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A small crowd, including representatives from the U.S. Department of Energy, gathered on a wide stretch of lawn on the CU Boulder campus to witness a one-of-kind technology demonstration—a laser device that could soon transform the oil and gas industry in the American West and keep potent greenhouse gasses out of the atmosphere.��

Carly, Colton, Sean, and Greg demonstrated Precision Laser Diagnostic Lab's first mobilized mid-infrared dual comb spectrometer at the Airforce Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Airforce Base! They took measurements inside the combustor of a ground-test scramjet engine. Way to go team!

Two University of Colorado Boulder mechanical engineering PhD students have earned prestigious 2024����(NDSEG) Fellowships.�� Alexander Hedrick and Carly Rowe have each been awarded the Department of Defense honor, which provides three year fellowships to promising young scientists and engineers.

Carly Rowe's research in the Precision Laser Diagnostics Lab��focuses on laser absorption spectroscopy using mode-locked mid-infrared frequency combs to simultaneously measure velocity, temperature, pressure, species mole fraction, and mass flux with low uncertainty and high resolution in a scramjet combustor.��

The program, established by Congress in 1989, provides fellowships to up to 500 people across the United States annually and is designed to promote education in science and engineering disciplines relevant to the Department of Defense.

Elevate Quantum, of which CU Boulder is a key partner, announced today that it has received a Tech Hub Phase 2 implementation award from the Department of Commerce, unlocking more than $127 million in new federal and state funding.��

The award is expected to drive more than $2 billion in additional private capital and cement the Mountain West as a global leader for quantum innovation.��

A dual-frequency-comb absorption spectrometer that��provides broad optical bandwidth to measure the mid-infrared absorption fingerprint of complex molecular reactants.

The invention of broad optical bandwidth mode-locked frequency combs opens new potentials for accurate, multi-species laser-based diagnostics. Quantum transitions in many molecules can be probed simultaneously with thousands of finely spaced and precisely known optical frequencies that are individually measured at comb tooth resolution by interfering two combs together, a technique called dual-comb spectroscopy (DCS).

The U.S. Department of Energy issued a $189 million conditional loan commitment on Jan. 5 to LongPath Technologies, Inc. of Boulder to fund the manufacture and deployment of its Active Emissions Overwatch System in “key U.S. oil and gas production basins.” The technology was developed at��Dr. Greg Reiker's laser laboratory at the University of Colorado's Mechanical Engineering department in Boulder.

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Ultrafast dual-comb spectroscopy - Article in Nature Photonics

An artistic image of a dual-frequency comb that is generated by using an optical parametric oscillator to convert a pair of near-infrared combs into the mid-infrared. The generated combs enable nanosecond-timescale spectroscopy for probing the ultrafast dynamics found in supersonic gas jets, explosions and chemical kinetics.

Professor Greg Rieker has been awarded one of seven��2023-2024 translational quantum research seed grants��incentivizing quantum science and technology innovations launched from the lab to accelerate them along the development path to new programs and businesses.��“Carcinogenic air pollutant monitoring with dual-comb spectroscopy”
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Professor Greg Rieker has received the 2023 Faculty Research Award from��the CU Boulder College of Engineering & Applied��Sciences.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE)����(LPO) announced a����to LongPath Technologies, Inc. (LongPath) for an up to $189 million loan guarantee to support the fabrication and installation of a real-time methane emissions monitoring network in U.S. oil and gas production basins across Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, and��Texas.����LongPath Technologies, Inc��is Professor Rieker's lab's spinoff company founded in 2017. ��Its' continuous line sensor technology was developed through joint research between NIST and CU Boulder, and supported by grants from DOE's ARPA E program.��

A new frequency comb setup can capture the moment-by-moment details of carbon dioxide gas escaping from a nozzle at supersonic speeds in an air-filled chamber, followed by rapid oscillations of gas due to complex aerodynamics within the chamber. The data plot shows the absorbance of light (vertical) over time (horizontal left to right) across a range of frequencies (horizontal forward to back). The project leader explained the results of recent experiments published in Nature Photonics��to a��Physics World reporter.

Engineers at CU Boulder and the Colorado-based company����are employing specialized lasers originally developed for research in quantum physics to do something surprising: They’re sniffing out natural gas, or methane, leaking from pipes at oil and gas facilities around the American West.��

Professor Rieker is collaborating with a diverse team of researchers led by CU Boulder Professor Juliet Gopinath on����the three-year, $5.9 million project called “SLEUTH:��Spectroscopy of Oceanic��Liquid��Environments��Using��Towed Optical Sensor��Heads” through the U.S. Department of Energy’s recent announcement for 11 projects in��supporting novel efforts to measure, report��and validate mCDR and identify cost-effective and energy efficient carbon removal solutions.��

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Toptica Photonics AG and the University of Colorado Boulder have developed a frequency comb system that can detect the presence of specific molecules in a sample every 20 nanoseconds, or billionths of a second. With this new capability, researchers can potentially use frequency combs to better understand the split-second intermediate steps in fast-moving processes ranging from the workings of hypersonic jet engines to the chemical reactions between enzymes that regulate cell growth. The research team announced its results in a paper published in��.

