May 2022 - Physical Sciences Inc.

Press Release

Physical Sciences Inc in collaboration with MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) has been awarded a research program from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Cancer Institute to develop and clinically evaluate a novel probe for guiding core needle biopsy procedures in various organs.

Since the radiologically identified masses can be very heterogeneous, containing fibrotic and adipose areas as well as necrotic cells or scar tissue, which do not have any diagnostic value, radiologically-guided biopsies can still result in many false negatives. To address this problem, PSI proposes to use a biopsy guidance probe, called “OptoGuide”, based on a novel encoder-based low cost optical coherence tomography (OCT) approach, which enables in situ tissue imaging with micron scale resolution. This technology has been previously successfully demonstrated in an animal model of cancer.

The OptoGuide technology will support improvements to the success rate of core biopsy procedures by providing immediate feedback to the interventional radiologist while performing the biopsy. In addition to improving the success rate of the biopsies and eliminating the needed for repeated biopsies, which will significantly reduce US healthcare costs, this technology will also reduce emotional costs for both patients and families by enabling a more reliable and timely diagnosis.

For more information, contact:

Dr. Nicusor Iftimia
Area Manager, Biomedical Optics Technology
iftimia@psicorp.com
Physical Sciences Inc.
Telephone: (978) 689-0003

Press Release

Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) has been awarded a program from the U.S. Marine Corps to design a portable, hydrokinetic generator for use in a wide range of river environments.

PSI’s generator is built from lightweight and high-strength materials with unique joints that allow it to flat-pack into a 2m by 1m by 0.5m box. The generator is composed of a set of four, redundant modules that may be quickly removed from the box and deployed to any water flow greater than 0.5 m deep. Each module comes with cabling to a central power management unit in the box to be situated on the riverside. Once installed in a typical stream, the full system will produce up to 1.5 kW of electricity via a 24 VDC hookup cable.

Rapidly deployable, hydrokinetic electricity production allows for quick installation of communication equipment, forward-operating units, spatial awareness sensors, and many other crucial implements of the modern warfighter. Over the last few decades, there has been a growing demand in renewable energy technologies from civilian and military stakeholders.

Systems that can generate electricity from existing energy sources in the environment; such as solar, wind, and hydro can reduce electricity costs and enable electrical equipment in locations that the electrical grid does not reach. In developing parts of the world where an electrical grid is not present, communities often rely on ‘microgrids’, small electrical generation stations. This situation drives a growing demand for systems such as MCHEG that can supplement electrical energy in almost any location close to a flowing water source. PSI’s MCHEG system can fill the niche of the developing, renewable energy market.

For more information, contact:

Dr. Sean Torrez
Area Manager, Deployable Technologies
storrez@psicorp.com
Physical Sciences Inc.
Telephone: (978) 689-0003

Presentation

Abstract

The urgency to reduce methane emissions to the atmosphere is driving industry adoption of advanced technologies for methane measurement and monitoring. We present a suite of laser-based sensors for detecting, locating, and measuring methane sources.

© 2022 Physical Sciences Inc. All Rights reserved. Acknowledgements: Department of Energy (DoE), Advanced Project Research Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), National Institute of Occupational Health & Safety (NIOSH), Department of Transportation (DoT), Leak Survey Inc., New Era Technologies, NYSEARCH, Southern California Gas (SoCalGas), GTI Energy, Heath Consultants Inc., Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI)

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Press Release

Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) has been awarded a contract from the U.S. Army to develop a cyclone concentrator (CC) particle collector coupled with an ultra-low power diamond-based field desorption ion mirror (FDIM) for integration with a man-portable mass spectrometer.

PSI’s technology has a flexible architecture that allows for isolation and ionization of a variety of aerosols, including volatile organic compounds (VOCs), bioaerosols, and chemical warfare agents. The FDIM employs PSI’s patent-pending diamond coating applied to an off-axis parabola, providing simultaneous soft ionization of the incoming particles and focusing of the ion beam into the mass spectrometer, which improves the transfer efficiency of the ions to the mass spectrometer. The CC serves as an automatic, “air-breathing” atmospheric sampler that requires no human intervention. The CC also provides size selection and concentration of the sampled aerosols.

