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Briefs
Photonics/Optics

Uncooled Tunable LWIR Microbolometers

Uncooled infrared detectors have significant potential capabilities that have been little explored. Micro-machined uncooled detectors with tunable spectral characteristics across the long-wave infrared...

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Briefs
Physical Sciences

Fluid Helmet Liner for Protection Against Blast-Induced Traumatic Brain Injury

An Advanced Combat Helmet liner design uses the novel idea of including filler materials inside channels in the liner. An energy-absorbing foam was selected for the main liner structure, and several filler material candidates of widely varying properties are being...

Briefs
Physical Sciences

Performance of Steel Stud Walls Subjected to Blast Loads

Construction trends have brought about an increase in the use of cold-formed steel studs in Air Force facilities. These steel stud walls have significant potential for mitigating large...

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Briefs
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Designing a Sensorless Torque Estimator for Direct Torque Control of an Induction Motor

Induction motors often are the preferred choice among industrial motors due to the modern power electronics that improve their speed control. Vitally...

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Briefs
Photonics/Optics

Development of GaN-Based Nanostructure Photon Emitters

Gallium nitride (GaN)-based wide bandgap semiconductors are very important material systems for fabrication of photon emitters in a wide range of wavelengths. In particular, the light emitters in ultraviolet (UV), blue, and green wavelengths have been developed and demonstrated in recent years....

Briefs
Physical Sciences

Through-the-Wall Small Weapon Detection Based on Polarimetric Radar Techniques

Detecting concealed small weapons carried by people has received significant interest from law enforcement agencies as well as the military, most frequently for...

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Briefs
Electronics & Computers

A Bistable Microelectronic Circuit for Sensing an Extremely Low Electric Field

Bistable systems are prevalently found in many sensor systems. It is well established that a well-designed coupling scheme, together with an appropriate choice of initial conditions, can induce oscillations (i.e. periodic switching between stable fixed points) in...

Briefs
Physical Sciences

Fiber-Optic Seismic Sensor for Unattended Ground Sensing

Seismic military sensors are required to be robust, reliable, compact, and easy to install and operate to be effective in the battlefield environment. Three types of sensor technologies...

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Briefs
Electronics & Computers

Reflected Signal Analysis

Forensic characterization of a wireless device is useful in many applications. An example of this is in the testing of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Part 15 devices that must adhere to strict guidelines with...

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Briefs
Photonics/Optics

Threshold Voltage Tuning of Metal-Gate MOSFETs Using an Excimer Laser

This work presents a localized method for tuning the threshold voltages (Vt) of multilayer metal-gate metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) devices with a spatial area theoretically limited by the wavelength of the laser beam. This technique allows an...

Briefs
Manufacturing & Prototyping

Solution Deposition Methods for Carbon Nanotube Field-Effect Transistors

Extensive research has been done on carbon nanotube field-effect transistors (CNTFETs), which may revolutionize electronics. Single-walled carbon nano-tubes (SWNTs) act as...

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Briefs
Manufacturing & Prototyping

Micro-Propulsion Devices Made of Low-Temperature Co-Fired Ceramics

In the satellite industry, the trend is towards decreasing the size of satellites and clustering of small satellites. Technological advancements in microelectronics have made it more economical to launch a cluster of satellites with a single vehicle rather than the traditional one...

Briefs
Test & Measurement

Analysis of Clustering Tools for Moving Target Indication

Current and future forces operating in urban environments need the capability to detect slow-moving personnel inside buildings. To accomplish this, a time-domain approach was developed that uses a low-frequency, ultra-wideband (UWB) radar with a transmit pulse capable of penetrating through...

Briefs
Photonics/Optics

Novel Wavelength Standards in the Near Infrared

The goal of this work was to develop a new class of portable optical frequency references based on sub-Doppler spectroscopy inside gas-filled, hollow-core photonic bandgap (PBG) optical fiber. The change in line width with core size, and narrower transitions inside a new “kagome” structured...

