Dr. Angelo Alfano, a Purdue Chemistry graduate now with Northrup-Grumman (NG) called me to discuss the possibility of finding Purdue faculty interested in working with him to write brief proposal(s) to NG for internal-source seed funding of research projects to:

(1) develop biochemistry concept(s) that could lead to improved sensitivity and specificity for detection of ionic, low vapor pressure hydrazine-like molecules intended as aerospace fuels but that could be concealed and difficult to detect as explosives. See the attached PDF file, hydrazine.pdf for more details.

(2) develop lab on a chip concepts, likely MEMS and/or nanotechnology-based, to lead to small, portable sensors for these hydrazine-like compounds for both leak detection and security screening. Some further thoughts are in the attached file, Purdue.doc from Dr. Alfano.

The purpose of this proposal process is to solicit novel approaches to some problems of current aerospace, Department of Defense, or Department of Homeland Security relevance. The technology should be farsighted with a possible 5 year payoff . This effort, if funded, is essentially seed funds to get started, around $40-50K to produce white papers spelling out the concepts for (1) and (2). Compelling white papers would form the basis for proposing a larger project(s) to prove the chemistry and work towards prototype sensor systems.

Please contact Sheryl Willison, swilliso@purdue.edu by Tuesday Sept. 5 of your interest. Please include email address, and phone number.

George B. Adams III, Ph.D.

Special Projects Manager, Discovery Park

Research Development Manager, Birck Nanotechnology Center

Purdue University

1205 West State Street , West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057

765 494 2698 phone 765 496 8383 fax | www.purdue.edu/nano