R&D 100

ThermalTracker-3D, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, is the only known avian tracking system equipped with 3D tracking capability via thermal cameras, providing the most comprehensive information needed for planned offshore wind farms to determine if birds and bats are flying at heights where they are at risk of turbine blade collision. The 3D capability captures detailed…

The Plug-N-Play Appliance for Resilient Response of Operational Technologies (PARROT), developed by Idaho National Laboratory, provides an extra layer of security from cyberattacks on critical infrastructure operations. When placed between control systems and infrastructure, PARROT isolates a cyberattack, provides a manual or automated response, and prevents harmful impacts while maintaining operations. Most critical infrastructure in…

UVL Robotics’ drone inventory is a disruptive technology that is a game-changer for future logistics. The company is a leading provider of drone-based technologies for the industry. Starting from 2019, UVL Robotics has successfully conducted more than 50 inventories for major FMCG, 3PL and retail companies and shaped a new market for industrial robots that…

Idaho National Laboratory’s Bison helps engineers model fuel performance inside a nuclear reactor, allowing them to test different fuel configurations and optimize safety and efficiency. Nuclear power companies use Bison to create advanced simulations of the new fuel configurations required to power the next generation of more economical nuclear reactors. Bison is a nuclear fuel…

The Field Programmable Imaging Array (FPIA), from MIT Lincoln Laboratory, is a first-in-class device that allows designers of niche sensing applications access to unprecedented on-chip computational resources. The reconfigurable nature of the FPIA allows designers to mix and match disparate functionality to create innovative solutions to problems. Once a front end for a specific detector…

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has a rich history of designing and deploying space systems. Over 30% of all U.S. space systems have the Laboratory’s fingerprint on them. Terra Spotlight ensures that the Laboratory’s history of scientific excellence in space will continue. Terra Spotlight opens exciting frontiers in remote sensing and our understanding of changes…

Minimizing contact with objects has become an essential part of anti-pandemic efforts.  Hong Kong Productivity Council’s kNOw Touch contactless panel lessens the risk of coronavirus transmission in elevators by enabling touchless sensing in the elevator controls. This cost-efficient technology only requires a small twist without the need of vast mechanical alteration to perform. The product…

This year’s iteration of the esteemed R&D 100 Awards features a judging panel comprised of nearly 50 professionals from across the globe, who boast an impressive collection of accomplishments and honors. Finalists in this year’s 60th R&D 100 Awards will be announced on August 15th at rdworldonline.com. Winners of this year’s R&D 100 Awards, along…

Siemens Healthineers’ AI-Rad Companion Organs RT is a comprehensive intelligent software that performs automatic segmentation of organs-at-risk at the level of consensus-based contours on computed tomography images for radiation therapy planning in cancer patients. Many of the most commonly cancer-impacted organs such as the prostate, lungs, colon, rectum and breasts are supported with automated contouring.…

Nortis is an innovator in the rapidly emerging Organ-on-Chip (OOC) field, which enables the engineering of living human tissues in microfluidic devices (chips). These chips are highly valuable for both pharma and academia, both of which are looking for novel technologies that will enable them to move away from animal models to improve drug development…

Wave Energy Converter Simulator (WEC-Sim), from National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories, is the first open-source code allowing developers to simulate WEC dynamics and performance, which lowers costs and reduces R&D cycle time in this pivotal and growing field. Wave energy can transform the way we power homes and businesses, lending resilience to…

Mitsubishi Electric Corp.’s Low voltage air circuit breakers guarantee the safety of electric power distribution systems such as those in buildings or factories. It is the first circuit breaker in the industry that realizes open/close operation using electro-magnetic solenoids. This leads to significant energy and labor saving while maintaining excellent economic efficiency. Under the Paris…

Currently, warehouses the size of several football fields are used to store data on hard drives, and in the U.S. alone storage centers account for nearly two percent of the country’s electricity consumption. Soon, the world will generate more digital data than it can store. Los Alamos researchers have turned to DNA to store more…