“What is truly special about this work is that it substantially lowers the barrier to entry for researchers who would like to use frequency combs to study fast processes,” said co-author Greg Rieker, a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder.

U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet visited campus Oct. 20, and the trip to campus became an unexpected cause for celebration about Colorado’s place in the nation’s burgeoning quantum ecosystem.

At��, multidisciplinary teams from both national and international��institutions investigate promising solutions to formidable quantum challenges of both fundamental and practical significance.��Q-SEnSE also��trains students to pursue quantum careers in academia, industry or government,��and to create quantum technologies that companies can further develop for societal benefit.

In the video, Q-SEnSE��faculty��and graduate students from the Precision Laser Diagnostics Lab discuss their work on��recent projects being explored through the institute.��

Prof. Rieker joined a main stage panel at the DOE ARPA-E summit to talk about LongPath’s growth under the ARPA-E SCALEUP program.

The Far North is thawing, unleashing clouds of planet-heating gas. Scientists rely on an arsenal of tech to sniff out just how nasty the problem is.��On a tower in Goldstream Valley, Alaska, a crew installs a spectrometer built in the Precision Laser Diagnostics Lab at CU Boulder��that uses an infrared laser to scan the air for the chemical signatures of the gases present. Scientists run such instruments year-round to determine how methane emissions change with the seasons.��

In its first year, the Buff Venture Fund has invested in five startups, including:

LongPath Technologies,��co-founded by Greg Rieker, associate professor of��mechanical engineering��at CU Boulder, with fellow research scientists Sean Coburn, Robert Wright and Caroline Alden (at the��). Its innovation combines laser engineering with atmospheric science to monitor greenhouse gas emissions, technology that is now poised to have a widespread, real-world impact. ��

Professor Rieker briefed��US Senator John Hickenlooper about LongPath Technologies' long-range laser networks, used to provide low cost detection and quantification of methane emissions sources across large areas. �� The visit to The Methane Emissions Technology Evaluation Center (METEC) in Fort Collins followed��the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act, which includes a fee to encourage a reduction in harmful methane pollution, coupled with over $1.5 billion in federal funding for monitoring and reducing methane pollution in the oil and gas sector.

Scott made another poster for the Colorado Photonics Industry Association (CPIA) university meetup. This year he shared our recent work developing high-speed mid-infrared frequency combs and our future plans to make them portable. The poster took second place in the competition.��

Professor Rieker and grad students, Eli Miller, and David Yun,��were recognized as Outstanding Mentors for their work with undergrad interns Walter Sabin and Alison Kelly��at the Discovery Learning Apprenticeship Mentor Recognition Luncheon. During their time in the laboratory, Walter Sabin created a retroreflector optical setup for increased SNR ramjet measurements which he tested at Wright Patterson Air Force Base and Allison Kelly��engineered structures to be used for collecting methane spectra across Alaskan permafrost.

Rieker Lab PhD candidate, David Yun, led a project using lasers to precisely quantify the performance of high-speed engines. Yun��worked��with different parts of the engine and process leading up to an early ground test demonstration for the Air Force in Ohio.��Yun said they addressed several issues before heading into the harsh field environment for those tests.

Researchers from CU Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will be better able to coordinate their efforts with the recent opening of the��Quantum Engineering Initiative (QEI)��Collaboration Lab on Sept. 26. This new, 1,500 square foot space in the Engineering Center will encourage cross-campus research and experiments in the high-impact field of quantum engineering. Collaborators will conduct research into quantum computing, optical clocks, quantum sensors and networks, hybrid quantum systems and more.

Carl and Augustine traveled to Rochester New York for a collaboration with Toptica Photonics and NIST to take measurements on a pulsed CO2 gas jet using mid-IR electronic optic modulator frequency combs.

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On this week's episode of Oil and Gas Startups,��, Co-founder & CTO of����gives��a masterclass in laser technology and how LongPath uses the tech to continuously monitor methane emissions on Oil and Gas leases.

David, Nazanin, and Greg at an excursion to Chateau de Montrottier in France shortly before stuffing themselves with fondue, bread, and wine. They each presented work at the FLAIR (Field Laser Applications in Industry and Research) conference about recent accomplishments in ramjet mass flux measurements, mid-IR shock tube measurements, and natural gas monitoring.

