SENSORS FOR SPACEBORNE AEROSOL, CLOUD, AND OCEAN (ACO) LIDAR MUST POSSESS VERY WIDE DYNAMIC RANGE TO COVER THE WEAKEST STRATOSPHERIC RETURNS FROM THE RAYLEIGH REGION...
TO ADDRESS NASA S NEED FOR NEXT-GENERATION SPACEBORNE LIDAR SYSTEMS FOR AEROSOL, CLOUD, AND OCEAN PROFILING, VOXTEL IS DEVELOPING A LOW-NOISE HIGH-EFFICIENCY HIGH-DYNAMIC-RANGE PHOTON-COUNTING (HIP) SENSOR. THE HIP SENSOR IS BASED ON SILICON SINGLE-PHOTON AVALANCHE DIODE (SPAD) TECHNOLOGY AND IS CAPABLE OF BOTH ATMOSPHERIC AND OCEAN PROFILING, ESSENTIALLY ENABLING THE FIRST-EVER OCEANPROFILING LIDAR FROM SPACE AND ADVANCED RETRIEVALS OF DENSE CLOUD PROPERTIES. THE HIP SENSOR HAS A LINEAR PHOTON-COUNTING DYNAMIC RANGE OF 10 GHZ, A LOW DARK-COUNT RATE OF 25 KHZ, AND A HIGH PHOTON-DETECTION EFFICIENCY OF 35% AT 532 NM.
FOR THE PURPOSES OF SUPPORTING PLANNED AND FUTURE NASA MISSIONS AND ADDRESSING AN UNMET NASA NEED FOR HIGH-QUALITY VISIBLE THROUGH SHORTWAVE-INFRARED TELESCOPE PHASE-CORRECTION OPTICS MANUFACTURED AND DELIVERED QUICKLY AND INEXPENSIVELY, VOXTEL PROPOSES A PHASE II EFFORT TO DEVELOP A NEW CLASS OF THREE-DIMENSIONAL FREEFORM OPTICS AND TO DEMONSTRATE THE OPTICAL PRECISION AND SIZE REDUCTION POSSIBLE FOR NASA SATELLITE OPTICAL SYSTEMS. THE PHASE I OPTIC AND INK DESIGN WILL BE EXECUTED TO IMPROVE THE FOCUS OF THE NASA DUAL FREEFORM MIRRORED OPTICAL SYSTEM, REDUCE ABERRATIONS FUNDAMENTAL TO THE DESIGN, AND CORRECT MEASURED MANUFACTURING PROCESS VARIATIONS. BOTH APERTURE-SIDE AND FIELD-SIDE FREEFORM GRIN OPTICS WILL BE COMBINED IN NONROTATIONALLY SYMMETRIC FORMS AND ADDITIONAL FREEFORM MIRROR DESIGN VARIABLES WILL BE EXPLORED INCLUDING VARIATIONS IN THE SPACING AND ANGULAR TILT OF FREEFORM MIRRORS AND SOLUTIONS WILL BE DEVELOPED THAT INCLUDES POLYCHROMATIC PERFORMANCE. MATERIAL PROPERTIES WILL BE CHARACTERIZED IN RADIATION CONDITIONS EXPECTED AT NEAR-EARTH ORBIT AND LOW-EARTH ORBIT, AND NEW OR EXISTING NANOCOMPOSITES WILL BE DEVELOPED AS NEEDED TO DEMONSTRATE HIGHLY RELIABLE OPERATION IN SPACE RADIATION AND HARSH ENVIRONMENT APPLICATIONS. VOXTEL S PHASE II EFFORT WILL INCREASE THE TECHNOLOGY-READINESS LEVEL FROM 4 TO 6 BY DELIVERING TO NASA A FLIGHT-CAPABLE OPTIC PRODUCED ON PRODUCTION-READY PROCESSES.
IGF::OT:IGF DEFENSE ADVANCED RESEARCH PROJECTS AGENCY, SMALL BUSINESS INNOVATION RESEARCH PHASE II EFFORT ENTITLED "LARGE-FORMAT LOW-FALSE-ALARM NIR SPAD IMAGER"
SMALL BUSINESS INNOVATION RESEARCH PHASE II EFFORT FOR 28 MONTHS, ENTITLED ASYNCHRONOUS DAY-NIGHT NIR-SWIR SEE-SPOT SENSOR DEVELOPMENT, PHASE ONE FFP FOR FOUR MONTHS FOR PHASE II INTERIM TASKS AND SBIR PHASE TWO, A COST PLUS FIXED FEE FOR TWENTY-FOUR MONTHS TO BE AWARDED TO VOXTEL, INC. USING THE RESULTS FROM SBIR PHASE I THE CONTRACTOR SHALL CONTINUE TO DEVELOP AN IMAGING SENSOR THAT IS SENSITIVE TO SHORTWAVE INFRARED LIGHT AND IS CAPABLE OF DETECTING A PULSED LASER AND READ AN ENCODED NUMBER FROM THE DETECTED LASER PULSE. THE TOTAL TASK ORDER CEILING FOR THIS EFFORT IS $1,049,995.91.