Award Data

In miniature gas turbines for UAV applications, traditional bearings exhibit a typical lifetime of only 25 hours due to excessive axial loading. Mainstream proposes to use a passive, permanent magnet thrust bearing to alleviate this problem and increase service life to over 1000 hours. Since this type of bearing is non-contacting, it can operate at very high rotational speeds with minimal heat gen ...

Military shelters currently use electrically driven Environmental Control Units (ECUs) to provide cooling for the air inside the shelter. The ECU is vapor compression cycle powered by a diesel generator, operating on JP-8 fuel. Other than fueling jet engines, the largest drain on U.S. military fuel supplies in current operations comes from running generators at forward operating bases. In hot cli ...

Hydrogen produced today from coal, natural gas, or biomass must be separated and purified outside the reactors using pressure swing absorption (PSA), a process that requires significant additional space and energy. Placing hydrogen-permeable membranes inside the reactors themselves would allow hydrogen to diffuse out, thereby reducing the cost of hydrogen production. In this Phase I effort, Mainst ...

The objectives of this Phase-II research effort is focused on transitioning noninvasive diagnostic techniques based on ultrafast lasers for characterizing nanoenergetic materials and their performance in rocket engine environments. Through the use of ultrafast laser imaging and spectroscopy, it is possible to isolate and characterize each physical process from initiation through energy release an ...

The objectives of this Phase-II research effort is focused on transitioning noninvasive diagnostic techniques based on ultrafast lasers for characterizing nanoenergetic materials and their performance in rocket engine environments. Through the use of ultrafast laser imaging and spectroscopy, it is possible to isolate and characterize each physical process from initiation through energy release an ...

We will develop novel acousto-optic devices for use in the UV using the new material Barium Borate (BBO) which not only has the required UV transparency, but a unique combination of acoustic and optical properties. The capabilities provided by these new UV AO devices are ideally suited for optical addressing arrays of trapped ions with focused spots from appropriately tuned UV and visible lasers t ...

This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase 1 project will lead to the development of a simple, cost effective technology which can recover helium from gas reservoirs containing helium concentrations too low to permit economic recovery at present. This will enable helium recovery from fields currently producing natural gas but considered uneconomical for the recovery of the contained heli ...

Currently, computation of the geopotential acceleration and its partial derivatives consumes a large portion of numerical integration time in special perturbations (SP) applications. The standard geopotential formulation is expressed as a spherical harmonic expansion in geocentric latitude, geocentric longitude, and radial distance. Recent research by Dr. Beylkin of the University of Colorado ha ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Enabling high dose regional chemotherapy with minimal systemic toxicity Abstract: The primary objective of this proposed study is to develop a filtration system that maximizes the removal (gt90%) of chemotherapeutic agents, such as doxorubicin, from blood while minimizing adverse effects of filtration on blood chemistry and hematological parameters. Vascular V ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overall goal of this study is to develop a head tracking procedure for the automated assessment of hearing in infants using Visual Reinforcement Audiometry (VRA). The head tracking procedure will be incorporated into the Intelligent Visual Reinforcement Audiometry (IVRA) system from Intelligent Hearing Systems Corp. The IVRA system currently provides automa ...