Effectiveness in the increasingly congested electromagnetic
environment is critical to future defence and security
operations. We need to harness the advances in metasurface
technology and smoothly integrate these innovations into
devices and onto platforms to maintain an electromagnetic
tactical advantage for the front-line.
Advantage may be realised by sensing and communication
superiority over an adversary. This applies equally to
enhancing your own capabilities, degrading those of your
adversaries, or being better able to differentiate your own
signals from those in the congested environment. Advanced
metasurfaces science will allow better control
electromagnetic waves, thereby giving an operator the
ability to understand the battlefield better, communicate
further and more securely, and do this more cheaply and
with a smaller device footprint than the current
technology.
To remain at the forefront of electromagnetic developments,
the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) Metasurfaces
competition is, once again, reaching out to experts in the
private sector and academia. We want to talk to all
innovators who are researching, experimenting or innovating
with the latest breakthroughs in metasurfaces technology
with the purpose of unlocking new and enhanced
applications, device and system performance.
Phase 1 saw the successful placement of 12 contracts across
9 companies, with a combined value of nearly £900k.
Building on the success of Phase 1, and in collaboration
with the Ministry of Defence (MOD), we are seeking new and
follow-on proposals incorporating metasurface science to
gain a technological advantage, primarily for defence and
security, but also for dual use application alongside
partner civil sectors. Phase 2 will culminate in a
practical demonstration of the work to defence and security
end users, therefore we are expecting technology readiness
level (TRL) 3 and above to be achievable.
The competition is aimed at people who are interested in
exploiting and showcasing their good ideas to harness
metasurfaces for improving electromagnetic hardware and
systems. We are keen to promote teaming between
organisations from across industry, academia, and broader
supply chains to develop the role of metasurfaces in
relevant applications.
To encourage collaboration and enable innovators to find
out more about what has been achieved to date, we will be
launching Phase 2 at a demonstration day for Phase 1 on 5
September 2019 at Aston Villa FC, Birmingham. To support
connection to dual use and civil opportunities, we expect
to be joined by representatives from InnovateUK and the
Knowledge Transfer Network. To attend, sign up at
Eventbrite.
In parallel to this competition, the Advanced Vision for
2020 and Beyond competition is seeking novel
optics and materials (challenge 1) for which
metasurface-based solutions can be applicable. If a
proposal is submitted to both competitions, it should
clearly outline duplications of costs and works. This
competition will be holding a launch and collaboration
event on 4 September in London, further information can be
found on Eventbrite.
At least £500,000 is available for the Metasurfaces Phase 2
competition which will close at midday on 31 October 2019.
We anticipate contracts for projects of up to 12 months’
duration to be placed by February/March 2020.
