Formaldehyde Profiler Using Laser Induced Fluorescence Technique

Formaldehyde (HCHO) is a key trace species that is of great interest to atmospheric scientists in NASA and other research institutions. In this SBIR project, we proposed to build an airborne atmospheric formaldehyde (HCHO) profiler implementing a Laser Induced Fluorescence (LIF) technique. This airborne instrument can also be used on the ground for measuring vertical HCHO profiles. To our knowledge, there exists no previous formaldehyde remote sensor that can measure range resolved formaldehyde profile by any technique. The instrument will be able to provide an HCHO profile from an aircraft flying at 20 km altitude to the ground at a 1 km range resolution, and achieve sensitivities better than 70 part-per-trillion-by-volume (pptv) concentration levels at a range of 1 km at nighttime with one second averaging time. In addition, we will explore the feasibility of daytime operation achieving sensitivity of less than 1 part-per-billion-by-volume (ppbv) at a range of 3 km. In Phase I we have built a breadboard formaldehyde profiler instrument and demonstrated the capability of performing highly sensitive nighttime formaldehyde measurements. The outcome of the Phase I work established the feasibility for high sensitivity detection of range resolved HCHO, and provides the design of the prototype sensor.

The HCHO profiler can be easily mounted on an aircraft or deployed ground based, which makes it a suitable candidate for a lot of currently active and future NASA missions. HCHO is a primary measurement objective in two missions of the Decadal Survey (GEO-CAPE and GACM). The proposed sensor allows profiling of formaldehyde for Earth science research such as, climate science, environmental monitoring and commercial pollution compliance efforts. With minor adaptations such as using a UV laser at different wavelengths, the sensor can be used to measure fluorescence signal of other chemicals such as NO, NO x , NO2, and OH, etc.

Several government agencies including NASA, EPA, DoE and DoD have identified the need for instruments for formaldehyde detection. Besides the environmental and industrial application, the LIF lidar technique can be used by many other military applications including detection of Chemical warfare Agent (CWA), bio warfare agent (BWA) aerosols, explosives.

This is early/mid-stage (TRL 6) — the most realistic path in is NASA SBIR/STTR, which funds small businesses and research institutions to develop technology aligned with NASA's needs (equity-free, phased funding). Check whether a current SBIR/STTR solicitation topic overlaps with this project's technology area, or contact the project directly (above) to ask.

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