. In the proposed system, an electromagneti ...