The Collier Report of U.S. Government Contracting

Sampling of Federal Government Funding Actions/Set Asides

In order by amount of set aside monies.

• $75,000 - Thursday the 17th of April 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  WE PROPOSE TO DESIGN AND FABRICATE A MEMS MICROMIRROR ARRAY CONSISTING OF 1021 ULTRA-FLAT, CLOSE-PACKED HEXAGONAL MIRROR ELEMENTS, EACH CAPABLE OF 6MRAD OF TIP AND TILT, AND 1.7UM OF PISTON (TTP) MOTION WITH SUB-NANOMETER PRECISION AS REQUIRED FOR A SPACE-BASED TELESCOPE USING A HYPER-CONTRAST CORONAGRAPH FOR TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING. FABRICATION PROCESS ENHANCEMENTS DEVELOPED IN THE PHASE I EFFORT TO INCREASE DEVICE YIELD BY SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCING THE DEFECT DENSITY IN POLYSILICON FILMS AND REDUCE WAFER BOW BY MODIFYING THIN FILM DEPOSITION PROCESSES, WILL BE INTEGRATED IN TO THE DM FABRICATION PROCESS TO PRODUCE A DEVICE WITH 100% ACTUATOR YIELD AND AN UNPOWERED PEAK-TO-VALLEY SURFACE FIGURE ERROR OF<500NM - WELL WITHIN THE DYNAMIC RANGE OF THE DM ACTUATORS. THIS LARGE ARRAY OF MIRROR SEGMENTS WITH TIP-TILT-PISTON DEGREES OF FREEDOM ANDλ/100 OPTICAL QUALITY WOULD CONSTITUTE A SIGNIFICANT TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCE AND WOULD BECOME AN ENABLING COMPONENT FOR THE HIGH CONTRAST VISIBLE NULLING CORONAGRAPH INSTRUMENTS PLANNED FOR EXOPLANET IMAGING MISSIONS.

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• $75,000 - Wednesday the 16th of July 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  THIS PROPOSAL DESCRIBES A NEW CONCEPT TO DRIVE MEMS DMS USING LOW-POWER, HIGH-VOLTAGE MULTIPLEXING. COMPARED TO OTHER REPORTED APPROACHES, THE PROPOSED ARCHITECTURE WILL REDUCE POWER CONSUMPTION BY A FACTOR OF ONE HUNDRED, TO A LEVEL OF A FEW HUNDRED MILLIWATTS. THIS ESTIMATE IS SUPPORTED BY DIRECT MEASUREMENTS OBTAINED FROM PROTOTYPE MODULES THAT WERE DEMONSTRATED IN PHASE I RESEARCH. IN THE PHASE II PROJECT WE WILL SCALE UP THIS INNOVATIVE CIRCUIT DMS THAT BOSTON MICROMACHINES CORPORATION (BMC) DEVELOPED FOR NASA IN SUPPORT OF THE TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING PROGRAM. AT THE SAME TIME, WE WILL REDUCE THE DRIVER'S SIZE IN TWO SUCCESSIVE STAGES OF INTEGRATION. IN THE FIRST STAGE, WE WILL IMPLEMENT A HYBRID PACKAGING APPROACH IN WHICH A 993-ACTUATOR DM, HV AMPLIFIER, MULTIPLEXER COMPONENTS, AND POWER SUPPLIES WILL ALL BE CO-LOCATED ON A COMMON MULTI-LAYERED CIRCUIT BOARD. WITH THIS DRIVER WE WILL DEMONSTRATE BOTH LOW POWER CONSUMPTION (~300MW) AND HIGH PRECISION (~10PM). IN THE SECOND STAGE OF INTEGRATION, WE WILL DESIGN, FABRICATE, AND TEST A HIGH VOLTAGE APPLICATION-SPECIFIC INTEGRATED CIRCUIT (HV-ASIC) VERSION OF THE MULTIPLEXING ARCHITECTURE USING A COMMERCIAL FOUNDRY. WE WILL COMBINE A NUMBER OF THESE 256 CHANNEL HV-ASIC MODULES INTO A DRIVER FOR A 3063 ACTUATOR DM THAT IS CURRENTLY BEING DEVELOPED BY BMC TO SUPPORT NASA'S CORONOGRAPHY GOALS.

