Award Data

The current produced in electrochemical galvanic cells is primarily dependent on the rate of the electrode reactions where the cell's anode is less negative, supplying less energy than thermodynamically predicted, and the cell's cathode is less positive, supplying less energy than thermodynamically predicted. Reduction of electrochemical overpotentials in electrochemical systems has been the prim ...

LADAR light reflection from a target is highly dependent of the spectral reflectivity and texture properties of the surface. Such dependencies could be exploited for target recognition based on surface characterization with appropriate imaging conditions and processing algorithms. Target surface light reflection is characterized by the Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF), which ...

Obscurant materials are used by the Army to protect both the soldier as well as military physical assets. Several obscuration systems have been developed over the years to defeat threats in all areas of the electromagnetic spectrum. Current obscurant materials typically consist of off-the-shelf or processed metal particles or flakes in which key properties such as particle size and aspect ratio ...

In this program, Omega Optics and the University of Texas at Austin propose to develop an on-chip surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) spectrometer array for single molecule detection. The sensitivity of the SERS spectrometer comes from the 5-nm gap between gold nanowires, which can achieve 108 enhancement factor (EF) for the Raman scattering signals. Especially, these gold nanowires are preci ...

Research in silicon photonics has received much attention in recent years for its potential to utilize well developed silicon processing technology. A broad range of linear and nonlinear silicon photonic devices such as modulators, splitters, switches and detectors have been demonstrated. However, the most important challenge in silicon photonics thus far is the difficulty of making electrically p ...

This Small Business Technology Transfer Research program will develop narrow band plasmonic resonant cavity filters with integrated microbolometer sensors operating in the long wave infrared (LWIR) atmospheric transmission band for IR absorption measurements of low concentration chemicals. IR spectroscopy can identify a wide range of contaminants, including chemical/biological warfare agents, exp ...

In a low-texture indoor environment, landmark-based navigation is difficult due to lack of distinctive micro-features such as SIFT and SURF. Intelligent Automation, Inc. (IAI) and GRASP Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania propose a Bio-Inspired Visual Navigation System with the following three innovations: First, we propose a segmentation-based method to extract landmarks as closed contou ...

The Department of Defense and owners of large, commercial enterprise networks need excellent tools and well trained personnel to enforce cyber-security and counter cyber-attacks. This proposal focuses on supporting security personnel to have great Situational Awareness and training to help them use next generation cyber-security tools. In collaboration with University of Utah researchers with expe ...

Cemented cobalt-tungsten carbide is a material with attractive properties including high hardness and fracture toughness that has found success in a wide variety of applications ranging from drilling bits to armor piercing projectiles. However, with the classification of cobalt as a strategic and critical material that the US Department of Health and Human Services has classified as"reasonably ant ...

Development of a novel logistic fuel reformer that has excellent tolerance to sulfur and is resistant to coke formation is proposed. The reformer will produce a hydrogen-rich product that contains less than 1 ppm sulfur and is suitable for use with solid oxide fuel cells. Significant improvements in power density, startup time, durability, and cost relative to state of the art logistic fuel refo ...