Award Data

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project proposes to develop nanoelectronic power generators for wireless sensors and active RFID tags. These devices need long lasting power supplies that can harvest energy from the environment to enable a truly autonomous operation. The objective of this research is to demonstrate a power harvesting technology that is significantly improved ...

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project proposes an energy harvesting technology for widely disbursed wireless sensor networks. These sensors need long-lived power supplies that can harvest energy from the environment to enable a truly autonomous operation. It is an objective of the proposed Phase I research effort to demonstrate the components of a very compact and low cost power ...

This proposal will design, develop, and demonstrate a self-contained probe that will provide sensor videos on-demand to aircraft operators. A Miniature Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (MUAV) is proposed to meet this requirement. The MUAV will be capable of being launched from existing airborne aircraft platforms, including helicopters, and will be capable of being controlled by the aircraft operator in fl ...

Lettuce is a major vegetable crop grown in the United States with a farm gate value in 2003 of $2 billion. For crops such as lettuce, the vegetative leaves of the plant are the harvested material. Because lettuce must be harvested before it flowers, premature flowering, or bolting, reduces crop quality and yield, and therefore is a leading cause of profit loss to farmers. Lettuce cultivars with en ...

Noxious, invasive weeds cause billions of dollars per year in damage to the environment. Progress in invasive weed control has been retarded by lack of commercially feasible diet to support mass production of specialist insects that control major noxious weeds. Such damage could be reduced by natural enemies of noxious weeds, but a means to mass produce the insects is not available for economical, ...

This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I project addresses the feasibility of harnessing the internal biomechanical forces using piezoelectric transducer technology to power implanted devices such as cardiac pacemakers. The project will advance the develop of in vivo energy harvesting devices as power sources in general, for medical appliances in human and veterinary health sciences. ...

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project provides a unique and robust in-situ sensor for detection and control of impurities in microstructures and porous layers associated with manufacturing of semiconductor, MEMS, and emerging nanodevices. Use of impedance as a measure of contamination in bulk fluids is well established. However, applying it in micro-scale features is nove ...

Varroa jacobsoni (Oudemans) (= V. destructor) is a parasitic mite of honey bees Apis mellifera (L.), that has had a catastrophic effect on populations of managed and feral honey bee colonies, beekeepers and the beekeeping industry worldwide. Honey bee colony losses in the United States range between 40% and 80% annually. These losses are stressing the bee industry's ability to provide adequate pol ...

The technical problem to be addressed is how to apply instructional technology to develop both computer skills and vocational skills for the significant proportion of the reservation workforce that is chronically unemployed. A successful Phase I will demonstrate the feasibility of a training application aimed at that 41% who have given up looking for work, as well as those currently unemployed, ra ...

This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I reseacrch project will ascertain the technical feasibility of fabricating practical traveling-wave tube (TWT) amplifiers and oscillators at THz frequencies. Preliminary research in this area suggests that by combining recent advances in carbon nanotube technology with those in the field of micromachining, practical THz TWT devices can be reali ...