Briefs
Photonics/Optics

Power Enhancement of a Rubidium Vapor Laser with a Master Oscillator Power Amplifier

The concept of alkali lasers was first suggested by Schalow and Townes in the late 1950s. In the 1970s, photo-dissociation of several of the alkali salts produced lasers with wavelengths ranging from the visible to the far infrared. Thirty years later, diode-pumped...

Briefs
Materials

Real-Time Intelligent Chemical and Biological Nanosensors on a Flexible Platform

The objectives of this research are to examine the feasibility of real-time sensing of chemical and biological species by using the unique materials and electronic...

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Briefs
Physical Sciences

Liquid-Crystal-Based Optical Phased Array for Steering Lasers

A paper describes the basic design and concepts of tunable liquid-crystal polarization gratings with a nematic liquid crystal (LC) optical phase plate, with a large, continuous in- plane gradient that is variable, and its application to a beam steering device with high efficiency.

Briefs
Information Technology

Considering Software Protection for Embedded Systems

Given the current trend of reprogrammable embedded devices within the Department of Defense and industry, attention needs to be refocused on the benefits or measurability of software protection applied to this domain. Modern reconfigurable embedded systems consider circuits as software and the...

Briefs
Electronics & Computers

Field-Programmable Gate Array-Based Software-Defined Radio

There are existing wideband communications systems that were built using field-programmable gate array (FPGA)-based software-defined radio (SDR) designs. Despite the inherent advantages of these systems, some are functionally restricted by limited output bandwidth.

Briefs
Information Technology

FPGA-Based System for Tracking Digital Information Transmitted Via Peer-to-Peer Protocols

Peer-to-peer (P2P) networking has changed the way users search for, send, and receive digital information over the Internet. Instead of relying on...

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Briefs
Electronics & Computers

Simulation Concept Exploits Tools for Computing Hybrids

The Simulation Concept – How to Exploit Tools for Computing Hybrids (SCHETCH) project is exploring the design modeling and simulation (M&S) process for developing advanced computing...

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Briefs
Electronics & Computers

Asymmetric Core Computing for High-Performance Applications

High-performance computing (HPC) users have traditionally relied upon two things to supply them with processing power: speed of the central processing units (CPUs) and the scalability of the system. There are problems with this approach. Physical limitations are curtailing clock speed...

Briefs
Materials

Templated Synthesis of Aluminum Nanoparticles for Stable Energetic Materials

Reactive nanoparticles as energetic materials have received much recent attention for a variety of existing and/or potential applications. Among more extensively...

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Briefs
Physical Sciences

Performance and Operability of a Dual-Cavity Flame Holder in a Supersonic Combustor

Supersonic combustion has been of interest for many years in order to support future Air Force hypersonic missions. The current generation of hydrocarbon-fueled...

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Briefs
Physical Sciences

Gesture-Directed Sensor-Information Fusion Gloves

Current chemical-protection gear for warfighters on the ground inhibits electronic communication via keyboards, cell phones, and remote-control devices. To improve communications capabilities...

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Briefs
Physical Sciences

GigE Advanced Imaging Sensor

The Wide-Field Dynamic Range (WFDR) camera is a high-sensitivity, wide-field-of-regard sensor of importance to future military surveillance and survivability systems. It is intended to be used in harsh, noisy...

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Briefs
Information Technology

Channel Modeling for a Wireless Transmission System

A wireless transmission system provides high-quality video transmission over severely impaired wireless links between nodes that are connected within airborne networks. The target bit rate for...

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Briefs
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Eccentric Mounting and Adjustment System for Belt-Driven Devices

This design relates to an eccentric mounting and adjustment (EMA) system for belt driving, or for belt-driven devices, that is installed and operated within the restricted confines of an engine compartment, typically a motor vehicle. It satisfies two essential requirements for...

Briefs
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Lightcraft Propulsion for Launching a Small Satellite

A study of lightcraft propulsion systems in general has led to the conception and analysis of such a system for launching a small (having a mass no more than a few kilograms) satellite into...

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