The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture, through the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) / Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program (CFDA 10.212), awarded a $650,000 Project Grant to S4 Mobile Laboratories LLC. The purpose of the award is to extend the generalizability and improve the accuracy and precision of the company's "SubTerra Green" system, a mobile soil laboratory that uses visible/near-infrared spectroscopic probes to...
This National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project grant, awarded under the NSF Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships program (CFDA 47.084), is focused on developing novel soil organic matter (SOM) amendment techniques to improve nutrient supply, sustain agriculture, and provide long-term, deep soil carbon sequestration to combat climate change. The $274,390 award to Earthen Carbon LLC aims to: 1) demonstrate viable integration of the SOM...
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) awarded a $174,978 Project Grant under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) / Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program to Stratio Inc. The grant, running from July 2024 to February 2026, supports the development of a low-cost, high-sensitivity germanium-based short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral sensor for monitoring soil organic carbon (SOC) in precision agriculture applications. Stratio will...
This National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I award to Vitidore, Inc. for $248,912 will fund the development of a machine learning-based software modeling system to quantify soil carbon sequestration and other agronomic metrics associated with a hybrid perennial grass cover crop used in specialty crop farming systems. The prototype software system aims to enable third-party verification of high-quality carbon offsets, provide feedback on important...
This $255,858 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation will support the development of machine learning models and a software and data platform for cost-effective soil carbon measurement and assessment. Funded under the NSF's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041), the award recipient Yard Stick PBC will develop novel digital pedology techniques to enable accurate in-situ soil carbon predictions. Specifically, the company will create new machine learning algorithms for soil carbon analysis,...
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture awarded a $124,481 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program project grant to Working Trees, Inc., a for-profit climate-tech startup. The grant, awarded on July 15, 2023, with a completion date of March 14, 2024, aims to commercialize Working Trees' existing prototypes for a mobile app that uses a smartphone's camera and LiDAR to measure carbon sequestration in silvopasture systems. Silvopasture, the...
This $750,000 Project Grant awarded by the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program supports research to enable the practical application of spectroscopy for in situ soil health assessment. The key objectives are to: (i) investigate different spectroscopic techniques for soil health assessment, (ii) study the effects of sample condition on soil spectra and mitigation strategies, and (iii) design, develop, and...
This federal Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program (CFDA 10.212) provides $174,933 to Aerodyne Research Inc., a small business manufacturer and R&D company based in Billerica, Massachusetts. The objective of this 20-month project is to develop and commercialize a field-deployable system for high-resolution monitoring of nitrogen transport and transformations in living...
Transcend Engineering and Technology, LLC was awarded a $181,395 Project Grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture within the Department of Agriculture under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program. The grant aims to develop a spatially dense, multi-level soil moisture sensor using commodity radio frequency electronic components to infer soil water content from dielectric properties. Phase I will determine feasibility and quantify tradeoffs between accuracy and...
This Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Institute of Food Production and Sustainability (CFDA 10.212 - Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program / Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program) will develop a plant-by-plant, precision fertilization capability for cool season vegetable crops. The $600,000 award to Geovisual Technologies Inc. aims to increase harvest yields while reducing overall fertilizer application through innovative precision targeting...