SBIR/STTR Award attributes
Our innovation, Focused LIBS for Elements in Water IDentification (FLEW.ID), is a compact, cost-effective, and sensitive instrument for monitoring the elemental composition of aqueous solutions in plant growth systems on-board the International Space Station (ISS). FLEW.ID utilizes a miniaturized, low-pulse energy laser for performing laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) measurements that, when coupled with a compact optical assembly and spectrometer system, enables reductions in instrument size, weight, and power (SWaP) conducive to accommodation on the ISS for direct integration with currently-operating and/or future proposed plant growth systems. The enhanced benefit of FLEW.ID is that it is application agnostic, and therefore can be used for analyzing other fluid systems on the ISS such as in the closed-loop Water Recovery Systemnbsp;or on future habitats on planetary surfaces.
