National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

Big news: We are back!

A NIST staffer grew up in Pittsfield, Massachusetts – a city with a long history of manufacturing – where her grandfather worked in the industry. While manufacturing is no longer at the center of Pittsfield life, it remains a critical field.  Today, Cassondra Blasioli (second from right in the photo) works at NIST supporting a program that expands American manufacturing, known as Manufacturing USA. Learn more in our latest Taking Measure blog post: https://lnkd.in/exku3e4r #ManufacturingDay 

This video shows a test of a new way to connect precast concrete beams to a central column. The connection was designed with intentional weak spots designed to stretch and break first. It’s a little like the way an electrical fuse breaks to protect the rest of the circuit. This design helps prevent what engineers call “disproportionate collapse,” which is when localized damage to a building spreads like dominos, causing a much larger disaster than the initial incident. New connections like these will help structures be more resilient to things like vehicle impacts or explosions. At the end of the test, one of the metal plates on the lower-left side of the central column broke at its thinnest point, showing the team that the structural fuse worked as intended. 🔗  https://lnkd.in/e62Rwe7X  

NIST has released a broad agency announcement soliciting proposals for research, prototyping and commercial solutions that advance U.S. microelectronics technology.  The primary goal and objective is to grow U.S. leadership in semiconductor technology and increase the pace of commercialization to enable technology dominance in the industries of the future. Aligning with the recently released NIST Strategy for American Technology Leadership in the 21st Century, the following general topic areas have been identified as priorities for proposals under this announcement: • Semiconductors, including research and prototyping of advanced semiconductor technologies and growing the domestic semiconductor workforce  • Application of artificial intelligence (AI) for advanced microelectronics research and development  • Application of quantum technology for advanced microelectronics research and development  • Application of biotechnology and biomanufacturing technology for advanced microelectronics research and development  • Commercialization of innovations  • Standards development    Learn more at https://lnkd.in/eRQMZTP4  

Drugs based on monoclonal antibodies can treat a wide range of diseases from cancer to Crohn’s disease, but they’re very challenging to manufacture. As described in this issue, NIST is supporting manufacturers of these drugs by releasing a reference material known as NISTCHO that produces the latest version of NIST’s monoclonal antibody protein. NISTCHO was originally a research grade test material, and it has now graduated to being a reference material; check out the chart on this page to see the differences. Visit our standards feature to learn more about why these and other reference materials are important for making sure products work as fully intended.

Picture two football players clashing on the field. The protective gear they wear, such as their helmets and pads, must be designed to absorb the force of the impact and protect the players’ heads and bodies.  Manufacturers have developed impact-resistant materials to protect against different types of impacts and stresses from objects and forces. But these materials also need to be lighter and more adaptable. What if there were a way to study how that stress moves through a material, allowing manufacturers to design materials that better handle these impacts?  That’s what NIST researchers and their collaborators at University of Michigan are trying to figure out.  First, they designed planar arrangements of connected elements, or networks, to simulate real-world materials. Then, they applied a mathematical concept called graph theory, which analyzes the interconnectivity of the networks or graphs and can be applied to everything from the spread of a virus to computer networks.  Researchers used this model to predict how the stress from an impact would spread throughout the 2D structures (shown here). Testing different 2D structures, they made successful predictions by considering the structure's arrangement and its individual geometry. These results lay the groundwork for designing better impact-resistant materials, which could lead to better running shoes, bomb protection gear, satellite shields in space, and much more.  This work was done in collaboration with the National Science Foundation’s COMPASS: Center for Complex Particle Systems. Learn more about the method: https://lnkd.in/ejFyPSBA #MaterialsScience #Engineering #Mathematics #Structures  

“Throughout my time in Pittsburgh, I witnessed the decline of steel and associated industries, which hurt my hometown. As jobs were lost, families and communities struggled. Both my time in Pittsburgh and industry experiences shaped the path that eventually led me to NIST. I found materials science and the opportunity to research a topic deeply rooted in my hometown: steel.” Andrew is a materials science researcher looking into new approaches to using lower-quality iron ore to make high-quality steel. The goal is to learn how to best use the raw materials we currently have available in the U.S. for steelmaking. https://lnkd.in/e7Atpdwu  #MaterialsScience #Steel 

Kartik Srinivasan has been appointed the newest NIST Co-Director of the Joint Quantum Institute. Read more at https://lnkd.in/e3E4Nnpy

Did you know that for more than 50 years, NIST called D.C. home? NIST’s campus was located in the northwest part of D.C. near the intersection of Van Ness Street and Connecticut Avenue. But in 1955, NIST leadership decided to make a big move, relocating the campus to Gaithersburg, Maryland. Why? When NIST was first established, D.C. was less populated than it is today. But as the city grew, so did the noise, vibrations from cars, and electrical interference from power lines and radio waves. Scientists needed fewer disturbances from these external factors when conducting their sensitive measurements. Gaithersburg was mostly rural farmland at the time, which eliminated some of the external disturbances that researchers were faced with in the city. The new lab buildings were designed to minimize most of the noise and electrical disturbances, and the campus also offered more space to expand. #Standards #Measurement #Science #NISThistory  

Spirit fingers? No.  Standard fingers? Stay tuned.    The hotdog-esque items shown here are actually what we would call phantoms, stand-ins for human appendages that can be presented to fingerprint collection devices. Instead of using human fingers (which vary significantly), our researchers have developed this consistent, repeatable way of testing the devices.    These finger phantoms are designed with a 3D-printed fingerbone inside and the ridges of a fingerprint on its surface.    We are working toward eventually designating them officially as NIST standard reference materials (SRMs) that leaders in industry, academia and government can purchase for their own testing purposes. That process can take a while, but we have our finger on the pulse of the industry and see the value in pursuing it.    #Fingerprint #Fingerprinting #ForensicScience