NIST CARES Act Pandemic Response Funding

NIST CARES Act Pandemic Response Funding

Award Amount: $3.4 million (distributed to ARM Institute and three other Manufacturing USA Institutes)

Geographic Scope: United States

Focus Areas: COVID-19 pandemic response through robotics solutions, testing automation, virus mitigation

Program Purpose

Funded high-impact projects for COVID-19 pandemic response through development of robotics solutions to address manufacturing and healthcare challenges.

What It Funded

• Primary Project: Wilder Systems proposal selected by NIST to develop, integrate, and deliver collaborative robots to automate COVID-19 testing processes
- Expected availability: within 4 months of project start - Application: Cobots manage RNA isolation and run multiple PCR (polymerase chain reaction) analyzers - Impact: Increases national testing capabilities, shortens result turnaround, reduces virus exposure risks - Scale: 100,000 PCR analyzers in U.S. hospitals and universities; potential for 24 million additional tests per day if all university PCR equipment ran at full capacity

Funder

U.S. Department of Commerce - National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Funding authorized by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act

Background

ARM worked with its members in spring 2020 to collect manufacturing-focused robotics proposals responding to NIST's project call for COVID-19 mitigation. The Wilder Systems project was one selected proposal. Additionally, ARM released an accelerated Technology Project Call on June 29, 2020, seeking additional proposals from members to develop robotics solutions to mitigate COVID-19 and help the Department of Defense respond to the pandemic, with $5M in additional DoD funding planned.

Contact Information

Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing Institute Mill 19 A, 4501 Lytle St., Suite 200 Pittsburgh, PA 15207 Phone: 412-785-0444 Website: www.arminstitute.org