CU Aerospace LLC, spun out from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with core areas of expertise on staff to include spacecraft propulsion/software, high energy lasers, modeling and simulation, and advanced materials. Principals of the firm also have successfully tackled problems in plasma/discharge engineering, robotics, controls, diode lasers, fuel cell technology, oxygen extraction from lunar regolith, and software toolbox development, among other technologies. At the heart of the firm's technology capabilities is X-ray computed microtomography showing sinusoidal microchannels (300 ?m diameter) in an epoxy composite. VascTech (Vaporization of sacrificial components Technology) is a unique process developed at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) to imbue composites with three-dimensional vasculature. This enabling technology is being commercialized by CU Aerospace and has been expanded from high strength fibers to include filament for fused deposition printers and 3D sacrificial templates. CUA is currently examining several applications for microvascular composites such as thermal management, self-healing, re-configurable antenna. Recent work has been inthe area of self-healing microvascular composites. Fabrication entails incorporating VascTech polymers into an epoxy matrix and curing at elevated temperature. After curing, the composite is trimmed to expose the sacrificial polymer, which is subsequently vaporized by heating the sample to ~200°C under vacuum yielding empty channels and a vascular network. By circulating fluids with unique physical properties, there is the capability to create a new generation of biphasic composite materials in which the solid phase provides strength and form while the fluid phase provides interchangeable functionality.
