What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project AA7 of PE 0601102A. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
Will finalize the generic framework of a machine learning model that can be used to develop arbitrary alloys and processing routes for better extensibility into relevant material properties; validate a constitutive model of novel alloy systems utilizing high-rate testing and ballistic assessment; assess the mechanical response of powder coatings using micromechanical assessment techniques; refine material characterization tools to determine material microstructure as a function of processing history; develop a laser-based process for the deposition of high strength, thermally resistant ceramic coatings; investigate the influence of powder chemistry and morphology on the relationship between processing, microstructure, and properties of transparent ceramics; refine the synthesis of nanocomposite coatings and fibers from liquid crystal solutions of cellulose nanocrystals; investigate non-linear optical behavior of materials using their interactions with small molecules, optical trapping using topologies controlled through advanced manufacturing, and textures for light scattering to confuse optical detection; validate synthetic image methodology using topology optimized additively manufactured coatings; high-throughput synthesis, processing, and characterization techniques to inform machine learning enabled computational materials engineering for accelerated materials discovery and maturation; devise synthesis and manufacturing routes that enable complex, scalable, directed assembly and self-assembly of multi-polymer hybrids; combine micro-scale material patterning with meso-scale directed additive assembly to build geometrically complex parts with property and functional gradients.
This is not a new start. FY 2027 funding increase reflects the consolidation of other ongoing efforts within this project from Microscopic/Nanostructural Materials, High Deformation Rate Materials, Materiel Research and Processing Using High Energy Fields, One Dimensional (1D) and Two Dimensional (2D) Materials and Processing Research, Terminal Ballistic Design and Evaluation for Next Generation Materials, and Additive Manufacturing Sciences to support the creation of Foundational Materials and Advanced Manufacturing Sciences. Funding increase reflects additional research in thermally resistant ceramic coatings & optimized additively manufactured coatings.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2027 | Request | 14.1 |
This activity is 38% of project AA7's FY2027 request and 6.5% of PE 0601102A's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
14 activities in project AA7
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the project page.