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• $747,977 - Thursday the 13th of August 2015
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  IGF::OT::IGF OTHER FUNCTION - THE GOAL OF THIS PROJECT IS TO DEVELOP AND DEMONSTRATE A RELIABLE, FAULT-TOLERANT WAVEFRONT CONTROL SYSTEM THAT WILL FILL A CRITICAL TECHNOLOGY GAP IN NASA'S VISION FOR FUTURE CORONAGRAPHIC OBSERVATORIES. THE PROJECT OUTCOMES INCLUDE INNOVATIVE ADVANCES IN COMPONENT DESIGN AND FABRICATION AND SUBSTANTIAL PROGRESS IN DEVELOPMENT OF HIGH-RESOLUTION DEFORMABLE MIRRORS (DM) SUITABLE FOR SPACE-BASED OPERATION. SPACE-BASED TELESCOPES HAVE BECOME INDISPENSIBLE IN ADVANCING THE FRONTIERS OF ASTROPHYSICS. OVER THE PAST DECADE NASA HAS PIONEERED CORONAGRAPHIC INSTRUMENT CONCEPTS AND TEST BEDS TO PROVIDE A FOUNDATION FOR EXPLORING FEASIBILITY OF NEW APPROACHES TO HIGH-CONTRAST IMAGING AND SPECTROSCOPY. FROM THIS WORK, NASA HAS IDENTIFIED A CURRENT TECHNOLOGY NEED FOR COMPACT, ULTRA-PRECISE, MULTI-THOUSAND ACTUATOR DM DEVICES. BOSTON MICROMACHINES CORPORATION HAS DEVELOPED MICROELECTROMECHANICAL SYSTEMS (MEMS) DMS THAT REPRESENT THE STATE-OF-THE-ART FOR SCALABLE, SMALL-STROKE HIGH-PRECISION WAVEFRONT CONTROL. THE EMERGING CLASS OF HIGH-RESOLUTION DMS PIONEERED BY THE PROJECT TEAM HAS ALREADY BEEN SHOWN TO BE COMPACT, LOW-POWER, PRECISE, AND REPEATABLE. THIS PROJECT WILL DEVELOP A SYSTEM THAT ELIMINATES THE LEADING CAUSE OF SINGLE ACTUATOR FAILURES IN ELECTROSTATICALLY-ACTUATED WAVEFRONT CORRECTORS SNAP-THROUGH INSTABILITY AND SUBSEQUENT ELECTRODE SHORTING AND/OR ADHESION. TO ACHIEVE THIS WE WILL IMPLEMENT TWO INNOVATIVE, COMPLEMENTARY MODIFICATIONS TO THE MANUFACTURING PROCESS THAT WERE PROVEN SUCCESSFUL IN PHASE I. WE WILL DEVELOP A DRIVE ELECTRONICS APPROACH THAT INHERENTLY LIMITS ACTUATOR ELECTRICAL CURRENT DENSITY GENERATED WHEN ACTUATOR SNAP-DOWN OCCURS, AND WE WILL MODIFY THE ACTUATOR DESIGN TO MITIGATE ADHESION BETWEEN CONTACTING SURFACES OF THE ACTUATOR FLEXURE AND FIXED BASE ELECTRODE IN THE EVENT OF SNAP-DOWN. THIS PROJECT WILL RESULTS IN A MEMS DM WITH 2048 ACTUATORS AND ENHANCED RELIABILITY DRIVEN BY CURRENT-LIMITING DRIVE ELECTRONICS.

