May 14, 2003

In This Issue:
	NIST WTC Investigation Marks One-Third Mark with Progress Report
	NIST Announces Seven New Advanced Technology Program Awards
	NIST Traps, Prepares and Serves Atoms—One at a Time
	Baldrige Index Beaten by S&P 500 After Nine Winning Years
	Clock Accuracy by Radio? NIST Paper Tells All

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Building Safety

NIST WTC Investigation Marks One-Third Mark with Progress Report

At a press briefing in New York City on May 7, 2003, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Director Arden Bement Jr. reported solid progress by the agency’s World Trade Center investigation team at the one-third mark of the ongoing 24-month effort.

NIST released a progress report on the WTC investigation, its second since the effort began in August 2002. The progress report does not include any conclusions or make any recommendations, since the investigation is still in its early stages.

Key points in the progress report included:

An online Adobe Acrobat version of May 2003 Progress Report on the Federal Building and Fire Safety Investigation of the World Trade Center Disaster (NIST Special Publication 1000-3) is available at http://wtc.nist.gov.

Media Contact:
Michael E. Newman, (301) 975-3025

 

Technology Partnership

NIST Announces Seven New Advanced Technology Program Awards

A possible cure for cystic fibrosis, a highly efficient method of producing biodegradable plastics, and an integrated circuit that could reduce greatly the costs of high-capacity data networks are among the novel technologies to be developed by the private sector with support from seven grants announced on May 5, 2003, by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Advanced Technology Program (ATP). The new awards represent a total of up to $12.8 million in requested ATP funding and an industry share of $6 million.

Each of the seven new projects will be led by a small company. Companies and their projects are:

Agility Communications (Santa Barbara, Calif.)—Develop a photonic integrated circuit that integrates a widely tunable laser, an optical amplifier, and a high-speed optical modulator, dramatically cutting costs for tunable transmitters widely used in Internet data systems.

Chicago PT Inc. (Evanston, Ill.)—Develop and demonstrate a prototype robotic tool, the kine-assist, that will enable physical therapists to deliver more intensive and effective rehabilitation therapy to stroke patients.

ISOGENIS Inc. (Denver, Colo.)—Develop gene therapy vectors that both cure disease and prevent harmful immune response against the therapy, as well as develop a system to selectively deliver the vectors to diseased tissues.

Metabolix Inc. (Cambridge, Mass.)—Reengineer the central metabolism of E. coli bacteria and demonstrate that the new strains efficiently convert renewable sugars into high-performance biodegradable polymers.

Mobile Systems Verification Corp. (Chicago, Ill.)—Develop next-generation automated testing technology to improve mobile information system
reliability.

RAPT Industries Inc. (Livermore, Calif.)—Extend the capabilities of reactive atom plasma (RAP) processing so that it can be used to rapidly shape and polish delicate optical and semiconductor materials without damaging them.

Valaran Corp. (Princeton, N.J.)—Develop and test telecommunications software that enables secure collaboration among multiple parties in impromptu groups using heterogeneous mobile wireless devices.

Detailed information on the seven new ATP projects and general information about the ATP may be found at www.atp.nist.gov.

Media Contact:
Michael E. Newman, (301) 975-3025

 

 

Physics

NIST Traps, Prepares and Serves Atoms—One at a Time

Getting a single, constantly moving atom to go exactly where you want it to is a difficult scientific challenge. In the May 5, 2003, Applied Physics Letters, NIST physicists describe a new method that promises to produce individual “atoms on demand,” a feat likely to warm the hearts of researchers in fields ranging from nanotechnology to quantum computing to semiconductor processing.

The new method relies on six intersecting laser beams and a magnetic field to trap neutral atoms in a vacuum chamber. A “feedback loop” ensures that only one atom can be loaded into the trap at a time. The system works by sending a stream of atoms past a laser tuned to a frequency readily absorbed by that particular atom. The instant one atom absorbs the laser energy, it enters a lower energy state and drops into the trap.

While the atom is in the trap it fluoresces. A detector senses this and the instant the fluorescence stops (indicating the atom has escaped), it lets another atom in to take its place. If by chance, two atoms should drop into the trap at once, the detector senses too much light and dumps them both out by momentarily shutting off the trap.

