DARPA's GPS Back-Up TIMU Is Smaller Than A Penny
It seems Pennies are still serving one purpose in America by being the de facto standard for measuring the minutest of things. The GPS is practically omnipresent for an average user, but the occasional unavailability could prove to be disastrous for military operations. This calls for a back-up device that could function when GPS is facing interference in the satellite signals. DARPA Researchers at University of Michigan have been doing just that. The timing & inertial measurement unit (TIMU) contains everything that is needed for navigation in absence of GPS. The single chip TIMU contains a six axis IMU constituted of three gyroscopes and three accelerometers. A highly-accurate master clock is integrated into the miniature chip which houses materials and designs from DARPA’s Micro-Technology for Positioning, Navigation and Timing (Micro-PNT) program. The goal of the Micro-Technology for Positioning, Navigation and Timing (Micro-PNT) program is to develop technology that assists self-contained, chip-scale inertial navigation and precision guidance.
Orientation, acceleration and time are the key pieces of information required to navigate from one point to another. The elegantly designed 10 cubic millimeter chip is capable of measuring all three simultaneously. TIMU has six microfabricated layers, each devoted to a different function. DARPA believes despite the size of the device, it is robust enough to perform activities such as personnel tracking, handheld navigation, small diameter munitions and small airborne platforms.
Source: <a href="https://www.darpa.mil/NewsEvents/Releases/2013/04/10.aspx" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency - Content not found</a>
Orientation, acceleration and time are the key pieces of information required to navigate from one point to another. The elegantly designed 10 cubic millimeter chip is capable of measuring all three simultaneously. TIMU has six microfabricated layers, each devoted to a different function. DARPA believes despite the size of the device, it is robust enough to perform activities such as personnel tracking, handheld navigation, small diameter munitions and small airborne platforms.
Source: <a href="https://www.darpa.mil/NewsEvents/Releases/2013/04/10.aspx" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency - Content not found</a>
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