ALERT | Awareness and Localization of Explosive-Related Threats

ALERT Researcher Matteo Rinaldi Receives $473K NSF Grant

ALERT Faculty Professor Matteo Rinaldi is part of a research team awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation for “Fully Integrated Parametric Filters for Extensive Phase-Noise Reduction in Low-Power RF Front-Ends and Resonant Sensing Platforms.” Dr. Rinaldi, along with Assistant Professor Cristian Cassella (PI), and Associate Professor Marvin Onabajo, will use this award to develop next-generation micro- and nano-sensors with a longer battery lifetime and the ability to transmit a higher volume of data.

The project, executed by a multidisciplinary team of machine learning, systems, and networking researchers, aims to develop new techniques to achieve frequency stability in low-power and high-frequency integrated oscillators, addressing one of the most critical challenges that is currently limiting the performance of RF receivers and resonant sensing platforms. This research will lead to integrated wireless front-ends with longer battery lifetime and capable to transmit larger volumes of information, at higher rates. Moreover, the outcomes of the research will enable unprecedented levels of resolution and sensitivity to be attained in next-generation low-power micro- and nano-sensors.

Dr. Rinaldi’s research with ALERT focuses on understanding and exploiting the fundamental properties of micro/nanomechanical structures and advanced nanomaterials to engineer new classes of micro and nanoelectromechanical systems (M/NEMS) with unique and enabling features applied to the areas of chemical, physical and biological sensing and low power reconfigurable radio communication systems. These next generation trace detectors should provide near real-time detection, high sensitivity, and high specificity for a targeted group of explosives, and should result in very low false positive and false negative rates. Read more about Matteo Rinaldi’s work in Multi-Functional Nano-Electro-Opto-Mechanical (NEOM) Sensing Platform.