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Manufacturing

At a time of opportunity and challenge for U.S. manufacturing, NIST is working with industry and universities to develop essential measurement capabilities and to forge precompetitive collaborations that help U.S. manufacturers overcome shared technical obstacles. A partner to the U.S. manufacturing sector for more than a century, NIST has a proven track record in delivering useful tools and technical assistance that existing manufacturers and aspiring start-ups need. Timely technical assists from NIST can help the nation’s manufacturers to invent, innovate and create new products and services more rapidly and more efficiently than their competitors around the world.

NIST Laboratory Programs collaborate with industry, academia, and other government agencies to develop the measurement and standards solutions to accelerate the development of the next generation of manufacturing technologies. A few key areas of NIST activity include Materials Genome Initiative, emerging technologies, and smart manufacturing.

Operation Tech Transfer
Operation Tech Transfer
NIST Mechanical Engineer Brian A. Weiss partnered with a program called FedTech, which connects government inventors with entrepreneurs for potential commercialization of government-developed technologies. Brian’s research focuses on enhancing maintenance strategies for manufacturing operations. Learn more about Brian’s research and his experience working to get federally funded technologies and capabilities into the marketplace.

The Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) facilitates and accelerates the transfer of manufacturing technology in partnership with industry, universities and educational institutions, state governments, NIST and other federal research laboratories and agencies. Find out  more about MEP.

Resilience in Manufacturing: InCharged and NJMEP
Resilience in Manufacturing: InCharged and NJMEP
Learn how one manufacturer, with the help from their local MEP Center, was able to innovate and pivot during challenging times to not only survive but thrive while growing their business. With a background in graphic design, Jessica Gonzales, Owner and CEO of InCharged, didn’t become a manufacturer until she had an idea that needed a manufacturing solution. Through support from the New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program, Inc. (NJMEP), Jessica and her team were able to go from a start-up to expanding into three companies while entering new markets. The manufacturing sector offers a world of opportunity! NJMEP: https://www.nist.gov/mep/centers/new-jersey-manufacturing-extension-pro… InCharged: https://incharged.com/ local MEP Center: https://www.nist.gov/mep/centers

Manufacturing USA consists of linked Manufacturing Innovation Institutes with common goals, but unique concentrations. Here industry, academia, and government partners are leveraging existing resources, collaborating, and co-investing to nurture manufacturing innovation and accelerate commercialization. Find out more about Manufacturing USA.

Increasing Diversity in Advanced Manufacturing Careers
Increasing Diversity in Advanced Manufacturing Careers
Advanced manufacturing creates millions of well-paid careers in industries from robotics to semiconductors. NIST’s sponsored Manufacturing USA® institute, NIIMBL, created the NIIMBL eXperience to offer undergraduate students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities real-world insight into careers in the biopharmaceutical manufacturing industry. The goals of the program are to raise awareness of the industry and its role in human health and well-being, as well as improve recruitment of a vast talented and diverse workforce. This story features one student’s experience in this program exploring advanced manufacturing with a mechanical engineering degree, and the industry opportunities and insights it revealed. https://niimbl.force.com/s/ https://www.manufacturingusa.com/

The Research

Projects & Programs

Schematic of interface engineering 2D materials.

Chemical Functionalization and Manipulation of Nano Materials

Ongoing
This project focuses on manipulating nanomaterials, including weakly bonded van der Waals systems, and probing emergent phenomena in these nanoengineered systems to impact technologies such as nanoelectronics, optoelectronics, quantum sensing, and quantum computing. Developing processes to

Crystal Plasticity Modeling of Yield Surface Evolution

A robust multiaxial constitutive law is needed to predict stresses within parts formed from sheet metal to be able to compensate for such phenomena as elastic springback. Ideally, the constitutive law would not need to be "trained" using empirical mechanical property data alone, but would be able to
Measurement Science for Robotics and Autonomous Systems

Measurement Science for Robotics and Autonomous Systems

Ongoing
Objective To develop and deploy measurement science that advances manufacturing robotic system performance, collaboration, agility, autonomy, safety, and ease of implementation to enhance U.S. innovation and industrial competitiveness. Technical Idea The fundamental idea is to provide the
cementitious material workshop cover

Properties of Sustainable Fresh Concrete Project

Completed
Objective - Provide the industry with measurement science tools to predict whether a concrete can be pumped, with SRMs (Standard Reference Materials) to calibrate concrete rheometers and with tools for quality control in the field. What is the new technical idea? Fresh concrete is intended a
View All Projects/Programs

Additional Resources Links

Publications
Industry Impacts
Rethinking Manufacturing Thumbnail

Rethinking Manufacturing

American manufacturing, once seen as the world’s icon of industrialization and then as a symbol of decline, is once again changing. Rethinking Manufacturing is the story of two young individuals who are on the cutting edge of that revolution. With support from America Makes (the first Manufacturing USA institute), Youngstown State University, and the Youngstown Business Incubator, these entrepreneurs and their peers are rethinking manufacturing, rethinking career choices, and rethinking the very idea of how we build and revitalize communities.

See video

News and Updates

Square with rounded edges. Fill of square looks like American flag. Coming off the sides of the square are lines with unfilled circles at end. Words underneath: CHIPS for AMERICA

Department of Commerce Awards CHIPS Incentives to Micron for Idaho and New York Projects and Announces Preliminary Memorandum of Terms for Virginia DRAM Project to Secure Domestic Supply of Legacy Memory Chips

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Square with rounded edges. Fill of square looks like American flag. Coming off the sides of the square are lines with unfilled circles at end. Words underneath: CHIPS for AMERICA

Biden-Harris Administration Announce Preliminary Terms with Coherent, SkyWater, and X-Fab to Advance U.S. Supply Chain Security

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Square with rounded edges. Fill of square looks like American flag. Coming off the sides of the square are lines with unfilled circles at end. Words underneath: CHIPS for AMERICA

Biden-Harris Administration Announces CHIPS Incentives Awards with Absolics and Entegris to Support Development of Advanced Packaging Technology and Onshore Material for Leading-Edge Chip Production

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