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• $580,254 - Tuesday the 3rd of December 2013
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA HEADQUARTERS
  IGF::OT::IGF OTHER FUNCTIONS: THIS IS THE BASIC NASA RESEARCH ANNOUNCEMENT AWARD FOR BOSTON MICROMACHINES. THE PROPOSED RESEARCH WILL ADVANCE THE TECHNOLOGY READINESS OF THE MEMS DMS COMPONENTS THAT ARE CURRENTLY AT THE FOREFRONT OF THE FIELD, AND THE PROJECT WILL BE LED BY THE MANUFACTURER OF THOSE COMPONENTS, BOSTON MICROMACHINES CORPORATION (BMC). THE PROJECT AIMS TO DEMONSTRATE BASIC FUNCTIONALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THIS COMPONENT IN CRITICAL TEST ENVIRONMENTS WHILE ESTABLISHING MODEL-BASED PREDICTIONS OF ITS PERFORMANCE RELATIVE TO LAUNCH AND SPACE ENVIRONMENTS. BMC MEMS DMS HAVE BEEN PROPOSED IN NASA SPACE-BASED EXOPLANET MISSION CONCEPTS INCLUDING EXTRASOLAR PLANETARY IMAGING CORONAGRAPH (EPIC), EXOPLANETARY CIRCUMSTELLAR ENVIRONMENT AND DISK EXPLORER (EXCEDE), WIDE FIELD CORONAGRAPH SPACE TELESCOPE (WFCST) AND PUPIL-MAPPING EXOPLANET CONONAGRAPHIC OBSERVER (PECO), AMONG OTHERS. BMC IS ONE OF TWO MANUFACTURERS THAT HAVE FIELDED PROTOTYPE MEMS DMS FOR THIS APPLICATION IN NASA TEST BEDS. PRESENTLY BMC IS THE ONLY MEMS DM TECHNOLOGY WORLDWIDE THAT HAS YIELDED FULLY FUNCTIONAL DM COMPONENTS WITH MORE THAN 1000 DEGREES OF FREEDOM. BMC HIGH-ACTUATOR-COUNT MEMS DM COMPONENTS HAVE BEEN INTEGRATED IN EXOPLANET EXPLORATION TEST BEDS USING MULTIMIRROR ARRAY (MMA) ARCHITECTURES WITH 331 INDEPENDENT HEXAGONAL MIRROR SEGMENTS SUPPORTED BY THREE UNDERLYING ELECTROSTATIC ACTUATORS PER SEGMENT, AND USING CONTINUOUS DEFORMABLE MIRROR (CDM) ARCHITECTURES WITH COMPLIANT MIRRORS SUPPORTED BY 1020 UNDERLYING ELECTROSTATIC ACTUATORS. DESPITE BROAD NASA INTEREST IN THE TECHNOLOGY AND STEADY TECHNICAL PROGRESS IN DM DEVELOPMENT AND USE, BMC MEMS COMPONENTS HAVE NOT BEEN TESTED FOR THEIR SURVIVABILITY UPON EXPOSURE TO MECHANICAL SHOCK AND VIBRATION AT LEVELS CONSISTENT WITH SPACE LAUNCH. THE OBJECTIVE IS TO ACHIEVE TWO INTERRELATED TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT MILESTONES THAT DEMONSTRATE THE CAPACITY OF THE MEMS DMS TO SURVIVE DYNAMIC MECHANICAL ENVIRONMENTAL STRESSES ASSOCIATED WITH LAUNCH AND DEPLOYMENT IN SPACE. WITHOUT SUCH TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT, A CORONAGRAPH MISSION USING MEMS DMS WOULD NOT BE POSSIBLE.

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• $49,000 - Thursday the 17th of April 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  WE PROPOSE TO DESIGN AND FABRICATE A MEMS MICROMIRROR ARRAY CONSISTING OF 1021 ULTRA-FLAT, CLOSE-PACKED HEXAGONAL MIRROR ELEMENTS, EACH CAPABLE OF 6MRAD OF TIP AND TILT, AND 1.7UM OF PISTON (TTP) MOTION WITH SUB-NANOMETER PRECISION AS REQUIRED FOR A SPACE-BASED TELESCOPE USING A HYPER-CONTRAST CORONAGRAPH FOR TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING. FABRICATION PROCESS ENHANCEMENTS DEVELOPED IN THE PHASE I EFFORT TO INCREASE DEVICE YIELD BY SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCING THE DEFECT DENSITY IN POLYSILICON FILMS AND REDUCE WAFER BOW BY MODIFYING THIN FILM DEPOSITION PROCESSES, WILL BE INTEGRATED IN TO THE DM FABRICATION PROCESS TO PRODUCE A DEVICE WITH 100% ACTUATOR YIELD AND AN UNPOWERED PEAK-TO-VALLEY SURFACE FIGURE ERROR OF<500NM - WELL WITHIN THE DYNAMIC RANGE OF THE DM ACTUATORS. THIS LARGE ARRAY OF MIRROR SEGMENTS WITH TIP-TILT-PISTON DEGREES OF FREEDOM ANDλ/100 OPTICAL QUALITY WOULD CONSTITUTE A SIGNIFICANT TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCE AND WOULD BECOME AN ENABLING COMPONENT FOR THE HIGH CONTRAST VISIBLE NULLING CORONAGRAPH INSTRUMENTS PLANNED FOR EXOPLANET IMAGING MISSIONS.

