Northeastern Inks $20.4 Million Research Deal with U.S. Army

Photo by Alex Lau

Northeastern University has secured an agreement with the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, providing up to $20.4 million in expedited funding for defense research over the next three years.

The agreement will make use of Northeastern’s 70,000-square-foot Kostas Research Insti­tute in Burlington, including its NanoOPS, a nanoscale printing system used for flex­ible elec­tronics, med­i­cine, and energy storage.

“A world that is resilient and secure is a world that is pow­ered by inno­v­a­tive research,” Northeastern President Joseph E. Aoun said in a release. “Northeastern’s research enter­prise is leading the way with a multi-​​year strategy that com­bines the inge­nuity of our sci­en­tists with the funding sup­port to sus­tain it. The gen­erous invest­ment from our alumnus, George Kostas, is a clear example of the mutu­ally rein­forcing ecosystem of acad­emia, phil­an­thropy, and gov­ern­ment funding.”

Two projects will make immediate use of this new funding. Eight Northeastern faculty members, led by pro­fessor Sinan Muftu and asso­ciate pro­fessor Andrew Gouldstone of the Depart­ment of Mechan­ical and Indus­trial Engineering, will be studying high-​​velocity spraying materials, or “cold spray,” which can be used to repair military infrastructure. Successful applications so far have included submarine periscopes and discontinued panels on Air Force’s B-​​1 bombers.

In addition, Vincent Harris of Northeastern’s Depart­ment of Elec­trical and Com­puter Engineering will work in collaboration with the Army’s Aberdeen Proving Ground facility in Mary­land, using mag­netic par­ti­cles to align nanopar­ticle ceramic materials in order to develop light­weight bul­let­proof vests and vehicle armor.

“This agree­ment sig­nals the Army’s recog­ni­tion of Northeastern’s lead­er­ship in devel­oping new strategic mate­rials for use in defense appli­ca­tions, David Luzzi, exec­u­tive director of Northeastern’s Secu­rity Research Ini­tia­tive, said in a release. “We see the Army agree­ment as the first in a set of strategic coop­er­a­tive agree­ments with agen­cies respon­sible for research on secu­rity, intel­li­gence and resilience.

Northeastern, which boasts more than 90 ongoing U.S. Department of Defense-funded research projects, signed an agreement with the National Guard earlier this year, creating an accelerated master’s degree program in homeland security for guardsmen.