Benefits of the CC include the combination of the automatic cyclone sampler with the ultra-low power diamond-based ionization source for man-portable mass spectrometers. Applications include sampling and ionization of a variety of aerosols and a wide array of mass spectrometer platforms.

For more information, contact:

Dr. Julia Dupuis
Vice President, Tactical Systems
jdupuis@psicorp.com
Physical Sciences Inc.
Telephone: (978) 689-0003

Publication

Abstract

The resistive torques of cable harnesses and service loops comprise a significant portion of the force budgets of deployable space mechanisms. The space engineering community lacks a reliable and methodical way to predict these forces early in the mechanism design process. Incumbent methods rely on estimates from heritage applications or use deployment prototype tooling. The latter approach is typically specific to the application and the design and therefore incurs timely and expensive iterations. This paper describes a methodology for directly predicting cable drag and resistive torque from the cable specification and deployment geometry alone. The method outlines a standard procedure for characterizing the elastoplastic and viscoelastic material properties of space cables. These experimentally-determined material properties are supplied along with deployed cable geometry to a FEA model, which predicts the cable resistive forces in a representative deployment system.

Copyright © 2022 Physical Sciences Inc. Paper https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2022-1623 Published by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics by permission. For permission to copy or republish, contact the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics 1801 Alexander Bell Drive, Suite 500, Reston, VA 20191-4344.

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Published

May 6, 2022

Publication

Abstract

A novel multi-path extinction detector (M-PED) is being developed for point detection, identification and quantification of vapor phase chemicals. M-PED functions by pairing a broadband long-wave infrared (LWIR) quantum cascade laser with a novel sample cell, designed to simultaneously measure chemical absorption at multiple pathlengths and wavelengths. The pathlength samples are angularly separated in one dimension, such that a diffraction grating can be used to measure wavelength data in the orthogonal dimension using a compact, low-cost microbolometer array. The resulting data matrix is fit to Beer’s Law in two dimensions to accurately quantify chemical concentration while rejecting common mode noise (e.g. laser amplitude noise). The design, characterization and a capability demonstration of the advanced prototype sensor are presented.

Copyright © 2022 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. This paper was presented at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 4-7 April, 2022, Orlando, FL (Paper No. 12116-39), and is made available as an electronic reprint (preprint) with permission of SPIE. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplication of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of the paper are prohibited.

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Published

May 5, 2022

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Abstract

There is an on-going need for sensor technologies capable of providing non-contact chemical detection and identification in the defense community. Here, we present the development of a standoff deep ultraviolet (DUV) Raman sensor for the detection of explosive residues. The sensor is based on a solid-state DUV excitation source coupled with a Spatial Heterodyne Spectrometer (SHS) receiver. The sensor is designed to detect Raman signals from a 4 cm2 area surface at a 1 m standoff. Detection and identification is achieved by correlating measured Raman signatures with high fidelity library spectra. The DUV excitation enables operation in a solar blind spectral region, leverages v4 cross section scaling and resonance enhancement of Raman signatures, and minimizes the impact of sample fluorescence. The SHS receiver provides a ~1000× higher etendue than conventional slit-based spectrometers in a compact and rugged form factor, allowing for high performance field use. This work describes the system design and architecture of the Raman sensor prototype. Developmental standoff Raman measurements with the sensor using bulk liquid and solid samples are presented. Traceability to detection at the μg/cm2 scale is demonstrated and future improvements to increase system standoff are discussed.

Copyright © 2022 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. This paper was presented at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 4-7 April, 2022, Orlando, FL (Paper No. 12116-1), and is made available as an electronic reprint (preprint) with permission of SPIE. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplication of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of the paper are prohibited.

