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The power output of the high power lasers used in physics research is limited by the materials available for making the gain media in the laser. Future increases in power will require new and better materials. Operation at high power creates great thermal stresses that can lead to effects such as birefringence, thermal lensing or even physical fracture damage to the host itself. Effective cooling ...

Special Operations Forces (SOF) are an integral aspect of the US military. SOF operators are among the most elite and highly qualified individuals in the U.S. military. As such, extraordinary physical and mental demands are placed upon them to excel in extreme environments for extended periods of time. This unrelenting cycle of combat deployments and intense pre-deployment training shortens the fu ...

Improved hydrogen separation membranes are needed for next generation power systems. Recent advances in metal membrane technology have identified a Pd alloy composite membrane that is not susceptible to embrittlement and poisoning problems, which have prevented widespread industrial use of Pd for high-temperature H2 separation. However, there is still a need to prepare thin membranes on porous ...

Acclimatization is the long-term adjustment that humans experience when exposed for weeks or months to high altitude. Acclimatization is important in this context because a warfighter who is acclimatized to high altitude is immune to high altitude illness, has superior work capacity, and has cognitive function approaching that found at sea level. In other words, the acclimatized warfighter is opti ...

Sn-doped In2O3 (ITO) is the industry standard and most widely used transparent conducting electrode (TCE) because of its good electrical and optical properties. However, ITO has a number of disadvantages: ITO is not a suitable TCE for next-generation, high-efficiency, flexible OLEDs, because of its inappropriate work function, difficulty in creating desired patterns, low stability, delaminantion d ...

Currently the chemical composition of atmospheric particulate matter is measured either by off-line analyses of time-integrated filter samples, or by in-situ instruments requiring near-constant operator oversight. These measurement approaches result in sparse or limited data coverage. Despite the critical role of composition on the health and environmental impacts of particulate matter, there exis ...

According to a report by the Hydrogen Council, a global lobby set up in January 2017 by Toyota and Air Liquide that includes 27 members such as automakers Audi, BMW, Daimler, Honda and Hyundai, and energy firms Shell and Total, increasing the use of hydrogen in power, transport, heat and industry could deliver around one fifth of the total carbon emissions cuts needed to limit global warming to sa ...

New products and services are needed to improve the performance and durability of wind turbine mechanical-drive systems that operate in extreme environments. In particular, the gearbox components (gears and bearings) require wide-temperature-range operation; resistance to corrosion; and solid-lubrication capability for start/stop, run-in, and lubrication starvation events. In this project, these ...

Carbon monoxide is produced as a result of incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and has been identified in the Chemical Industry Vision 2020 Catalysis Report as one of the highlighted ares of development with an emphasis on lowering energy requirements via higher selectivity, more moderate temperature or pressure, and higher productive per unit area. A specific area under development is CO oxida ...

The discovery of large shale gas reserves in recent years has resulted in the reduction of natural gas price and a need to develop new applications for the available resource. Upgrading shale gas to liquid fuels which are more easily transportable and have greater economic value can result in significant benefits to the US. Coupled with this challenging problem the DOE has a goal of further develo ...