US Department of Defense
BLAST INJURY RESEARCH
COORDINATING OFFICE
Advancing Blast Injury Research to Protect and Heal Those Who Serve
The DOD Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Programs harness the innovative talents and entrepreneurial energies of our nation's small technology companies for US Military and economic strength. BIRCO participates by developing candidate topics for Phase I solicitations in the US Army or Defense Health Agency (DHA) SBIR/STTR Programs and manages successful proposals funded for these topics. Below is a summary of BIRCO-developed topics and resulting SBIR/STTR awards.
Blasts from improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are one the most common causes of combat injuries in recent military operations; however, there is a limited understanding of blast injury pathways including biomechanical injuries caused by the direct effects of pressures penetrating the body, flying debris, body translocation in air, and impact on hard objects. Therefore, anatomically consistent human body models and computational tools for modeling blast physics coupled to human physiology and biomechanics are needed to better understand blast injuries, interpret experimental data, and develop improved protective armor, diagnostics and medical treatment procedures.
To further develop these concepts, the DOD SBIR Program funded two Phase I projects:
Following completion of Phase I and Phase II, The DOD SBIR Program selected CFDRC for a Phase III award to continue development of their project, "Physics and Physiology Based Human Body Model of Blast Injury and Protection."
Objective
Design, develop, demonstrate, and finalize the Blast Injury Simulation framework for multiscale modeling of blast injury and
protection for military operational and combat casualty care applications.
Accomplishments
Developed a novel computational biology (CoBi) blast framework for accurate calculation of the human body blast exposure in
military heavy weapon training scenarios using data from the free field and warfighter wearable pressure sensors. This CoBi
blast tool can be used to calculate spatially and temporally resolved blast loads on the whole human body and on specific
organs vulnerable to blast loads, such as the head, face, and lungs. The CoBi blast tool (also called the Blast Overpressure
Tool) is being considered for integration with the Range Manager ToolKit for facilitating communication of safety precautions
and providing a mechanism for safety precautions to account for blast exposure on cognitive performance.
Blast-induced neurotrauma has been recognized as a major medical problem among U.S. Service members. Although large volumes of data from experimental animal models are being collected and published, the data cannot be collated or correlated with each other because the biomechanical loading conditions vary across laboratories and experiments. The objective of this topic is to develop a biomechanical surrogate of a rat model that can accurately measure shock overpressure conditions. The device will also measure the actual biomechanical loading experienced by the experimental animals so that the research results of individual laboratories can then be cross-correlated across different test conditions and research groups.
To develop this device, the DOD STTR program funded one Phase II project:
"Biofidelic Rat Surrogate for Blast-induced Neurotrauma Studies" by Creare, LLC
Objective
Develop a biomechanically accurate rat model that can precisely measure loading conditions for experimental animal models, allowing
correlation and cross-validation of research outcomes from different studies.
Accomplishments
Personalized medicine has the potential to create customized health care with medical decisions and treatments tailored to the individual patient. In the last few years, remarkable progress has been achieved in wearable non-invasive physiological and activity sensors, mobile computing, bioinformatics, and computational medicine; however, there remain few objective measures of the health status of a deployed Service member. Therefore, there is great interest in developing technology that can be used in the battlefield to non-invasively measure current health status and predict future changes in the health status of an individual.
To begin to address these concerns, the DOD SBIR Program funded three Phase I projects:
Following completion of Phase I, the DOD SBIR Program selected CFDRC for a Phase II award to continue development of their project, "Personalized Warrior Health Avatar."
Objective
Design, develop, demonstrate, and deliver a "Warfighter Health Avatar" simulation platform: physiology based modeling tools of a
Warfighter body enabling definite assessment of health status, physical and physiological performance, and injury trajectory by both
the user and medical personnel using mobile computing platforms.
Accomplishments
There is a continuing military need for the development of an effective long-term antimicrobial textile finish that can be incorporated into Service members' uniforms, wound dressings, and other hospital textiles to control the transmission of pathogenic bacteria and minimize infection. The goals of the resulting technology include easy integration into fabric weaving and manufacturing and the ability to scale production to a high throughput process, allowing large volumes of fabrics to be treated. It is anticipated that the technology will have both DOD and civilian applications, including the inclusion in antimicrobial textiles, anti-infective wound dressings, medical devices, and hospital textiles, bedding, and wipes.
To begin to develop this product, the DOD SBIR Program funded three Phase I projects:
Your 15 minute session will timeout in approximately 10 minutes.
If you're in the middle of entering information, please close this warning and save your progress (if possible) or finish up your task.
If your session fully times out, you will lose any un-saved work.
Your current Blast Injury Research Program session has expired.
Your next click will take you away from the private area, and you will lose any work you have in-progress.
Please enter your email address, and try again.