Charlie and Scott shared their work at the International Conference on Molecular Spectroscopy in Urbana / Champaign Illinois. Charlie presented his work on a high-speed GPU accelerator for generating molecular absorption models and Scott shared recent progress with the high-speed,��broadband MIR dual comb lasers.

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Now, oil and gas companies from Colorado to Texas subscribe to LongPath Technologies system to access data on potential leaks.

CU Boulder and LongPath Technologies worked together to develop methane-detecting lasers, called frequency comb lasers. The technology is already monitoring an oil and gas site in Colorado, and is revolutionizing how the industry detects methane leaks.
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On Wednesday, June 8th, the House Science Committee held a hearing��on efforts to monitor methane emissions from the oil and gas sector. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and the Biden administration is aiming to����methane pollution, including by improving capabilities for pinpointing methane leaks from oil and gas wells and other sources. Among the hearing witnesses is Brian Anderson, director of the National Energy Technology Laboratory, which is playing a key role in the Department of Energy’s��. Also testifying are David Lyon, a senior scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund; LongPath Technologies co-founder Greg Rieker, whose company received $5 million from DOE to deploy a 700-square-mile����in the Permian Basin in Texas; and Riley Duren, CEO of Carbon Mapper, a public-private consortium that is working to advance satellite-based emissions monitoring.��

Ryan Cole��(PhDMechEngr’21) has developed an experiment that recreates the actual climate of planets beyond our solar system inside a 2,000 lb. instrument at��Professor Greg Rieker’s��lab on the University of Colorado Boulder campus. By reaching the same high-temperature and high-pressure conditions found on many exoplanets, the instrument can map the gases in their atmospheres, which could one day help humanity find life on other planets.

The Department of Mechanical Engineering has awarded PhD candidate Ryan Cole this year’s Outstanding Dissertation Award.��

The Environmental Protection Agency��has released new regulations for oil and gas companies to find and fix methane gas leaks.��Professor Rieker is interviewed about using new laser technology to detect methane emissions.

The Troy, Michigan native earned a degree in mechanical engineering from OU in 2020 and is now a Ph.D. student in mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder. As a member of Professor Greg Rieker’s��Precision Laser Diagnostics for Energy and the Environment Lab, Lalko works with a team of doctoral student researchers and senior research scientists.��

The upcoming EPA regulations are significant for methane detection companies because they will create a nationwide standard for controlling emissions of the greenhouse gas. In this article,��Professor Rieker talks about��advantages of the��ground-based continuous approach, which include the ability to see��emissions quickly and confirm if they are significant and more than a short-lived event before responding.

The Colorado Photonics Industry Association (CPIA)��presents the Photonics Company of the Year award to the business or institution that has contributed greatly to the growth and prosperity of the Colorado photonics industry. LongPath Technologies, Professor Rieker's spin off company, is the first company to leverage Nobel prize-winning long-range frequency comb laser sources to achieve dramatic cost reductions for continuous emissions monitoring. LongPath's continuous emissions monitoring services have already enabled major methane emission reductions in the oil and gas sector with partners in the productive U.S. Permian and Denver Julesberg Basins.

JILA researchers, along with collaborators��at NIST and CU Engineering – Scott Diddams and Greg Rieker, respectively – are looking into miniaturizing the frequency comb to make the breathalyser suitable for settings other than a laboratory.

Professor Rieker’s work to strengthen quantum engineering within the college of engineering is coming to fruition with the launch of the quantum engineering effort, which is securing faculty hires and shared laboratory space for collaborators from local national labs.

Greg Rieker, CUbit associate director, Vogel Family Faculty Fellow and associate professor of mechanical engineering at CU Boulder, along with Philip Makotyn,��executive director the��CUbit Quantum Initiative��and other business leaders, spoke on Sept. 9 before the Colorado General Assembly's Joint Technology Committee.

Listen to the presentation:

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I am an incoming PhD student in mechanical engineering and will be working in Greg Rieker’s��Precision Laser Diagnostics for Energy and the Environment Lab.

My research objective will be to develop a portable laser that monitors atmospheric toxics. Various pollutants can be detected with mid-infrared (mid-IR) electromagnetic waves, but laser-based sensors must be improved to function in the mid-IR range while being small enough to operate in the field.

I aim to have this technology help cities, companies��and countries analyze how they affect air quality at local and global scales, and I am looking forward to beginning my PhD research.

The launch of Basin-SCAN (Basin Scale Continuous oil and gas Abatement Network) will result in the largest continuous emissions monitoring network for the oil and gas industry, enabling real-time location and sizing of natural gas emissions across 700 square miles of the Permian oil and gas basin in the Southwestern U.S. It is anticipated that LongPath’s Basin-SCAN program will reduce oil and gas production emissions by 60-80% in the Basin-SCAN area.

