{"id":110779,"date":"2020-07-06T13:42:08","date_gmt":"2020-07-06T17:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=110779"},"modified":"2020-09-30T11:34:53","modified_gmt":"2020-09-30T15:34:53","slug":"ucf-researcher-earns-2nd-department-of-defense-grant-to-detect-opioids-toxins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-researcher-earns-2nd-department-of-defense-grant-to-detect-opioids-toxins\/","title":{"rendered":"麻豆原创 Researcher Earns 2nd Department of Defense Grant to Detect Opioids, Toxins"},"content":{"rendered":"
Subith Vasu, 麻豆原创 associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering<\/a>, was recently awarded the prestigious Director\u2019s Fellowship from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, one of just 12 researchers nationally to earn the 2020 research<\/a> grant.<\/p>\n Vasu, an expert in spectroscopy and optical diagnostics<\/a>, was awarded $250,000 by the Department of Defense to continue his work to develop a handheld device to help first responders and military personnel detect deadly toxins.<\/a> He won the highly selective DARPA Young Faculty Award for the project in 2018 and received $250,000 for each of the past two years.<\/p>\n Vasu was selected for this new grant because of the progress he has made on the device, says Mike Fiddy, program manager in DARPA\u2019s defense sciences office that oversees DARPA\u2019s Young Faculty Award program.<\/p>\n Vasu has been working on the mobile sensor to detect fentanyl and Carfentanil, opioids that are 50 to 10,000 times more potent than heroin.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n He has been working on the mobile sensor to detect fentanyl and Carfentanil, opioids that are 50 to 10,000 times more potent than heroin. When dispersed in the air, the chemicals can kill. The sensor is being developed to also detect similar toxins, which are sometimes released in fires or explosions and pose threats to first responders. The toxins also can be used in chemical warfare.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile DARPA and other agencies have been working on stand-off trace detection, it has been more for gases and in the IR [infrared region of the spectrum],\u201d Fiddy says. \u201cRegarding developed reflection spectroscopy systems, particularly those that claim to detect solids on a surface, no commercially available THz [terahertz] or IR systems immediately come to mind. Hence the importance of Vasu\u2019s research.\u201d<\/p>\n