WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – WaveLogix, a start-up technology company commercializing an Internet of Things sensor system for infrastructure monitoring, has received a six-month SBIR Phase I grant from the National Science Foundation to advance its technology.
The company’s Rebel brand of concrete strength sensors improves on the industry standard for measuring concrete strength: breaking multiple field-cured concrete samples. Destructive concrete strength testing has several disadvantages, including inaccuracy, quality control issues, user variability, material waste, and cost.
The Rebel sensor from WaveLogix improves upon the industry standard for measuring concrete strength. WaveLogix received a six-month SBIR Phase I grant from NSF worth $255,996 to further develop it. (Image courtesy of Luna Lu) Download image
The Rebel Sensor System directly measures real-time, in-situ concrete strength without the need for destructive concrete testing or maturity curves. The sensors are also unaffected by concrete mix design, meaning the mix can change during a project.
Luna Lu is the Founder and Chief Science Officer at WaveLogix. The NSF grant will help accelerate WaveLogix’s timeline to market, she said.
“The funding will help the company accelerate its product development stage, especially the IoT platform for data processing and sharing,” Lu said.
WaveLogix plans to begin beta testing the Rebel sensor system in 2023.
“After the beta testing, we will start manufacturing the sensors with an initial market focused on roads, bridges and other major infrastructure projects,” he said.
Lu is also an ACPA professor at the Lyles School of Civil Engineering. She is the founding director of the Center for Intelligence Infrastructure at Purdue University. Lu, who invented the technology that WaveLogix is commercializing, reports to the Purdue Research Foundation’s Office of Technology Commercialization.
The Rebel brand of concrete strength sensors has been named a 2021 American Society of Civil Engineers GameChanger. The scientific paper also received the 2022 Alfred Nobel Prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers.
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About the Purdue Research Foundation Office of Technology Commercialization
The Purdue Research Foundation’s Office of Technology Commercialization conducts the most extensive technology transfer programs of any research university in the U.S. It supports Purdue University’s economic development initiatives and benefits the university’s academic activities through commercialization, licensing, and preservation of Purdue. Enrollment of intellectual creativity. The office is located in the Convergence Innovation and Collaboration Center in Purdue’s Discovery Park District, adjacent to Purdue’s campus. The office reported that in fiscal year 2021, 159 agreements have been completed, granting 236 technologies, 394 disclosures, and 187 US patents. The office is managed by the Purdue Research Foundation and received the 2019 Innovation and Economic Prosperity Universities Award from the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities. In the year In 2020, the IPWatchdog Institute ranked Purdue third nationally in startup innovation and in the top 20 for patents. The Purdue Research Foundation is a private, not-for-profit organization created to advance the mission of Purdue University. Contact otcip@prf.org for more information.
Secretary: Steve Martin, sgmartin@prf.org
Source: Luna Lu, luna@purdue.edu
