The general purpose of this competitively awarded DARPA contract is to investigate innovative approaches that enable revolutionary advances in science, devices, or systems. The specific purpose is to develop a micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) implementation of NGIMG, with the ultimate objective being the realization of tiny, low-power, rotation rate sensors capable of achieving performance commensurate with requirements for GPS-denied navigation of small platforms, including individual soldiers, unmanned (micro) air vehicles, unmanned underwater vehicles, and even tiny (e.g., insect-sized) robots. By harnessing the advantages of micro-scale miniaturization, the NGIMG program is expected to yield tiny (if not chip-scale) gyroscopes with navigation-grade performance characteristics Successful completion of this 54 month project will enable completely autonomous navigation without any reliance on GPS. Project goals are gyro bias stability of 0.1°/hr and angular random walk of 0.005°/hr in a one cubic cm package using less than 100mW of power for a six axis IMU.

NGIMG-enabled devices with characteristics similar to that listed above and achieved via low cost, batch fabrication methods are expected to enable a myriad of strategic capabilities. In particular, the sheer portability of the rotation rate sensors sought by the NGIMG program should introduce a host of new applications and deployment scenarios, including wearable inertial measurement units (IMU’s) for dismounted warriors capable of GPS-denied navigation for lengthy periods; small IMU’s for unmanned air and underwater vehicles, and for guidance of small, long-range munitions; and tiny IMU’s for insect-like robots intended for a variety of future applications, including first warning perimeter sensing. Together with chip-scale atomic clocks (CSAC’s) and location-tracking algorithms that harness additional kinetic information (e.g., biokinetic), chip-scale NGIMG’s should allow man-portable dead-reckoning devices with unprecedented precision, with and without GPS. By enabling a swelling of applications, as illustrated above, miniaturization via NGIMG technology is expected to generate a need for high volume manufacturing that, together with wafer-level batch fabrication methods enabled by MEMS technology, should substantially lower the cost of miniature navigation systems, and thus, further fuel expansion of the application suite for NGIMG technology.

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications. Areas of expertise include sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008

Dr. Katherine Greene, President of Archangel, says "we are proud of Ron’s achievement in becoming an AS9100 Aerospace auditor.  This is one of the many ways that Archangel strives for Quality and Safety in the Inertial Sensing Market through Innovative Research, Design, Development and Manufacture of Products that Meet or Exceed Customer Expectations".

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn , Alabama . Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and Power Electronics for Military and Space applications.  Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

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334-826-8008

The objective of this contract is to develop a low cost six degrees of freedom body tracking system to monitor the orientations of occupants and pedestrians as well as vehicle kinematics in vehicular impact tests. This tracker system can be standalone or part of a subsystem that can communicate with other trackers and an external computer via serial, USB and/or Bluetooth interface. The proposed tracker, coined Body Orientation Sensing System (BOSS), will be based on Archangel’s Inertial Measurement Unit (IM3).  BOSS will employ QFLASP (Quaternion Fuzzy Logic Adaptive Signal Processing) to compute orientations (roll, pitch and yaw), velocities and positions.  If needed, this IMU based system will have an option to use a magnetic sensor and/or GPS to correct for long-term drift in measures.  An optional ‘Smart Fuzzy Corrector’ feature in QFLASP will assess the quality of measured data and automatically reject inconsistent GPS or magnetic data and select the appropriate proprietary adaptive filtering algorithms based on quality of data to compute solutions.

The expected result of the BOSS program is a new line of kinematics sensors with unprecedented performance.  BOSS sensors promise extreme miniaturization, low power, high accuracy and rich communications features that will enable a new era in crash test instrumentation.   Major anticipated markets for the BOSS sensor include DOT, independent laboratories, the automotive industry and ATD manufacturers.  The BOSS sensor can also be marketed to smaller, “specialty” customers such as DOD (pilot safety) and the boating industry. 

  Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn , Alabama . Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and Power Electronics for Military and Space applications.  Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

 Media Contact:
334-826-8008

The objective of this proposal is to develop a low cost head tracking system to monitor the orientations of an individual’s head. This head tracker can be incorporated with a 3-D audio system that will provide cues to operators for increasing situational awareness. This proposed system will be based on Archangel’s Inertial Measurement Unit ‘IM3’.  The Head Alignment and Orientation (HALO) system will use QFLASP (Quaternion Fuzzy Logic Adaptive Signal Processing) to compute roll, pitch and yaw angles. This IMU based system will have the option to use a magnetic sensor and/or GPS to compute the head orientation accurately. The ‘Smart Fuzzy Corrector’ in QFLASP can reject the inconsistent GPS or magnetic data and use appropriate proprietary filtering algorithms to compute solutions based on quality of the data.

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn , Alabama . Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and Power Electronics for Military and Space applications.  Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

 Media Contact:
334-826-8008

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and Power Electronics for Military and Space applications. Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008

Three-phase ac power from the linear generator is converted to desired dc output by the Intelligent Energy Controller (IEC). The IEC contains the power converter, battery recharger, sensor suites (for monitoring battery state of charge) and a processor that supervises all activities. The IEC uses adaptive control and optimum battery recharge routines to maximize efficiency as load levels and generator output vary. Additional features include data logging for post-mission maintenance, real-time diagnostics and displays.

