Under a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement, Purdue and NSWC Crane will work on a broad range of projects designed to provide state-of-the-art energy storage and power management technologies for US combat forces.

Among the planned research areas are:

• battery efficiency and safety;
• high-fidelity sensors for energy storage systems;
• mitigation of lithium battery fires;
• hydrogen storage research;
• bio material growth, harvesting and processing for power; and
• fuel cell advancements.

Purdue’s tasks will include conducting activities that explore the basic sciences related to the research areas; developing modeling capabilities for the Department of Defense; providing access to high-end analytical instrumentation; and providing research and development studies or reports of interest to the Navy.

A broad range of Purdue faculty will work on the projects under the leadership of James Caruthers and Joseph Pekny, chemical engineering professors, and Eric Dietz, director of the Purdue Homeland Security Institute and an associate professor of computer technology.

Through its Strategic Missions Center, NSWC Crane will develop test and evaluation data related to energy storage and power management; provide access to power and energy assets, test equipment and other components for collaborative research; and document responses to completed evaluations and tests.

The agreement is part of a strategy to develop a broad-based, collaborative relationship between Purdue and NSWC Crane.