New NSF Research Center to Transform Sensor Technology

Texas A&M University is one of six core partners in a new multi-million-dollar National Science Foundation (NSF) center expected to revolutionize sensor technology and yield devices capable of transforming aspects of various industries ranging from health care to environmental quality.

The center, dubbed MIRTHE for “Mid-Infrared Technologies for Health and the Environment,” is part of the NSF’s recently unveiled 2006 class of Engineering Research Centers (ERCs), which are among the foundation’s largest and most prestigious grants. Launched May 1 with $15 million in NSF funding over five years, MIRTHE is expected to attract additional financial support from corporate partners and other sources to conduct more than $40 million in research and educational activities during the next 10 years.

MIRTHE will be housed at Princeton University and led by Claire Gmachl, associate professor of electrical engineering at Princeton. The center will combine the work of about 40 faculty members, 30 graduate students and 30 undergraduates from the six core partner institutions, which also include the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, Rice University, Johns Hopkins University and the City College of New York.

“As multiple-institution partnerships, the centers foster collaboration among researchers from many disciplines and provide rich educational and research environments for preparing new generations of engineering leaders,” says Lynn Preston, NSF Deputy Division Director for Centers.

In addition to collaborating with dozens of industrial partners to turn their resulting technology into commercial products, MIRTHE will work with several educational outreach partners, which will use the center’s research as a vehicle for improving science and engineering education at the K-12 and college levels to help ensure a more knowledgeable and competitive U.S. workforce.

“This center allows the Texas A&M College of Science to enhance several of our most important initiatives, including collaborative research and educational outreach,” adds H. Joseph Newton, dean of the College of Science.

MIRTHE’s work will span fundamental science to applied technology. For example, one avenue of research is to develop devices that allow doctors to diagnose and monitor diseases — including lung, kidney and liver disorders — by measuring chemicals in a patient’s breath. Other MIRTHE participants will explore highly sensitive, low-cost sensors that monitor air quality, follow the evolution of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere or detect chemical weapons.

“The sensors we are creating will be portable and easy to use,” Gmachl explains. “Today’s state-of-the-art sensors are very sensitive, but they require an expert to operate and are bulky and expensive. MIRTHE’s vision is to make sensors with the same or better level of sensitivity at a fraction of the size and cost.”

A key technology enabling the center’s work is the quantum cascade laser, named for the way the electrons “cascade” through thin layers of material stacked within the device. The major advantage of these lasers is that they emit light in the part of the spectrum known as the mid-infrared, the area where most molecules have strong spectral fingerprints. Gmachl says having the ability to produce and detect these wavelengths allows scientists to “see” certain chemicals in the same way that sunlight and the human eye reveal everyday objects.

Texas A&M’s MIRTHE team includes groups led by physics professors Alexey Belyanin, Marlan Scully and Michael Weimer as well as electrical engineering professor Christi Madsen. Belyanin and Scully will attack several problems that hinder the development of mid-infrared sensor technologies, including ways to improve sensitivity of the detectors using the same kind of physics that previously enabled Texas A&M physicists to slow light to tens of meters per second.

“Imagine that you are standing near a roaring airplane engine and trying to listen to a soft whisper while wearing headphones that play loud music,” Belyanin explains. “Our goal is to detect a weak mid-infrared signal from a tiny amount of chemicals amid a huge background of thermal radiation produced by all surrounding objects, including the body of the detector itself.”

One additional problem is how to scan the laser through signals produced by different molecules, which Belyanin equates to searching for a particular radio station’s frequency by turning a knob.

During the past decade, Weimer’s laboratory has pioneered new techniques for visualizing the detailed atomic arrangements at the heart of such lasers and detectors that, in turn, control the precise frequencies, or wavelengths, emitted or absorbed by these structures.

“We are especially excited by this unparalleled opportunity to pursue the challenging and significant scientific questions naturally brought up by visionary applications of such societal importance,” Weimer adds.

Madsen will focus on designing and fabricating integrated optical components to make a spectrometer-on-a-chip. When combined with the laser and detector work of other groups, it will enable compact and affordable analysis of the mid-infrared signature of materials for environmental, health and process monitoring.

To learn more about MIRTHE, its collaborators and activities involving Texas A&M, visit http://www.mirthecenter.org.

-aTm-

Contacts: Shana K. Hutchins, (979) 862-1237 or shutchins@science.tamu.edu or Dr. Alexey Belyanin, (979) 845-7785 or belyanin@physics.tamu.edu

Additional Media Contacts

Josh Chamot, National Science Foundation: (703) 292-7730 or jchamot@nsf.gov
Jay Mwamba, City College New York: (212) 650-750 or jmwamba@ccny.cuny.edu
Kenna Lowe, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health: (410) 614-6029 or klowe@jhsph.edu
Steve Schultz, Princeton University: (609-258-3617 or sschultz@princeton.edu
B.J. Almond, Rice University: 713-348-6770 or balmond@rice.edu
Mike Lurie, University of Maryland-Baltimore County: (410) 455-6380 or mlurie@umbc.edu

Based on excerpts from original release by Teresa Riordan, Princeton University