Project Grant 1143093

This National Science Foundation project grant of $150,000 supports research at the University of Connecticut to develop a new solid-state millikelvin quantum elastocaloric adiabatic refrigeration technology. Funded under the Engineering program (CFDA 47.041), the two-year award running from January 2023 to December 2024 will realize a cooling cycle achieved via periodic application of elastic strain/stress, without or with small magnetic field, on frustrated magnet materials. Researchers will...

The Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture awarded Energy Concepts Company, LLC $175,000 under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program/Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program to develop an innovative refrigeration cycle for small-scale refrigeration. Energy Concepts will modify an existing propane-fired diffusion absorption chiller to enable operation using heat from renewable energy sources like solar thermal, geothermal, waste heat,...

This two-year, $297,189 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation's Division of Materials Research aims to develop new approaches for ultra-low temperature refrigeration without reliance on rare helium isotopes. Specifically, researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute will investigate using electrically-tunable spin-orbit interactions in Rashba materials to achieve refrigeration through adiabatic electrification, with a goal of reaching temperatures as low as 0.01 K. If successful,...

Federal Grant Award Summary R7 Instruments Inc. received a $303,669 Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships program (CFDA 47.084), effective October 1, 2025 through September 30, 2026. The award supports development and demonstration of a novel acoustic-based air-cycle refrigeration system capable of achieving ultra-low temperatures (-80°C) without relying on synthetic or flammable...

This $300,000 National Science Foundation project grant supports the development of a new sub-kelvin refrigerator using superfluid helium vortex cooling. Funded under the Engineering (47.041) program, Yale University will analyze, design, build a prototype, and benchmark a two-stage cooling system combining a superfluid vortex cooler and Joule-Thomson precooler. The system aims to achieve high-capacity cooling below 1K without using helium-3, addressing stockpile depletion issues. By...

The National Science Foundation awarded $275,000 under the Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships federal grant program (CFDA 47.084) to Kazadi Enterprises LTD to develop a Hydrologic Open Cooling System. The project aims to create a renewable, closed container cooling system incorporating rechargeable vacuum insulation and a novel two-stage heat pump. The system is designed to maintain cooling chamber temperatures between 1.5-5 degrees Celsius using 10% or less of the electrical power of...

Radiant Innovation LLC was awarded a $175,000 Small Business Innovation Research Phase I Project Grant by the United States Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture to develop rapidly deployable, grid-independent refrigerated containers powered by solar energy and battery storage. The goal of the project is to enable new markets for farmers and food distributors through reliable cold supply chains for storing, distributing, and marketing fresh foods using off-grid...

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a $275,000 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project grant to Fourth Power, Inc., a minority-owned small business, to develop an energy storage technology that stores electricity as heat and converts it back to electricity using thermophotovoltaics (TPV). The goal is to create a low-cost battery system that can decouple power and energy, enabling discharge durations between 1-100 hours, which is not currently achievable with other...

The National Science Foundation awarded a $225,000 two-year Project Grant to Stanford University under the Mathematical and Physical Sciences program (CFDA 47.049). The grant will support research into developing materials and techniques to enable sub-kelvin cooling via adiabatic decompression of para-nematic materials. Specifically, Stanford University researchers will identify and characterize rare earth compound materials with thermoelastic properties suitable for cryogenic cooling without...

The National Science Foundation awarded a $298,856 Project Grant to the Regents of the University of Michigan under the Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) for the period of October 1, 2022 through September 30, 2024. The grant funds the development of superconducting tunnel junction-based solid-state refrigeration to enable cooling from 1 K to sub-100 mK temperatures. Successful demonstration of high cooling rates and temperatures as low as 100 mK would dramatically impact quantum technologies...