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CAMBRIDGE, Mass., May 28, 2003 — From shape-shifting armor to fabric that can turn away microbes as well as bullets to new power sources, the U.S. Army has big plans for nanotechnology. With help from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the military has finally started to get cracking.
At a ceremony last week, MIT and Army officials unveiled their new Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies: a 28,000-square-foot facility that marshals government, academic and industrial resources to develop a new generation of equipment the average soldier will take into combat.
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The ISN, as it is called, was announced last year with a $50 million contract from the Army. MIT enlisted three industrial partners — DuPont, Raytheon and CIMIT — to begin basic research on subjects such as conductive polymers, germ-resistant fabrics and enhanced medical sensors. At last week’s formal opening, several hundred soldiers, scientists and business executives witnessed the first demonstrations of new materials science research that the ISN hopes to bring into reality.
The institute also named six new industrial partners: Partners Healthcare, Dow Corning, Triton Systems, Dendritic Nanotechnologies Inc., Nomadics Inc. and Carbon Nanotechnologies Inc.
“MIT has never been an ivory tower university,” said Charles Vest, the school’s president. “These advances will make a dramatic difference to the combat experience of the everyday soldier.”
The advances Vest envisions all focus on one idea: easing the burden that ground troops carry into combat. The ISN will not develop nanotechnologies for new weapons or nanoscale warfare; rather, the goal is lighter uniforms, stronger fabrics, interchangeable batteries, and medical equipment that delivers care while the soldier still is in combat. As that basic research evolves into prototypes and practical products, the institute’s industrial partners will assume greater responsibility and shape the technology to fit specific goals and contracts issued by the Army.
Vest and others also see plenty of commercial potential. Military products could be modified for police, firefighters and other public safety occupations — markets that are larger than even the military itself. One leading candidate from the ISN so far is water- and germ-resistant Kevlar, the material made by DuPont for bulletproof vests.
“We in the Army will concentrate on the soldier,” said Claude Bolton, assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology. “Our industrial partners will concentrate on the soldier as well as on items that can benefit the rest of us.”
The ISN’s three founding members all have full, royalty-free (but not exclusive) access to any intellectual property developed at the institute. The six additional partners announced Thursday will get royalty-based access specific to the research they work on with MIT and Army scientists.
While MIT officials will not disclose precisely how much each partner contributes, spokesmen say the original three paid several hundred thousand dollars each, while the newer partners paid tens of thousands or donated existing research and equipment.
“We see this potentially as a very high payoff,” said Bruce Snyder, a Raytheon executive who has worked closely with the ISN. “We’ll do the next stage to transition it… this type of research really has to be done at the academic level.”
In the lab
The ISN occupies two floors at 500 Technology Square, a building on the outskirts of the MIT campus and once home to Akamai Technologies. Edwin Thomas, director of the institute, called the facility “very labby space… all very open, very configurable. We’re sure this is going to evolve.”
One floor houses a nanomaterials processing center, as well as labs for synthetic chemistry and biology research. The second floor is home to faculty offices, computer equipment, a conference room and re-configurable meeting space for various ISN research teams. About 35 faculty members will work at the institute, plus more than 100 students and visiting scientists from the government or industrial partners.
The ISN is divided into seven principal research teams that focus on broad themes such as energy absorbing materials, biochemical sensors, medical technologies or mechanically active materials. Each team has its own space for quick collaboration about ideas and research.
The first breakthroughs people are likely to see? Improved bulletproof vests and “dynamic armor” that can harden or soften as necessary. Two MIT scientists already have developed a nanoparticle coating for Kevlar (the material DuPont makes for bulletproof vests) to make its fibers waterproof and germ-proof. That sort of advance, Thomas says, will give soldiers stronger protection with less weight.
Dynamic armor is another favorite at the ISN. Researchers have developed hollow fibers about 100 microns wide, and filled them with hollow beads that contain magnetic particles about 10 nanometers long. When exposed to a magnetic field, which the soldier could trigger, the beads instantly line up to make the fabric about 50 times stiffer or stronger than it normally is. Soldiers would activate dynamic armor when they hear gunfire, or after bullets puncture the skin. Thomas envisions using this fabric as a complement to Kevlar, to protect a soldier’s extremities from bullets or to create an instant splint when he is wounded.
“We do a great job with Kevlar… but it’s only for the torso,” he said. But in the battlefield, Thomas says, a soldier’s real risk is bleeding to death from wounds in his arms and legs.
Wayne Marsh, a research manager at DuPont, says his company has about 20 people developing nanotechnology. He expects them to visit the ISN and collaborate with MIT scientists frequently, and said the company would never be able to deliver the sort of next-generation nanotech the Army wants without academic help. (Marsh would not disclose DuPont’s research budget specifically for nanotech, but the company spent $1.26 billion overall on research last year.)
“It’s absolutely necessary for the university base… they’re the best for that basic scope,” he said. “Without that, it’s done in pieces and sometimes there are large gaps in those pieces.”