GridDamper, from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Electric Power Research Institute and the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, is a field-deployment-ready technology to mitigate three major categories of oscillations (natural, forced and sub-synchronous) and allow more renewable electricity in power grids. GridDamper adaptively updates its parameters, sensors and actuators to guarantee power grid stability and reliability…

The deterrence of misinformation requires the establishment of public fact-checking awareness; smooth reporting/inquiry channels; professional fact-checking agencies and a collaborative environment. Through AI technologies, the Institute for Information Industry tackled the requirements and integrated fact-checking related organizations so that a national-level joint-fighting system is formed, successfully preventing misinformation from spreading. Through the cooperation of various…

Sandia National Laboratories’s QSCOUT provides scientists free and complete access to the only open quantum computing testbed based on trapped ions in the world. It gives the scientific community a new level of programming control and execution for improving quantum computer science. Quantum information processing has reached an inflection point transitioning from proof-of-principle scientific experiments…

OmniVision’s OH0TA OVMed medical image sensor is the world’s smallest commercially available image sensor. With a package size of just 0.55 mm x 0.55 mm, featuring a 1.0-micron pixel and a 1/31 optical format, it is smaller than the Guinness World Record held by its predecessor and quadruples resolution and provides wafer-level optics in a…

The Continuous Type Heat Treatment System Equipment for Micro Parts (CTHT), from Metal Industries Research & Development Centre (MIRDC), is an exclusive heat treatment system equipment for micro parts, making them maintain a high collecting rate and an excellent mechanical property. In addition, the CTHT has the advantage of shortening delivery schedules and reducing production…

Corning’s Guardiant is an antimicrobial additive that can be dosed into paints and coatings. Testing performed at the University of Arizona’s microbiology lab show that coatings containing Corning Guardiant can kill 99.9% of germs on coated surfaces, including the virus that causes COVID-19 within two hours. Guardiant uses Corning’s expertise in glass ceramic technology, allowing…

Southwest Research Institute’s Floodlight is an artificial intelligence-based program for chemical discovery. The software performs automated quality review of two-dimensional gas chromatography mass spectrometry data at accuracies comparable to human experts in a fraction of the time. Floodlight enables high-throughput, non-targeted analyses, screening chemicals present in food, drugs, consumer products and environmental samples. Today’s modern…

The Optical Transconductance Varistor (OTV), from Opcondys and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, is a light-triggered semiconductor power switch enabling higher switching speeds than competitors at previously unattainable voltages to facilitate more efficient grid-scale power conversion, reduce expensive, environmentally damaging energy losses and generate the voltages required for medical proton therapy or air disinfection. The OTV…

The Global Synthetic Weather Radar (GSWR) technology, from MIT Lincoln Laboratory and the U.S. Air Force, uses machine learning–based algorithms to provide radar-like weather imagery and radar-forward forecasts in global regions where actual weather radars are not deployed or available. The GSWR capability builds on a previous limited-domain version, the Offshore Precipitation Capability (OPC). The…

PerkinElmer’s NexION 5000 multi-quadrupole ICP-MS – the first in its category to boast four quadrupoles – is engineered to remove the most complex interferences and address the most challenging applications in trace-elemental testing. Taking ICP-MS performance beyond high-resolution ICP-MS and traditional triple-quadrupole technology, delivering exceptionally low parts-per-trillion background equivalent concentrations. The spectrometer can be used…

The Multiplicity Counter for Thermal and Fast neutrons (MC-TF), from Radiation Monitoring Devices (RMD) Inc.*, is a field-deployable device first responders can use to quickly assess in real-time and with high confidence the threat level posed by a suspected nuclear weapon. It is designed to detect time-correlated fast and thermal neutrons unique to special nuclear…

Taiwan Textile Research Institute (TTRI) has developed the world’s first Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) yarn, which makes it full of applicative possibilities. RFID Yarn passes five major durability tests: anti-laundry, anti-acid, anti-alkali, anti-high temperature and anti-roller pressure. TTRI initiated RFID Yarn Technology Industry Alliance, to set up testing standards for newcomers. To achieve RFID Yarn, the…