INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC TECHNOLOGIES INC — Department of Defense SBIR Phase II: DTRA143-001

Description

In Topic DTRA143-001, a need has been identified to improve monitoring human presence near containers, stored items, and secured areas in order to monitor activities, particularly in remote locations that are not patrolled all day every day. The use of smart materials to detect human presence by sensing volatile organic compounds emanating from the human body is a major area of interest within the monitoring and surveillance field. To address this need, International Scientific Technologies, Inc., in conjunction with Ferrum College, propose the development of polyoxometalate-based oxyanions immobilized on graphene to detect specific vapor-phase compounds emitted by humans. Graphene is used in polyoxometalate sensor as a high surface-to-volume substrate, providing high sensitivity with small sample volumes. Phase II Technical Objectives include extension of polyoxometalate sensor technology for human-presence detection, fabrication of polyoxometalate-modified graphene vapor sensors, acquisition of families of test data of electronic-nose response to simulated breath exhalant and alkaline or acidic perspiration, optimization of polyoxometalate/graphene gas sensor coupled with infrared motion detector for human proximity sensor array system, and demonstration of optimized electronic nose multi-modal sensor array. Anticipated result of the Phase II program is development of smart material sensor array for human presence detection in proximity to containers.