Innovation Partnership Building at UConn Tech Park

Est. November 2014

Thermo Fisher Scientific Center for Advanced Microscopy and Materials Analysis (CAMMA) is one of the world’s foremost facilities for electron microscopy. Its nine microscopy instruments include the Titan Themis for sub-angstrom analysis of materials and the Talos TEM for simultaneous quantitative energy dispersive spectroscopy and analysis of the chemical composition of materials. CAMMA equipment will be available for collaborative research with industry partners, including applications for clean energy materials and the testing of additively-manufactured components such as those found in medical devices and polymeric materials for biomedical applications.

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Est. April 2013

The Pratt & Whitney Additive Manufacturing Center (PW AMC) is a premier facility for metal additive manufacturing. The range of equipment available includes electron beam melting and laser sintering technologies and a suite of thermophysical measurement instruments. PW AMC is focused on the underlying physics of additive manufacturing with emphasis on rapid solidification, powder spreading, and metal-atmosphere interactions. Experiments as well as ab-initio calculations are used to develop new insight into the additive manufacturing process. PW AMC has also addressed control theory with the goal of improving current machine technologies and supports the generation of data for manufacturing simulations.

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Est. October 2013

The Pratt & Whitney Institute for Advanced Systems Engineering (PW IASE) produces, disseminates, and commercializes new science and technology in the field of cyber-physical systems engineering through transformative research, education, and workforce development. The Institute serves as a hub for world-class research, project-based learning by globally-distributed teams of students, and industrial outreach activities focused on model-based systems engineering (MBSE) of complex systems that are built from and are dependent on the synergy of computational and physical components. Research applications are broad, and include, eg, smart buildings and cities, aerospace systems, manufacturing and energy industries, robotics and cybersecurity.

Est. April 2016

Collins Aerospace Center for Advanced Materials offers educational funding to graduate and undergraduate students as well as post-doctoral fellows. It provides an opportunity for firsthand interactions with an industrial partner whose focus is on advanced aerospace and defense products. The center has three main research thrusts: (1) design and development of custom aerospace alloys that lend themselves to additive manufacturing using computational and experimental tools, (2) processing of high temperature ceramic composites for extreme environments and (3) quasicrystal-strengthened alloys for structural applications.

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Est. October 2015

The Eversource Energy Center leads the utility industry in innovating and developing new technologies and science-based solutions to ensure the delivery of reliable power and enhanced risk management associated with cyber and physical infrastructure security. Through research and teaching, the Center is advancing the next generation of storm outage forecasting, best practices for healthy and storm-resistant forest design, and new technologies to proactively pinpoint electric grid operational efficiencies and storm resiliency improvements.

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Est. July 2013 (Fraunhofer Center), relaunched spring 2020 (CCAST)

The Connecticut Center for Applied Separations Technology (CCAST) provides contract R&D services that identify energy and cost-efficient solutions for separations needs through thoughtful consideration of innovative materials, differentiating techniques & robust process design.

Proof of Concept Center (POCC) offers state-of-the-art prototyping and fabrication equipment that facilitate new product development for a wide range of industries.

Connecticut Manufacturing Simulation Center (CMSC) provides SMMEs with affordable technical assistance for computer-based design, finite element modeling and simulation, testing, and validation, with capabilities in modeling a variety of manufacturing processes, including machining, forming, forging, and casting.

Est. 2017

Reverse Engineering Fabrication Inspection & Non-Destructive Evaluation (REFINE) lab houses state-of-the-art light, X-ray, electron and ion microscopes. The lab focuses on “correlative microscopy” where information from multiple imaging modalities can be integrated in order to reach a much deeper understanding of imaged samples. REFINE lab's instruments can “talk” to each other, enabling researchers to gain a multi-dimensional, multi-resolution and multi-scale perspective about the studied sample. REFINE is working closely with industries in areas of electronics and hardware security, biomedical devices, batteries and energy storage, aerospace, advanced coatings and additive manufacturing.

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Est. July 2018

The Center for Science of Heterogeneous Additive Printing of 3D Materials (SHAP3D) is a named National Science Foundation (NSF) industry/university cooperative research center (I/UCRC) dedicated to additive manufacturing. Co-founded by UConn, UMass Lowell and Georgia Tech, the center strives to develop critical insight into the fundamental structure-processing-property relationships to control the integration of diverse materials, decrease cost and increase reliability at all stages of additive manufacturing. SHAP3D provides a platform in which companies and federal agencies may cost-effectively collaborate on shared, pre-competitive research topics by leveraging R&D investment to access world class facilities, faculty and graduate students.

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Est. January 2018

The National Institute for Undersea Vehicle Technology (NIUVT) is a collaborative partnership between government, academia, and industry charged with performing research, developing workforce, and transitioning technology in the undersea domain.  The original partners of UConn, the University of Rhode Island (URI) and General Dynamics Electric Boat (EB) founded the institute to enhance performance and reduce costs of the shipbuilding process while ensuring that advanced technologies are implemented into the next generation and future undersea vehicles and platforms.  NIUVT combines the talents, equipment, facilities, and experience of its partners to align resources from across sectors for the benefit of national security and economic imperatives. Through its activities, NIUVT will develop the personnel and knowledge needed to accelerate critical research and enhance U.S. superiority in the manned and unmanned undersea domain.

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Est. August 2018

Project Daedalus is an ongoing collaboration supported by the Air Force Research Laboratory, with industry partners Pratt & Whitney, Aero Gear, GKN Aerospace, Collins Aerospace and Sikorsky. This effort leverages UConn expertise in machining, casting, heat treating, composites, ceramics, additive manufacturing, state-of-the-art sensing, uncertainty quantification, multiscale modeling, and systems engineering. Our mission is to provide transformative capabilities on manufacturing technologies to the AFRL, OEMs and supply chain to reduce scrap rates and increase yield/performance.

Est. May 2019

The IN-siTu/Operando Electron Microscopy (InToEM) center is a partnership between UConn and DENSsolutions, an international leading supplier of state-of-the-art MEMS-based In Situ systems. These advanced systems bring stimuli like heating, biasing, gas and liquid into transmission electron microscopes. The InToEM center leverages these technologies to transform transmission electron microscopes from an imaging instrument into a comprehensive research laboratory, at the frontier of materials dynamics research. These new in-situ/operando microscopy capabilities provide promising potential for transformative research in nanomaterials synthesis, heterogeneous catalysis, corrosion and alloy degradation, fuel cells and many other important material systems to our every life.

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Est. October 2019

The Center for Materials Processing Data (CMPD) is a research center dedicated to producing and collecting pre-competitive transient material property data used in materials process simulations.  It is a multi-university consortium with industry founded by academic members from UConn, Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), and the Research Foundation for the State University of New York on behalf of the University at Buffalo (RF), along with ASM International, a non-profit materials science and engineering society (ASM). CMPD is dedicated to the stewardship of materials data for modeling of materials and process design via integrated computational materials engineering. CMPD will serve the needs of the membership organizations by educating future leaders of the industry and disseminating experimentally obtained and verified data to industry.

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