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Please direct questions about the magazine or this Web page to Anne Scott.

By Janet Zink
Photography by Jason Marsh

Researchers in the College of Marine Science are using MEMS technology to develop underwater sensors that might one day be used to make sure our borders are secure, your drinking water is safe and your children are healthy.

USF College of Medicine pediatricians Robert Nelson and Laura Hobner are working with College of Marine Science researchers to develop a newborn-sized training mannequin.

A ship on a chip? It could happen.

Using microelectromechanical systems, also known as MEMS, David Fries hopes to create a chip that will perform all the functions currently handled by a sea vessel carrying a crew of scientists and a fully-equipped laboratory.

MEMS devices, like the one that Fries, a researcher in USF's College of Marine Science, envisions are comprised of microscopic gears, hinges and levers as small as human hair fiber.

"You've got these micro landscapes with not only electronic functions but also mechanical, fluidic and optical functions working in concert," Fries says. "You can build a complete system on a chip."

The potential for MEMS technology is already revolutionizing industries throughout the world. Biotech companies, for example, are developing miniature sensors that will detect cancer and other diseases. Fiberoptic, manufacturing, and telecommunication companies also will incorporate MEMS technology in their systems and products.

At USF, MEMS research focuses on the development of underwater biochemical sensors.

With a $13.1-million grant from the Department of Defense, Fries and his colleagues in the colleges of Marine Science and Engineering are working to develop a miniature system that can analyze the biological and chemical make-up of the ocean, bay or other bodies of water.

The system would be deployed on autonomous underwater vehicles that could independently cruise around the ocean or a port, monitoring the water for toxins or explosives. The sensors may be used to test water in a port for agents used for bioterrorism or drinking water that's coming out of a treatment plant. The events of Sept. 11, 2001 placed a new emphasis on the use of such sensors for homeland security.

The biochemical sensing device, no larger than a deck of cards, would draw in a water sample using its fluidic system. A tiny electronic pump would push the sample to another part of the chip where the DNA would be extracted and amplified. Then, the fluid would be fed to the testing section where an electromechanical system would analyze the DNA and send a signal back to scientists in a laboratory in St. Petersburg if harmful materials were detected.

Depending on what's found, the vehicle might then perform some kind of action, such as radioing for cleanup to make the area safe.

MEMS research at USF, in fact, began to take shape in 1994 when Peter Betzer, who was chairman of what was then the Department of Marine Science in the College of Arts and Sciences created the Center for Ocean Technology. The center was created because Betzer believed that for the marine science program to be competitive it had to have an engineering component, and he began hiring faculty and staff to create novel underwater instruments.

Around the same time, USF's marine scientists received a grant from the U.S. Navy to develop sensors that could find mines in the water, a need that was identified during the Persian Gulf War.

Fries, who now leads the Department of Defense project, came to USF in 1996 and drove the MEMS effort in the Center for Ocean Technology. The first contract was awarded in September 2000, and the center now holds $13.1 million in grants for MEMS research.

The relationship and research evolved away from mine sensors to the creation of underwater chemical, biological and physical sensors for a variety of uses. It has most recently evolved into miniaturizing those sensors.

Already, the COT has developed a Bottom-Stationed Ocean Profiler or BSOP, a 10-by-7-foot platform that holds chemical, biological and physical sensors that give information about the safety of the water. The profiler sits underwater, so it is not as noticeable as a buoy, and surfaces on command to collect data and radio it back to a person in an office.

The autonomous underwater vehicle pictured above holds sensors, develpoed at USF, that determine the biological, chemical, and physical make-up of the ocean.

But the BSOP is macro-sized, and the vision of the future calls for smaller vehicles that are less expensive to produce and able to navigate small spaces or work in swarms. The newest autonomous underwater vehicles are as small as 5-by-24 inches. Fries is helping researchers at Duke University outfit their miniaturized AUVs with MEMS-based sensors.

The work requires a multi-disciplinary effort that involves dozens of faculty members and graduate students in engineering and marine science who are focusing on specific aspects of the system. For example, in the College of Engineering, Thomas Weller is working on the development of the radio frequency telemetry portion of the system, and Shekhar Bhansali is developing the power supply for ion traps that are necessary for the identification of unique molecular structures.

"MEMS technology for a long time has been focused on developing individual pieces for a very small machine. Now the industry is moving more toward creating whole systems, and that's our forte," says Carol Steele, business development manager of the COT.

Although Fries and his colleagues are focusing on the development of underwater sensors using MEMS technology, the sensors have wide-ranging applications.

"By addressing the most difficult cast of the ocean, where you have corrosion and pressure and vibration and fish and biology, we're designing a system that can easily be used in a factory or water treatment plant," Fries says.

Or, the human body.

"Many of the lessons learned making underwater sensors applies to putting sensors in space and the body," says Steele. "We believe if we can make it work with the saline solution of the ocean we can make it work in the saline solution of the body."

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