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• $35,000 - Wednesday the 16th of July 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  THIS PROPOSAL DESCRIBES A NEW CONCEPT TO DRIVE MEMS DMS USING LOW-POWER, HIGH-VOLTAGE MULTIPLEXING. COMPARED TO OTHER REPORTED APPROACHES, THE PROPOSED ARCHITECTURE WILL REDUCE POWER CONSUMPTION BY A FACTOR OF ONE HUNDRED, TO A LEVEL OF A FEW HUNDRED MILLIWATTS. THIS ESTIMATE IS SUPPORTED BY DIRECT MEASUREMENTS OBTAINED FROM PROTOTYPE MODULES THAT WERE DEMONSTRATED IN PHASE I RESEARCH. IN THE PHASE II PROJECT WE WILL SCALE UP THIS INNOVATIVE CIRCUIT DMS THAT BOSTON MICROMACHINES CORPORATION (BMC) DEVELOPED FOR NASA IN SUPPORT OF THE TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING PROGRAM. AT THE SAME TIME, WE WILL REDUCE THE DRIVER'S SIZE IN TWO SUCCESSIVE STAGES OF INTEGRATION. IN THE FIRST STAGE, WE WILL IMPLEMENT A HYBRID PACKAGING APPROACH IN WHICH A 993-ACTUATOR DM, HV AMPLIFIER, MULTIPLEXER COMPONENTS, AND POWER SUPPLIES WILL ALL BE CO-LOCATED ON A COMMON MULTI-LAYERED CIRCUIT BOARD. WITH THIS DRIVER WE WILL DEMONSTRATE BOTH LOW POWER CONSUMPTION (~300MW) AND HIGH PRECISION (~10PM). IN THE SECOND STAGE OF INTEGRATION, WE WILL DESIGN, FABRICATE, AND TEST A HIGH VOLTAGE APPLICATION-SPECIFIC INTEGRATED CIRCUIT (HV-ASIC) VERSION OF THE MULTIPLEXING ARCHITECTURE USING A COMMERCIAL FOUNDRY. WE WILL COMBINE A NUMBER OF THESE 256 CHANNEL HV-ASIC MODULES INTO A DRIVER FOR A 3063 ACTUATOR DM THAT IS CURRENTLY BEING DEVELOPED BY BMC TO SUPPORT NASA'S CORONOGRAPHY GOALS.

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• $3,050 - Tuesday the 12th of February 2013
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  AMES RESEARCH CENTER
  KILO-DM PCIE CARD UPGRADE

