MSU engineers provide technological spark for military projects

Contact: Phil Hearn

Mississippi State research engineers are using their expertise in power electronics to provide some technological spark for America's war-fighting capabilities on land and at sea.

Two defense-related research initiatives guided at the university by electrical and computer engineering professor Marshall Molen are helping the U.S. Navy plan a new generation of all-electric warships and assisting Army development of HUMVEE-powered radar systems for rapid, sustainable deployment in remote fields of combat.

HUMVEE is the common nickname for the Army's High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle; the official acronym is HMMWV.

At the core of both projects is MSU's considerable wealth of research knowledge in the field of power electronics, which utilizes cutting-edge technology to convert electric power into readily useable forms. Available testing resources of the university's High Voltage Laboratory can generate lightning bolts of up to three million volts.

"We're very pleased to be playing a major role in both of these projects," said Dean Wayne Bennett of the Bagley College of Engineering, which includes Molen's electrical and computer engineering department. "They are highly focused, but offer a wide variety of engineering research and development opportunities for faculty."

MSU is a member of the Electric Ship Research and Development Consortium, which is beginning the second year of a five-year, $52 million grant from the Office of Naval Research. The consortium will help shipbuilders such as Northrop Grumman Ship Systems, whose large Ingalls facility is located in Pascagoula, design the all-electric combat vessels of the future.

Other members of the consortium include Florida State University, which is building a large test facility to evaluate project components; University of South Carolina, which is devising computer software to analyze ship systems; and University of Texas at Austin, which is developing electromechanical systems that could be utilized on ships.

Molen is principal investigator for the MSU team, which also includes departmental colleagues Randolph Follett, Herbert Ginn, Georgios Lazarou, and Michael Mazzola.

In August, Molen and Ginn will board the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy for an Arctic voyage from Thule, Greenland, to Barrow, Alaska. They will analyze the performance of the Coast Guard's only all-electric vessel during its ice-breaking mission via the Northwest Passage.

"We at the universities are not ship designers," emphasized Molen, a former department head who now directs the High Voltage Laboratory and recently was named the college's first Diversified Technology/Ergon Distinguished Professor. "We are trying to provide some of the science to assist shipbuilders.

"We want to help shipbuilders such as Northrop Grumman design a ship that can be effective throughout its 50-year lifetime," said Molen, who earned a doctorate in electrical engineering at Texas Tech University in 1974. "You have to think about how to accommodate new technologies that may be developed 25 years from now, and make sure the electrical capabilities are available for whatever those systems might be."

Northrop Grumman was awarded a $265 million government contract last year to complete the system design for the DD (X) destroyer, the Navy's next-generation surface combat vessel that will feature an integrated power system. Massachusetts-based Raytheon Corp., which has a plant at Forest, also is involved in the project.

According to the ONR, warships currently are built with their propulsion systems separate from their auxiliary systems and weapons. As a result, the considerable power locked into the mechanical propulsion train is not available for other uses.

"The move to integrated, all-electric designs will significantly improve efficiency, effectiveness and survivability while simultaneously increasing design flexibility, reducing costs and enhancing sailors' and marines' quality of service," an ONR document said in outlining future naval capabilities.

Mississippi State also is a participant in the Army Radar Power Technology Program, a multi-million-dollar project to help the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command, headquartered at Huntsville, Ala., develop cutting-edge technology.

Molen, Mazzola and Ginn, along with administrative specialist Bill Buchanan, are collaborating with researchers from the University of Mississippi and Auburn University on the five-year project, which is pumping about $1 million a year to each of the three research teams.

Now in its third year, the cooperative seeks to develop radar technology for smaller, lighter and more efficient mobile systems--such as the Army's early-warning Sentinel system--by integrating the radar and its power source. MSU's role is overall integration of the system, with emphasis on power electronics.

"One of the issues we're looking at is operating the system by using the vehicle itself to power the radar," said Molen. "The hybrid-electric HUMVEE has a relatively small diesel and a 280-volt battery array, and is driven by electric motors. So while the HUMVEE is sitting there, not being used, it can utilize its electrical power system to power the radar. We've demonstrated it several times."

He said the hybrid-electric HUMVEE is produced by PEI Electronics Inc. Basically, the Huntsville, Ala., company strips everything from beneath the hood of a regulation vehicle, installs a smaller diesel engine, larger generator and multiple electric motors, and makes some additional modifications that are not under the hood.

"How do you get from a battery on a vehicle to a radar?" asked Molen, a Greenville, Texas, native and 11-year MSU faculty member. "That's where you make use of power electronics to provide the interface."

NEWS EDITORS/DIRECTORS: For additional information, contact Dr. Molen at (662) 325-3912 or molen@ece.msstate.edu.