So far, the system traps one atom at a time with 99 percent accuracy, and can eject them at a rate of 10 times per second. The NIST scientists hope to substantially speed up that rate with further research and to devise reliable ways to transfer the individual atoms to adjacent instrumentation.

For technical information, contact Jabez McClelland, (301) 975-3721, jabez@nist.gov.

Media Contact:
Laura Ost, (301) 975-4034

 

 

Quality

Baldrige Index Beaten by S&P 500 After Nine Winning Years

For the first time since the study began in 1995, the “Baldrige Index” has under- performed the Standard & Poor’s 500. The Baldrige Index is a fictitious stock fund made up of publicly traded U.S. companies that received the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award between 1992 and 2001.

Throughout the nine years of the study, the Baldrige Index consistently has outperformed the S&P 500 by as much as 6 to 1. “These studies have shown that businesses that excel in everything they do can achieve success in many areas, including the bottom line,” said Harry Hertz, director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Baldrige National Quality Program. “This past year has been a particularly tough one for technology stocks, which are a very significant component of the Baldrige portfolio. But, I am confident that in the coming years, the Baldrige Award winners will continue to excel in their performance, including in their bottom line,” he said.

In this latest study, NIST hypothetically “invested” $1,000 in the two whole company winners—Eastman Chemical Company (1993 winner) and Solectron Corp. (1991 and 1997 winner)—and the parent companies of 19 subsidiary winners. Another hypothetical $1,000 was invested in the S&P 500 for the same time period. The investment was tracked from the first business day of the month following the announcement of the Baldrige Award recipients (or the date when they began public trading, if it is later) through Dec. 2, 2002. The two whole company award winners underperformed the S&P 500 by about -0.71 to 1, with a -34.19 percent return compared to a 48.02 percent return for the S&P 500 over the multiyear period. The group of 19 subsidiary winners underperformed the S&P 500 by approximately -0.53 to 1, with a -23.74 percent return compared to a 45.16 percent return for the S&P 500.

In last year’s study, the same two whole company winners—Eastman Chemical and Solectron—outperformed the S&P 500 by about 4.5 to 1, while the parent companies of subsidiary winners outperformed the S&P 500 by about 3 to 1.

More information on all nine of the Baldrige Index studies is available at http://baldrige.nist.gov/Stock_Studies.htm.

Media Contact:
Jan Kosko, (301) 975-2767

 

 

 

Time & Frequency

Clock Accuracy by Radio? NIST Paper Tells All

It might surprise you to know that the concept of a radio-controlled clock (RCC)—wall clocks, desk clocks, wristwatches and other timepieces that use special radio signals to keep highly accurate time—is nearly as old as radio itself. Or that RCCs may never be off by more than a fraction of a second at any time. These two facts are among the many in a recently published paper by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) that explores the history of RCCs, how they work, and the type of radio signals that control them.

Some manufacturers refer to their RCCs as “atomic clocks,” but that description isn’t true. An RCC is primarily a radio receiver tuned to pick up time code signals derived from measurements made by an actual atomic clock. The RCC then uses these signals to synchronize its clock mechanism, yielding very precise time.

Like all clocks, an atomic clock—such as the NIST-F1 cesium fountain device at NIST’s Boulder, Colo., laboratories—works by making the same event happen over and over. The repetition of this event produces a frequency, which is counted to keep time. For example, in a grandfather clock, this repeating event is the swinging of a pendulum. In NIST-F1, it’s the transition of a cesium atom as it moves back and forth between two energy states.

This recent proliferation of RCCs represents one of the most significant developments in the history of timekeeping. WWVB consumer-oriented RCCs were relatively rare until 1999, when NIST increased the station’s radiated output power to 50 kilowatts, a move that allowed the signal to reach all of the United States.

For a copy of paper no. 21-03, contact Sarabeth Harris, (303) 497-3237, sarabeth@boulder.nist.gov. For technical information on RCCs, contact Michael Lombardi at (303) 497-3212 or lombardi@boulder.nist.gov.

Media Contact:
Fred McGehan (Boulder), (303) 497-3246