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Performance
of 50 Completed ATP Projects
Status
Report - Number 2
NIST SP 950-2
Chapter
4 - Electronics, Computer Hardware & Communications
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Netoptix
corp.
(formerly Galileo Corporation)
Low-Cost Night-Vision Technology
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| Objects
around us emit or reflect electromagnetic radiation, some of it in
the form of visible light that we can see. None of us sees well when
the light is poor, whether at night, in fog, or under other circumstances
of darkness. |
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COMPOSITE
PERFORMANCE SCORE
(Based on a four star rating.)
No Stars
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Seeing in the Dark
If a way could be found to magnify the unseen emissions that remain even
in darkness, by passing them through special glasses, then we could see
things even when the light is too dim to sense objects with the naked
eye.
Such glasses already
exist. They were developed for military use and are quite expensive. High-performance
night-vision devices typically cost more than $1,000 — too much for
general consumer use.
This ATP project with
Galileo Corporation, founded in the middle 1970s to develop microchannel
plates (MCPs), aimed to develop a much less expensive process technology
that would make night-vision devices widely available to, for example,
law enforcement officials and the estimated 400,000 Americans suffering
from retinitis pigmentosa (night blindness). Another potential use of
the technology is in detector components for highly miniaturized analytical
instruments. Funding from the ATP enabled Galileo to perform research
to develop the new fabrication processes and higher performance prototype
MCPs that it would otherwise have been unable to do and helped the company
form alliances with research partners and contractors.
New Electron Multipliers
The ATP project involved the development of new kinds of electron multiplier
devices based on the same kind of manufacturing technology used in semiconductor
fabrication. An MCP is a flat, usually disc-shaped array of closely packed
microscopic tubes that act as tiny amplifiers. Electrons, photons, or
ions entering one side of the plate trigger a cascade of thousands of
electrons out the other side. MCPs form the heart of image intensifiers
used in night-vision and scientific devices and electronic imaging systems.
MCPs are currently made using glass-working techniques developed for producing
fiberoptic bundles. The process has been improved greatly over the years
but has reached its limits in terms of further cost reductions and performance
improvements.
Galileo’s ATP
project abandoned the glass-fiberoptic production approach to MCPs and
instead used the photolithography, dry-etch, wet-etch, and thin-film deposition
technologies developed by the semiconductor industry to develop improved
MCPs. The company succeeded in the technical goals of the project, developing
new fabrication
procedures and using them to demonstrate prototypes of working, high performance
electron-multiplier devices.
Financial Distress
During the last 6 months of its 26-month ATP project, Galileo encountered
financial problems and decided to abandon its original goal of in-house
commercialization of the new process technologies for electron multipliers.
The company has continued to produce MCPs using its earlier fabrication
process and sell them. Even though feasibility of the new approach was
demonstrated by the ATP project, Galileo officials reported that another
$5 million investment would have been needed to commercialize the advanced
performance MCPs using the new process. They say they could not justify
the investment for commercialization, given the company’s financial
difficulties and the length of time needed to build revenue streams.
Commercialization
Potential
At the close of the project, the company entered into an agreement with
the Center for Advanced Fiberoptic charged with commercializing technologies
developed by Galileo and other CAFA members, mainly small to medium sized
optics companies in the mid-Massachusetts area. Galileo granted a nonexclusive
royalty-free license of the ATP-funded technology to CAFA. The principal
investigator on the ATP project left Galileo to become section head for
microelectromechanical systems in the CAFA consortium. In addition to
licensing agreements, CAFA is pursuing partnerships with a number of companies
as an avenue for commercializing the ATP-funded MCP technology, but the
chances for commercialization are uncertain at this time.
In theory, it is expected
that the technology will reduce the costs of MCP production and improve
performance, but these effects have not yet been shown in practice. The
prototype demonstration focused on the feasibility of the new process
technology adapted from the semiconductor industry to produce MCPs and
on improved MCP performance, rather than on their comparative costs. Laboratory
tests and calculations suggested that production costs would be lower
using the new technology, but no pilot project has yet been developed,
so those predictions have not been confirmed. Demonstrated lower costs
and improved performance would make it more feasible to pursue new market
opportunities for applications to address night blindness.
In addition, the technology
holds further potential that might one day be realized. It is important
for miniature scientific and analytical instruments — for example,
a mass spectrometer on a chip. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration
(NASA) recently awarded a contract to develop components for miniaturized
mass spectrometers to CAFA, Galileo, and the Argonne National Laboratory,
under which prototypes have been delivered and are now being evaluated.
While the NASA contract did not itself involve the use of the ATP-funded
technology, extensions to additional contracts could easily do so, because
of the need for additional miniaturization. Commercialization of the technology
for this application, if it can be accomplished, could also have far-reaching
economic benefits.
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Project
Highlights
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PROJECT:
To develop fundamentally new, lower-cost fabrication processes for
and prototypes of higher quality microchannel plates (MCPs) —
which form the heart of image intensifiers used in night vision
— to enable wider use of the technology, including applications
for the estimated 400,000 Americans suffering from retinitis pigmentosa
(night blindness).
Duration: 4/1/1993 — 5/31/1995
ATP Number: 92-01-0124
FUNDING (in
thousands):
| ATP |
$1,910
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57%
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| Company |
1,428
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43%
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| Total |
$3,338
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ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
Galileo developed new processes for fabricating MCPs and other types
of electron multipliers, using techniques from semiconductor fabrication,
and used the new processes to produce prototype MCPs. As evidence
of these accomplishments, the company:
- received
four patents for ATP-related technology:
“Method for Fabrication of Discrete Dynode Electron Multipliers”
(No. 5,618,217: filed 7/25/1995, granted 4/8/1997),
“Method for Fabrication of Microchannel Electron Multipliers”
(No. 5,569,355: filed 1/11/1995, granted 10/29/1996),
“Microfabricated Electron Multipliers”
(No. 5,568,013: Filed 7/29/1994, granted 10/22/1996) and
“Fabrication of a Microchannel Plate From a Perforated Silicon
Workpiece”
(No. 5,544,772: filed 7/25/1995, granted 8/13/1996);
- published
five technical papers, including one as a dissertation and four
in professional journals;
- produced
working vacuum-electron multipliers by microfabrication methods;
and
- developed
thin-film techniques to produce dynode structures that
support electron multiplication in MCPs and other channel electron
multiplier devices.
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CITATIONS
BY OTHERS OF PROJECT’S PATENTS:
See Figure 4.11.
COMMERCIALIZATION
STATUS:
No products based on the ATP-funded technology have yet reached
market.
OUTLOOK:
Prospects for commercialization of this technology are uncertain.
Financial difficulties forced Galileo to abandon plans to directly
commercialize the ATP technology. The company now is working with
the Center for Advanced Fiberoptic Applications (CAFA), a nonprofit
consortium charged with commercializing technologies developed by
Galileo and other CAFA members.
If CAFA can commercialize the ATP technology to benefit people suffering
from night blindness, or if the technology is adopted for use in
producing miniature scientific and analytical instruments, such
as a mass spectrometer on a chip, the broad economic benefits could
be very large.
Composite
Performance Score:
No Stars
COMPANY:
NetOptix Corporation (formerly Galileo Corporation)
Sturbridge Business Park
Sturbridge, MA 01566
Contact:
Enrique Bernal G.
Galileo Corporation
Phone: (508) 347-4291
William Tasker
Center for Advanced Fiberoptic Applications
Phone: (508) 765-0180
Number of Employees: 314 at project start; 240 at the end
of 1997
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Return to Table
of Contents or go to next section.
Date created: April
2002
Last updated:
April 12, 2005
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