SBIR Phase I: Educational Particle Image Velocimetry Suites

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is to develop a low cost educational particle image velocimetry (PIV) suite including both hardware and software for fluid science and engineering education at high-school, undergraduate and graduate school levels. PIV technology is fluid flow research that enables visual and quantitative analysis of the flow field. Industrial/research level PIV system usually costs over $100,000. Current PIV systems are high power systems, and their high cost and safety considerations make them not suitable for adoption in the higher education system. This development will create learning materials by developing software as a virtual teaching assistant for the education process, where the students can develop enhanced understanding of fluid flow by interactive experiments through a computer terminal in the classroom. Hence, the software will be an instrument that can be used in diverse educational settings because of its effectiveness as an education tool, high-tech appeal, compact size, low cost and safety. The broader impacts include the development of applications which more effectively utilize the computational power of multi-core processor architectures and enhanced productivity of software developers. The successful technical execution of this project and the follow up commercial development of this project would impact a broad range of application domains. Education and professional development would also be positively assisted.