Mobile power sources, such as batteries, often add great additional weight to a backpacker’’s load. As a result, there is great interest in harvesting electrical power from the energy expended during walking in a variety of situations. A number of markets have been identified for application of this developed technology. Once it is available to the commercial market, the Harvester Backpack will help consumers to use their electronic equipment in remote locations, where no other source of energy is available. Different versions of this backpack could allow disaster relief workers, explorers or soldiers to go out into the field with fewer heavy replacement batteries for cell phones, GPS instruments, night vision goggles and other portable electronics. Refinements of the design could also lead to backpacks that use active morphing to increase comfort and to dynamically customize fit. Incorporating therapeutic features is also possible.

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and power electronics for military and space applications. Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008

John Gorski
Product Manager
100 Executive Way, Suite 212
Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida 32082 USA
Phone +1 904-273-1200
Fax: +1 904-273-2596
E-Mail: John Gorski

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications and power electronics for military and space applications.  Areas of expertise include power conversion and management, sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008

The general purpose of this competitively awarded DARPA contract is to investigate innovative approaches that enable revolutionary advances in science, devices, or systems. The specific purpose is to develop a micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) implementation of NGIMG, with the ultimate objective being the realization of tiny, low-power, rotation rate sensors capable of achieving performance commensurate with requirements for GPS-denied navigation of small platforms, including individual soldiers, unmanned (micro) air vehicles, unmanned underwater vehicles, and even tiny (e.g., insect-sized) robots. By harnessing the advantages of micro-scale miniaturization, the NGIMG program is expected to yield tiny (if not chip-scale) gyroscopes with navigation-grade performance characteristics Successful completion of this 54 month project will enable completely autonomous navigation without any reliance on GPS. Project goals are gyro bias stability of 0.1°/hr and angular random walk of 0.005°/hr in a one cubic cm package using less than 100mW of power for a six axis IMU.

NGIMG-enabled devices with characteristics similar to that listed above and achieved via low cost, batch fabrication methods are expected to enable a myriad of strategic capabilities. In particular, the sheer portability of the rotation rate sensors sought by the NGIMG program should introduce a host of new applications and deployment scenarios, including wearable inertial measurement units (IMU’s) for dismounted warriors capable of GPS-denied navigation for lengthy periods; small IMU’s for unmanned air and underwater vehicles, and for guidance of small, long-range munitions; and tiny IMU’s for insect-like robots intended for a variety of future applications, including first warning perimeter sensing. Together with chip-scale atomic clocks (CSAC’s) and location-tracking algorithms that harness additional kinetic information (e.g., biokinetic), chip-scale NGIMG’s should allow man-portable dead-reckoning devices with unprecedented precision, with and without GPS. By enabling a swelling of applications, as illustrated above, miniaturization via NGIMG technology is expected to generate a need for high volume manufacturing that, together with wafer-level batch fabrication methods enabled by MEMS technology, should substantially lower the cost of miniature navigation systems, and thus, further fuel expansion of the application suite for NGIMG technology.

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications. Areas of expertise include sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008

Archangel’s AHR150A, selected by Bell, provides ARINC 706-4 Air Data on 4 ARINC 429 Lo-Speed busses and ARINC 705-5 Attitude Data on 4 ARINC 429 Hi-Speed busses. Each AHR150A system is comprised of two boxes, an Inertial Sensing Unit (ISU) and a remotely mounted three axis Magnetic Sensing Unit (MSU). The ISU contains multiple dissimilar software and processors to achieve true DO178b Level A performance with MEMS sensors. Certification of the unit is expected in December of 2006, with deliveries starting in the first quarter of 2007.

The heart of the AHR150A inertial sensing is a commercial version of the IM3 (Inertial Measurement Cube) and is based on Archangel’s proprietary FLASP software. The IM3 is being provided in varying configurations for a variety of guidance and control systems, image stabilization systems, and other applications.

The Bell/Agusta 609 is the world’s first civilian Tiltrotor aircraft. The BA609 Tiltrotor combines the speed, altitude, and comfort of a turboprop with the vertical takeoff and landing capabilities of a helicopter. Having cruising capabilities of 25,000 ft., this versatile aircraft will fly in icing conditions and extreme climates, from Arctic to desert. Seating up to nine passengers and at twice the speed of typical helicopters of comparable capacity, the BA609 is designed to be the best multi-mission aircraft for the task.

Jack Gallagher, Program Director for Bell/Agusta 609, expressed the importance of the long-term agreement, "Key to the success of the 609 is cost, performance, weight and schedule; Archangel Systems meets these critical elements and we welcome them to our Team."

"Archangel was founded to improve inertial sensing and navigation systems while at the same time reducing costs" said Archangel’s president Kitty Greene. "Bell’s selection makes it clear that Archangel is achieving that goal."

Archangel Systems, Inc. is a private, closely held Alabama Corporation, headquartered in Auburn, Alabama. Formed in 1992, the company specializes in Inertial Sensing Systems & Solutions for Aerospace, Automotive, and Military Applications. Areas of expertise include sensor development, hardware & software development, as well as FAA certification of both hardware & software to the highest levels of criticality. For additional information, please visit www.archangel.com.

Media Contact: 334-826-8008