Award Data

The objective of this program is to develop, demonstrate and implement a low reconfigurable, reliable Free Space Optical (FSO) link supporting high bandwidth communications for satellite to satellite or satellite to ground communication. The FSO Transceiver (Transmitter/Receiver) to be implemented will be small Size, Weight, Power and Cost (SWaP-C) such that it can be easily carried by compact spa ...

Modern Directed Energy (DE) missions require target engagements at low elevation angles and long ranges.These engagement geometries require propagation through distributed-volume turbulence. To correct for distributed-volume turbulence effects, an estimation of the turbulence along the propagation path is required. Correcting for these image aberrations will improve the quality of the target image ...

Target detection and recognition is a challenging problem because of changes in appearance, viewing direction, occlusion and other covariates. Systems that can accurately and efficiently detect and track objects can provide several benefits in surveillance, monitoring and other applications. As part of this effort, we propose to develop a robust learning-based approach to detect, track and recogni ...

To understand how insects and crustaceans sense and process light fields, researchers need a projection system that provides realistic wide field of view (FOV), high-speed imagery from UV to red (320-650nm) that includes polarization control. Insects and crustaceans have vastly different visual acuity and wavelength response from humans. In addition, some can sense polarization. Therefore, commerc ...

High speed air vehicles operate at material strength performance limits and are at significant risk when subjected to additional localized heating that can result in softening, pitting and burn-through the material and potentially change the vehicle structural profile. These effects degrade aerodynamic performance. The team of CFDRC and UDRI proposed to develop, validate and deliver a comprehensiv ...

Design analysis of parachute recovery systems has relied on a combination of core design principles, historical empirical data, and extensive testing for decades. Parachute motion involves complex phenomena involving porous bluff-body aerodynamics and highly deformable cloth. The proposed project is a plugin for the DoD CREATE-AV Kestrel simulation suite that will enable high-fidelity simulations ...

Metasurfaces are a fascinating new direction for producing small form factor optical elements that can be directly integrated with a variety of sensors and illumination sources. Metasurfaces have received extensive attention for their potential applications in imaging optics as they enable significantly more compact camera modules with enhanced functionality and because the unit processes to creat ...

The main objective of this STTR Phase I effort is two-fold. First, to develop a robust approach for coupling the flow solver Kestrel with the multidisciplinary software tool AERO Suite in order to enable the physics-based modeling and simulation of the dynamics of Aerodynamics Decelerator Systems (ADS) such as parachutes from deployment to terminal velocity or terminal descent and touchdown, and t ...

Nutronics, Inc. and Montana State University propose to develop a method for characterization of the full Mueller matrix for reflective scattering from a test object. The Complex Object Reflectance Characterization System (CORCS) will initially be designed for laboratory use and characterization of test objects by active imaging to measure both the Mueller Matrix and the target depth associated wi ...

Current scene projection hardware is challenged to simultaneously meet the requirements for high peak temperature (> 2000K), high resolution (2Kx2K), response time < 4 ms, cryogenic and temporally uniform photon flux. MEMS, Resistor arrays, liquid crystals, and photonic crystals all suffer in one or more areas. MEMS suffer from flicker and low dynamic range. Resistor arrays suffer from low frame r ...