Project Grant DESC0013733

This National Science Foundation (NSF) Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (CFDA 47.084) Project Grant award of $305,000 to Tau Optics Inc. supports the development of a compact, high-precision volume grating-based spectrometer prototype. The project aims to enhance the performance of rotated chirped Bragg gratings (R-CBGs) to enable a spectrometer design that is smaller, less complex, and more affordable than traditional spectrometers, while maintaining high precision. The anticipated...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) will support the development of the first electromechanical "spinphonic" radio frequency (RF) bandpass filter capable of effectively suppressing electromagnetic interference (EMI) in 5G and future 6G wireless communication systems. The $500,000 award to Northeastern University, to be completed by March 2028, will leverage expertise in micro- and nanofabrication, spintronics, and...

This $524,480 Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports research at New York University (NYU) on developing novel semiconductor crystal materials and manufacturing processes for advanced optoelectronic applications. The key focus is on understanding how to fabricate "twisted" organic semiconductor crystals that can spontaneously form into aligned networks, enabling them to outperform single crystal materials in properties like...

This National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I Project Grant award, funded under the NSF Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (CFDA 47.084) program, is to develop a subtractive-waveguide-based display technology for augmented reality (AR) smart glasses. The $275,000 grant, awarded on March 1, 2024, aims to create a display solution that can achieve pixel-wise transparency control and hard-edge occlusion using a single CMOS display panel. This would...

Blueshift Optics LLC was awarded a $255,788 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation on February 1, 2021 to complete work by October 31, 2021. The grant was awarded under the NSF's Engineering program (CFDA #47.041), which aims to improve quality of life and economic strength through engineering innovation and education. Specifically, this award will support Blueshift Optics' work to integrate organic glass scintillator materials into a 64-channel pixelated detector array. The...

This $274,919 National Science Foundation Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships project grant funds the development of color-shifting security films by Chromatir Technologies, LLC. Chromatir will pursue two technical aims: increasing total reflectivity without compromising color saturation to ensure eye-catching appearance under varied lighting; and demonstrating serial color patterning for customized printing of iridescent films with bar codes or numbers to enable integration with digital...

The National Science Foundation Division of Electrical, Communications and Cyber Systems awarded $510,000 under the Engineering (47.041) federal grant program to the University of Illinois from August 2022 to July 2025. The award will support research into developing dynamic plasma/metal/dielectric crystals as millimeter-wave to terahertz communications and sensing devices. Specifically, the University will focus on fundamental behavior of these tunable plasma photonic crystals and their...

The National Science Foundation's Division of Electrical, Communications and Cyber Systems awarded a $499,999 Project Grant to the University of California, Davis (UC Davis) to demonstrate an on-chip infrared spectroscopy system. The goal is to develop a miniaturized, ultra-sensitive, and low-noise infrared sensing platform that can compete with conventional Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) technologies while operating at room temperature. The key technical approach involves fabricating an...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) provides $450,000 in funding to Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University (Virginia Tech) from September 1, 2024 to August 31, 2027. The objective is to investigate the design of tunable tin (Sn) compositional germanium-tin (GeSn) based laser and mid-wavelength infrared (MWIR) photodetector architectures that combine GeSn quantum-well (QW) or absorber layer lattice-matched to...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences program (CFDA 47.049) provides $596,121 to the Trustees of Dartmouth College to investigate how light-sensitive molecular additives, called switchable molecules, can control the color reflected from liquid crystal surfaces. The research aims to gain insights into leveraging this capability to develop low-energy devices and applications such as smart price tags, anti-counterfeit...