SBIR-STTR Award

Ionfinity and its collaborators - the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Pace Technologies propose to develop an innovative, miniature and highly sensitive system to sample and analyze water and air in real time within the payload bay of an underwater platform. PaceTech is experienced in underwater sensing and has developed a patent-pending liquid sample acquisition system. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory has invented the Soft Ionization Membrane and the Rotating Field Mass Spectrometer which, when combined, yield an extremely sensitive and compact system for real-time detection of radioactive materials, chemical agents (including industrial chemicals) and biological warfare agents in water and air. The sensor can also detect explosives and narcotics. Ionfinnity is commercializing the JPL technology. Ionfinity has two patents pending and is collaborating with Beckman Coulter Incorporated to develop commercial prototypes. The proposed system will provide detection levels at sub-parts-per-billion (ppb) for many species in a miniature, low-power package. The package and its components have many commercial applications including environmental monitoring, industrial process control, drug discovery and medicine. The Soft Ionization Membrane, which ionizes nearly 100% of the sample that passes through it without fragmentation, represents a revolutionary advance in the production of ion beams. Its immediate application is in the mass spectrometry market where, together with the Rotating Field Mass Spectrometer, it enables a 50x increase in sensitivity, a 50x reduction in size, and a 10x reduction in cost. In addition to the current $2B/year market for mass spectrometry instruments, the SIM enables a new generation of sensors for nuclear, biological and chemical (NBC) warfare agents and for narcotics and explosives.

The goal of this STTR (Phase I and II) is to develop a miniature, low power system to detect chemical and biological warfare agents and related industrial chemicals in seawater and the air immediately above the water surface. The system is to be deployed in the Navy's Remote Environmental Monitoring UnitS (REMUS) Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV). Ionfinity, together with its partners, the NASA/Caltech Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Pacific Environmental Technologies, has designed such a system and demonstrated components in Phase I of this STTR. The key elements are the miniature Rotating Field Mass Spectrometer (RFMS) using the patent-pending Soft Ionization Membrane (SIM) and the undersea sampling and analysis system. Under Phase I, Ionfinity has demonstrated the ability to detect DMMP, an analog to Sarin gas, in vapor and liquid phase and in liquid phase Malathion, a neurotoxin insecticide and trichloroethylene, benzene and toluene, industrial chemicals that pollute water supplies. Biological samples were also measured. Phase II proposes to build and integrate the system and demonstrate to the Navy in the REMUS AUV.

Keywords:
CHEMICAL AGENTS, BIOLOGICAL AGENTS, NUCLEAR AGENTS, WMD, MASS SPECTROMETER, SENSING, IONIZATION