Just this week the 100 winners of R&D 100 Awards were
notified.
Congratulations to our winners.
Each of our winners has made technological advances in their
given categories ranging from analytical instrumentation to thin-film and vacuum
technologies.
Below, our winners share our excitement in their R&D 100
victories.
While national laboratories may seem like the big winners this year, industry companies and academia served as over half of our
winners with impressive technologies ranging all our categories.
Harvard University won an R&D 100 Award this year for their SLIPS material, a
novel coating that the university says can repel just about anything.
PixelOptics won an R&D 100 Award this year for their engineering of the world’s
first electronic focusing eyewear.
Keeping with the theme of eyes, OptiMedica’s
Catalys precision laser system was also awarded an R&D 100 Award.
Protea
Biosciences was awarded an R&D 100 Award for their breakthrough bioanalytics
platform.
Oscium
was awarded an R&D Award for their revolutionary iPad oscilloscope. Merging
the test equipment industry with the smartphone and tablet industries, their
technology provides engineers with an intuitive, necessary test tool.
While right now we may be living in a 4G communications
world, Broadcom Corporation won an 2012 R&D 100 Award for their 5G WiFi chip family,
which are three times faster and up to six times more power efficient than
previous generations of WiFi.
ArrayPower
earns an R&D 100 Award for their Sequenced Inverter, the first
module-integrated solar inverter designed specifically for the commercial-scale
market, converting the DC power produced by solar modules into grid-ready,
three-phase AC power.
Spectrometers have dominated our analytical instruments
winners throughout the years, and this year was no different with Microsaic Systems winning an R&D 100 Award for their 3500 MiD, the most compact
mass spectrometer, and P&P Optica winning an R&D 100 Award for their PPO HyperChannel, a
revolutionary hyperspectral multichannel spectrometer.
Maxwell Technologies was awarded with an R&D 100 Award for its
ultracapacitor-based Engine Start Module, which provides the power required to
reliably start Class 6 to 8 medium and heavy duty trucks due to its
revolutionary patented ultracapacitor technology.
As imaging technologies have been one of our most
represented throughout the year, many impressive imaging technologies were
awarded this year, including Headwall Photonics’ Hyperspec RECON, a rugged and portable hyperspectral imaging
sensor designed to provide discrete target identification of a 6 in by 6 in
scene at a distance of up to a mile, and Xradia’s VersaXRM 3D X-ray Microscope,
a breakthrough microscope technology with a combination of world-leading
resolution and contrast, sample flexibility, a large working distance required
to address emerging research challenges.
For mechanical devices/systems, EWI
was awarded with an R&D 100 Award for its AcousTech Machining, its
patent-pending ultrasonic-assisted machining technology that increases
production rates, tool life, and quality of traditional machining processes,
such as drilling, milling, and boring. NovaTorque
was also a 2012 R&D 100 Award-winner with its Gen2.0 PremiumPlus+
Electronically Commutated Permanent Magnet motors, which use low-cost ferrite
magnets in an innovative flux-focusing design to deliver the superior
efficiency of rare-earth permanent magnet motors at a price that is competitive
with induction motors.
Every year the national laboratories put forth impressive
technologies in hopes of commercialization and licensing with industry. Below
are some of the impressive wins from this year:
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory this year is the recipient of five R&D
100 Awards, being the primary organization on four award-winning technologies—a
high velocity laser accelerate deposition process, LEOPARD, plastic
scintillators for neutron and gamma discrimination, and their snowflake power
divertor—and co-developer with National Security Technologies on one
technology—the Multiplexed Photonic Doppler Velocimeter.
Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory this year is the recipient of four R&D 100
Awards, being the primary organization of three award-winning technologies and
co-developer with Adelphi Technology Inc. on one technology.
Oak
Ridge National Laboratory celebrates their technological success with nine
R&D 100 Awards in 2012, making their total 173 in all.
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory celebrates two wins in this year’s R&D
100 Awards.
Like Berkeley Lab, Argonne
National Laboratory celebrates four wins this year. And Brookhaven
National Laboratory was awarded a 2012 R&D 100 Award for their
dedicated fuel cell research. Sandia
National Laboratories also celebrate four wins this year in technologies
ranging from their Neuristor, a computer chip configuration for neutron
generators, to their Microsystems enabled photovoltaics.
Los Alamos National Laboratory celebrates three wins this year, with a total of
124 win in all. While both the National Energy Technology Laboratory and Idaho
National Laboratory celebrate one win each.
Rounding off for the national laboratories are the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Battelle,
earning two and one award, respectively.
While these are just a few of the congratulatory
announcements from our winners, we once again want to extend our
congratulations and honor your impressive work.
