Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Projects/Programs

Displaying 51 - 75 of 79

Optical and Optoelectronic Materials Characterization

Ongoing
Today's electronics have reached a point where sheer computation power has combined form and function as the key driver of large consumer markets. The demand for portable and pervasive electronics with greater functionality promises significant changes over the next decades in how society interacts

Optical Radiation Metrology and Standard Radiometers

Ongoing
Radiometric, radiance temperature, photometric, and color scales have been realized based on the spectral responsivity of standard detectors and radiometers. These reference responsivity scales have been transferred to other NIST calibration facilities to realize and maintain these detector-based

Optical scattering from surfaces

Ongoing
Light Scattering Ellipsometry: The polarization of scattered light can often indicate the source of that scattered light. Using Light Scattering Ellipsometry, whereby the polarization of light scattered into directions out of the plane of incidence is measured for a fixed incident polarization

Photometry

Ongoing
The development of revolutionary energy-efficient solid-state lighting (SSL) products has sparked the need for new performance metrics and measurement methods to address their unique construction and operating conditions. NIST has been working closely with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)

Photonic Radiometry

Ongoing
Meeting the needs of the photonics industry and anticipating emerging technologies requires investigation and development of improved measurement methods and instrumentation. This project develops state-of-art, absolute microfabricated thermal detectors with absorber coatings consisting of carbon

Photonic Thermometry

Ongoing
NEED Temperature measurement is critical to innumerable industries – precise, accurate, and rapid temperature sensing enables much of the modern technology on which we depend. Most of these temperature sensors are based on a temperature-dependent resistance measurement of a strain-free metal wire or

Pico-Watt ACR

Ongoing
Design Parameters for Improved ACR Sensitivity An absolute cryogenic radiometer (ACR) is an electrical substitution instrument for calibrating optical power. A bolometer designed so that virtually all incident optical power is absorbed by the radiometer, an ACR allows for absolute calibration

Precision Measurement Grants Program

Ongoing
If funding is available, two new grants in the amount of $50,000 per year will be awarded for the initial period of October 1 through September 30 of the following year. Each award may be continued for up to two additional years; however, future or continued funding will be at the discretion of NIST

Primary optical watt radiometer (POWR)

Ongoing
The POWR, including the detector module, was completely designed by NIST to have the versatility to grow with NIST's needs and embrace new technologies. It provides optical power measurements with uncertainties of 0.01 % ( k=1), which have been verified by an intercomparison with two other cryogenic

Qualification for AM Feedstocks, Machines and Processes

Completed
Objective - To develop, utilize, and analyze test methods and protocols for characterizing the feedstocks, machines, and processes in metal-based additive manufacturing to enable optimum usage and to reduce the cost and time needed for qualification. What is the Technical Idea? Qualification of AM

Quantitative Information from Images

Ongoing
Projects: Quantifying Amount of Material through Light Measurement Fluorescence and Luminescence Imaging for Surgical Guidance Fluorescence-guided imaging devices are being used for navigation in minimally invasive surgical procedures to increase a patient’s positive clinical outcomes and shorten

Quantum Radiometry

Ongoing
For quantum applications, it is important to generate quantum states of light and detect them with extremely high efficiency. This project explores the metrology challenges associated with precision measurement of single photon sources and detectors. The classical photonic radiometry techniques used

Radiation Sensitivity of Thermoluminescent Dosimeter Sensors

Completed
The radiation sensitivity of a Thermoluminescent Dosimeter (TLD) is defined as dosimeter light output per dose unit. TLD light output depends not only on the sensitivity of the TLD elements (Fig.1) but also on the transparency of the Teflon® used for their encapsulation. The effect of encapsulation

Radiation Thermometry

Ongoing
Radiation thermometers are calibrated using a range of variable-temperature blackbodies. For heatpipe blackbodies and fluid-stirred blackbodies, the temperatures of these blackbodies are determined using platinum resistance thermometers. These blackbodies can also be assigned temperatures using

Reflectance Measurements of Human Skin

Ongoing
Investigations of the optical properties of human skin have largely been limited to the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum, whereas many applications require high-quality reflectance data in the near infrared and short-wave infrared. Further, the complex and dynamic nature of skin results

Remote Sensing Laboratory

Ongoing
The Remote Sensing Laboratory (RSL) is designed to address Earth-oriented remote sensing radiometry for the spectral region from the ultraviolet (UV) to the short wave infrared (SWIR), or 250 nm to 2500 nm. For spectral radiance, several lamp-illuminated integrating sphere sources are arranged

SDO/EVE/ESP Calibration

Ongoing
The SDO satellite is the first mission in NASA's Living With a Star program, which aims to understand the connections between the Sun and Earth. In addition to the light and heat with which we are familiar, the Sun produces x-ray radiation, extreme ultraviolet light, and the solar wind which

Solid-state lighting metrology

Ongoing
Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) are increasingly being introduced into lighting market, and solid state lighting (SSL) is becoming a reality. But, this new technology still faces many challenges. Lighting consumes a huge amount of energy, currently 22% of all electricity consumed in the U.S. White LED

Spectral Reflectance and Transmittance

Ongoing
NIST serves as the nation's primary source for spectral reflectance and transmittance measurements from 250 nm to 2500 nm. Our reflectance and transmittance measurements support the measurement infrastructure of communities involved in optics, photonics, color technology, instrument manufacturing

Spectral responsivity measurement

Ongoing
The spectral responsivities of typical photodiodes that are used in the ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared and calibrated by the SCFs are shown below. **Any commercial equipment, instruments, or materials mentioned are identified to foster understanding. Such identification does not

Spectrophotometry

Ongoing
NIST uses spectrophotometric techniques to measure the optical properties of materials for dissemination of national measurement scales to its stakeholders and advancing the development of standards, measurement methods, and modeling capabilities. The beneficiaries of these activities include the

Spectroradiometry of sources

Ongoing
The spectral radiance sources in the form of tungsten-strip lamps and integrating-sphere sources are calibrated in the Facility for Spectroradiometric Calibrations (FASCAL). The measurements are performed by the use of a prism-grating double monochromator whose spectral radiance responsivity is

State-resolved Spectroscopy of Biomolecules

Ongoing
Terahertz radiation interrogates the lowest frequency vibrational modes of a biomolecule. These modes characterize the incipient motions for large-scale conformational changes responsible for the backbone flexibility of protein, polynucleotide and polysaccharide. Thus, terahertz spectral features