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Published

May 5, 2022

Publication

Abstract

An environmentally hardened compressive sensing hyperspectral imager (CS-HSI) operating in the long wave infrared (LWIR) has been developed for low-cost, standoff, wide area early warning of chemical vapor plumes. The CS-HSI employs a single-pixel architecture achieving an order of magnitude cost reduction relative to conventional HSI systems and a favorable pixel fill factor for standoff chemical plume imaging. A low-cost digital micromirror device modified for use in the LWIR is used to spatially encode the image of the scene; a Fabry-Perot tunable filter in conjunction with a single element mercury cadmium telluride photo-detector is used to spectrally resolve the spatially compressed data. A CS processing module reconstructs the spatially compressed spectral data, where both the measurement and sparsity basis functions are tailored to the CS-HSI hardware and chemical plume imaging. An automated target recognition algorithm is applied to the reconstructed hyperspectral data employing a variant of the adaptive cosine estimator for detection of chemical plumes in cluttered and dynamic backgrounds. The approach also offers the capability to generate detection products in compressed space with no CS reconstruction. This detection in transform space can be performed with a computationally lighter minimum variance distortionless response algorithm, resulting in a bandwidth advantage that supports efficient search and confirm modes of operation.

Copyright © 2022 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. This paper was presented at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 4-7 April, 2022, Orlando, FL (Paper No. 12094-27), and is made available as an electronic reprint (preprint) with permission of SPIE. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplication of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of the paper are prohibited.

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Published

May 5, 2022

Publication

Abstract

A platform for building sensor specific machine learning detection algorithms has been developed to classify spectroscopic data. The algorithms are focused on long wave infrared reflectance (LWIR) and Raman spectroscopies. The classification algorithm is based on a one dimensional (1D) convolutional neural network (CNN) architecture. Training data is generated using an appropriate signal model that is combined with sensor specific characteristics such as spectral range, spectral resolution, and noise. Within this paper, the performance of trained CNNs for both LWIR and Raman sensor systems has been evaluated. The evaluation uses both real and synthetic data to benchmark the performance in terms of the discriminant signal. The evaluation data consists of various chemical representations and varied noise levels. The performance of the 1D CNN approach has demonstrated high classification accuracies on data with low discriminant signals. Specifically, the CNNs have demonstrated a classification accuracy >90% for infrared reflectance data down to a wavelength averaged discriminant SNR>1. For Raman systems, we have demonstrated classification accuracies >90% for data with a peak discriminant SNR of approximately 6.

Copyright © 2022 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. This paper was presented at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 4-7 April, 2022, Orlando, FL (Paper No. 12094-12), and is made available as an electronic reprint (preprint) with permission of SPIE. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplication of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of the paper are prohibited.

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Published

May 5, 2022

Publication

Abstract

Physical Sciences Inc. has developed an ultra-compact shortwave infrared (SWIR) staring mode hyperspectral imaging (HSI) sensor with an additional visible full motion video (FMV) capability. The innovative HSI design implements a programmable micro-electromechanical system entrance slit that breaks the interdependence between vehicle speed, frame rate, and spatial resolution of conventional push-broom systems and enables staring-mode operation without cooperative motion of the host vehicle or aircraft. The FMV and HSI components fit within 1000 cm3, weigh a total of 2.1 lbs., and draw 15 W of power. The sensor mechanical design is compatible with gimbal-based deployment allowing for easy integration into ground vehicles or aircrafts. The FMV is capable of achieving NIRS-6 imagery over a 6°×6° field-of-view (FOV) at a 1500 ft. standoff. The SWIR HSI covers a spectral range of 900-1605 nm with a 15 nm spectral resolution, and interrogates a 5°×5° FOV per 1.6 s with a 2.18 mrad instantaneous FOV (1 m ground sample distance at 1500 ft.). A series of outdoor tests at standoffs up to 300 ft. have been conducted that demonstrate the payload’s capability to acquire HSI information. The payload has direct utility towards diverse remote sensing applications such as vegetation monitoring, geological mapping, surveillance, etc. The data product utility is demonstrated through the spectral identification of materials (e.g. foam and cloth) placed in the sensor’s FOV.

Copyright © 2022 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. This paper was presented at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 4-7 April, 2022, Orlando, FL (Paper No. 12094-7), and is made available as an electronic reprint (preprint) with permission of SPIE. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplication of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of the paper are prohibited.

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Published

May 5, 2022