New agreements build on Purdue, NSWC Crane strategic partnership

June 22, 2017 |

Saving lives through improved communications and defense of U.S. Navy fleets and eliminating dangerous counterfeit laptops and other electronics are the goal of two new cooperative agreements between Purdue University researchers and the Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division (NSWC Crane).

The cooperative agreements through Purdue Discovery Park continue the university’s longstanding tradition of research that supports the armed forces, taking on costly issues and enhancing Purdue’s collaboration with the Indiana naval installation. They involve research by R. Graham Cooks, the Henry B. Hass Distinguished Professor in Analytical Chemistry, and Daniel DeLaurentis, interim director of the Institute for Global Security and Defense Innovation (i-GSDI) and an aeronautics and astronautics professor.

“The cooperative agreements with Purdue are another sign of how Crane recognizes the importance of Purdue research in directly augmenting and improving Crane’s mission,” DeLaurentis says. “These are the first examples of contact mechanisms that allow Purdue and Crane to easily work together and increase the research that we work together on going forward.”

Cooks’ research is in the interest of public safety by working to detect and discriminate between counterfeit and authentic electronic components. The project will use mass spectrometry to examine the surface of materials and then filter out the potential counterfeit electronics using statistical methods.

The DeLaurentis project researches building computer models for a system of systems that can help coordinate information and communication between the Navy’s various sections, including ship radar and aircraft and satellite sensors, each trying to detect possible threats. His partners include Shimon Nof and Seokcheon Lee, professors in the School of Industrial Engineering.

“The ability to link all of that info together and understand all the complex meanings in that data so the commanders can understand how to defend the fleet appropriately is an example of a mission the Navy does every day,” DeLaurentis says.

Writer: Brian L. Huchel, http://bit.ly/2sYrZ9g