America Makes announces open project call and rapid innovation call
June 4, 2021
America Makes, Youngstown, Ohio, USA, has announced an Open Project Call (OPC) worth $1.6 million in total funding from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Materials and Manufacturing Directorate, Manufacturing and Industrial Base Technology Division. The goal of this is to accelerate the development and deployment of innovative, cost-effective, and energy-efficient Additive Manufacturing technologies to meet defence and/or commercial needs.
Specifically, the OPC aims to support key goals of the America Makes’ AM Technology Roadmap, namely: Design, Material, Process, AM Genome and Value Chain. This Roadmap intends to identify measurable and meaningful challenges that, when met, promote inquiry, knowledge-sharing, and technical advancements across the industry.
The 2021 OPC addresses five technical topic domains:
- Strategies for Real-Time Defect Mitigation for AM Processes
- Introductory-level Training Course on the Inspection and Quality Assurance of AM Components
- Accelerating Qualification of AM Materials for High-temperature Applications
- Solid-state AM Process Technical Data Package Maturation
- Assessing Opportunities for AM Process Productivity Improvement
“This Open Project Call represents a vast array of topics and opportunities to benefit our membership and our industry at large,” stated Brandon D Ribic, PhD, America Makes Technology Director. “As our first OPC of 2021, we are thrilled with the efforts of our Roadmap Advisory and Working Groups for their contributions in identifying, prioritising, and developing these technology and education and workforce development topics. We also appreciate the provided insightful membership input that helped to further enhance this OPC. I look forward to receiving the quality and innovative responses that we have come to expect from our membership community.”
Also announced was a Rapid Innovation Call (RIC), for which America Makes is seeking topic submissions with the intent to officially launch a RIC at the beginning of August, when future funding opportunities will be made available.
The submission deadline for both the Open Project and Rapid Innovation Calls is July 2, 2021. On August 3, four awards are expected to be given for the OPC. At this time, the announcement for RIC will also take place, with the award(s) for that call to be announced on September 20.
Further information is available via the organisation’s website.