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• $199,807 - Wednesday the 16th of July 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  THIS PROPOSAL DESCRIBES A NEW CONCEPT TO DRIVE MEMS DMS USING LOW-POWER, HIGH-VOLTAGE MULTIPLEXING. COMPARED TO OTHER REPORTED APPROACHES, THE PROPOSED ARCHITECTURE WILL REDUCE POWER CONSUMPTION BY A FACTOR OF ONE HUNDRED, TO A LEVEL OF A FEW HUNDRED MILLIWATTS. THIS ESTIMATE IS SUPPORTED BY DIRECT MEASUREMENTS OBTAINED FROM PROTOTYPE MODULES THAT WERE DEMONSTRATED IN PHASE I RESEARCH. IN THE PHASE II PROJECT WE WILL SCALE UP THIS INNOVATIVE CIRCUIT DMS THAT BOSTON MICROMACHINES CORPORATION (BMC) DEVELOPED FOR NASA IN SUPPORT OF THE TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING PROGRAM. AT THE SAME TIME, WE WILL REDUCE THE DRIVER'S SIZE IN TWO SUCCESSIVE STAGES OF INTEGRATION. IN THE FIRST STAGE, WE WILL IMPLEMENT A HYBRID PACKAGING APPROACH IN WHICH A 993-ACTUATOR DM, HV AMPLIFIER, MULTIPLEXER COMPONENTS, AND POWER SUPPLIES WILL ALL BE CO-LOCATED ON A COMMON MULTI-LAYERED CIRCUIT BOARD. WITH THIS DRIVER WE WILL DEMONSTRATE BOTH LOW POWER CONSUMPTION (~300MW) AND HIGH PRECISION (~10PM). IN THE SECOND STAGE OF INTEGRATION, WE WILL DESIGN, FABRICATE, AND TEST A HIGH VOLTAGE APPLICATION-SPECIFIC INTEGRATED CIRCUIT (HV-ASIC) VERSION OF THE MULTIPLEXING ARCHITECTURE USING A COMMERCIAL FOUNDRY. WE WILL COMBINE A NUMBER OF THESE 256 CHANNEL HV-ASIC MODULES INTO A DRIVER FOR A 3063 ACTUATOR DM THAT IS CURRENTLY BEING DEVELOPED BY BMC TO SUPPORT NASA'S CORONOGRAPHY GOALS.

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• $199,566 - Thursday the 17th of April 2014
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  NASA SHARED SERVICES CENTER
  WE PROPOSE TO DESIGN AND FABRICATE A MEMS MICROMIRROR ARRAY CONSISTING OF 1021 ULTRA-FLAT, CLOSE-PACKED HEXAGONAL MIRROR ELEMENTS, EACH CAPABLE OF 6MRAD OF TIP AND TILT, AND 1.7UM OF PISTON (TTP) MOTION WITH SUB-NANOMETER PRECISION AS REQUIRED FOR A SPACE-BASED TELESCOPE USING A HYPER-CONTRAST CORONAGRAPH FOR TERRESTRIAL PLANET FINDING. FABRICATION PROCESS ENHANCEMENTS DEVELOPED IN THE PHASE I EFFORT TO INCREASE DEVICE YIELD BY SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCING THE DEFECT DENSITY IN POLYSILICON FILMS AND REDUCE WAFER BOW BY MODIFYING THIN FILM DEPOSITION PROCESSES, WILL BE INTEGRATED IN TO THE DM FABRICATION PROCESS TO PRODUCE A DEVICE WITH 100% ACTUATOR YIELD AND AN UNPOWERED PEAK-TO-VALLEY SURFACE FIGURE ERROR OF<500NM - WELL WITHIN THE DYNAMIC RANGE OF THE DM ACTUATORS. THIS LARGE ARRAY OF MIRROR SEGMENTS WITH TIP-TILT-PISTON DEGREES OF FREEDOM AND?/100 OPTICAL QUALITY WOULD CONSTITUTE A SIGNIFICANT TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCE AND WOULD BECOME AN ENABLING COMPONENT FOR THE HIGH CONTRAST VISIBLE NULLING CORONAGRAPH INSTRUMENTS PLANNED FOR EXOPLANET IMAGING MISSIONS.

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• $18,000 - Wednesday the 11th of March 2015
  National Aeronautics And Space Administration
  GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER
  IGF::OT::IGF OTHER FUNCTIONS CONTRACTOR SHALL CUSTOM MIRROR CALIBRATION FOR KILO-DM, INCLUDES: 1) GENERATION OF SINUSOIDAL SHAPES OVER THE USEFUL STROKE OF THE DM (10 NM RESOULTION STEPS, 5 SPATIAL FREQUENCY CASES) 2) DEVELOPMENT OF MATLAB INTERFACE SOFTWARE TO COMMAND THE DM 3) TECHNCICAL SUPPORT FOR OPERATION OF THE MIRROR SYSTEM WITH THE ABOVE MENTIONED SOFTWARE (APPROX. 10 HOURS) - (2) TWO KILO CABLES

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