In the paper, pulbished in the ,��graduate student Ryan Cole and his fellow researchers��present the design and validation of a new gas cell to enable laboratory absorption spectroscopy at high pressure and temperature. They plan to��use the new gas cell to study fundamental absorption spectroscopy��in extreme��conditions similar to those found in many combustion systems and exotic planetary atmospheres.

Graduate student researcher, Elizabeth Strong and her colleagues in Professor Rieker's lab have developed an optical sensor approach to determine a component of the angular velocity vector. This approach uses beams of structured light and a machine learning-based analysis. This approach represents an interesting new direction for fluid flow velocimetry which may be extended to sense other flow parameters by selecting different light structures.

We are pleased to announce the 2021 Class of Senior Members, 63 of the world’s best emerging academic inventors!

Congratulations to these rising luminaries & the incredible����Institutions that support and foster innovation!

View the class list:��

CU Story here:����/researchinnovation/2021/02/10/faculty-innovators-recognized-national-academy-inventors

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Resolving nonuniform temperature distributions with single-beam absorption spectroscopy. Part I: Theoretical capabilities and limitations

Professor Rieker and recent PhD grad Nathan Malarich��introduce a singular value decomposition framework in order to explore the theoretical limits to resolving temperature distributions with single-beam line-of-sight absorption measurements.

Centering a beam of light to the axis of rotation of a planar object

Graduate student��Ellizabeth Strong's paper in the Review of Scientific Instruments details the��technique she developed��for��centering a beam of light to the axis of a rotating surface.��

Fully phase-stabilized 1 GHz turnkey frequency comb at 1.56 µm

Recent work between Nazanin Hoghooghi of the Precision Laser Diagnostics Lab and the Diddams group at NIST was the top download in OSA Continuum in August, and subsequently was featured on OSA’s Spotlight on Optics!

The National Science Foundation announced that CU Boulder will receive a $25 million award to launch a new quantum science and engineering research center.����“A challenge as big as quantum requires collaboration between many types of scientists and engineers. This type of collaboration requires a catalyzing event,” said Greg Rieker, an associate professor in the��Paul M. Rady Department of Mechanical Engineering��and a co-principal investigator of Q-SEnSE. “This grant is the event that we needed.”

Amanda Makowiecki’s paper demonstrating the use of the group’s new modified free induction decay technique to scale complex measured absorption spectra to other pressures is out in JQSRT!�� This eliminates the need to measure reference spectra at many different pressures to help with interpreting complex absorption spectra (i.e. from large molecules).

Forming Partnerships from Patents

The ARPA-E team Caroline Alden, Robbie Wrigt, Sean Coburn��and Greg Rieker,��were featured in a story from the tech transfer office about LongPath Technologies, Inc.,��a��spinoff commercializing cost-effective, continuous gas leak detection.

Can you tell me a little bit about your research?��

Ryan Cole works in the��Rieker Lab. The lab's general goal is to develop laser-based sensors for systems ranging from combustion devices to the atmosphere. Ryan's personal research is focused on developing and improving models for the absorption of light by gasses at very high pressures and temperatures.�� You can read about his work measuring gases at high pressure and temperature in this month's��ME Department feature article.����

Authored by Rieker Lab graduate students Ryan��Cole and��Amanda��Makowiecki, senior research associate��Nazanin��Hoghooghi, and Professor Greg��Rieker, this article was the editor's pick in��Optics Express�� pp. 37920-37939 (2019).����In the article they��validate a��new approach in several complex absorption spectroscopy scenarios and discuss its limitations.��

Prof. Rieker weighs in on methane detection from satellites:

Ultimately, the most effective way to reduce methane leaks may come from a combination of solutions, said Greg Rieker, professor��and head of the Precision Laser Diagnostics Laboratory.��See ��for full story.

In collaboration with the National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST), the��Renewable And Sustainable Energy Institute (RASEI)��and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) Professor Rieker, colleague Ian Coddington, and��team members Caroline Alden, Sean Coburn, and Robbie Wright have received premier scientific research recognition for their technology based on Nobel Prize-winning research in Colorado.�� The Pathfinding Partnership Award was presented to them on Tuesday, November 12. 2019 at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science.��

Based on Nobel Prize-winning research in Colorado can detect methane emissions as small as a quarter of a human breath from over a mile away. Principal Investigators: Ian Coddington, Applied Physics Division, NIST Greg Rieker, CTO, LongPath Technologies, Inc., Nathan Newbury, Applied Physics Division, NIST.�� CO-LABS is emphasizing the unique collaborations among many partnering organizations that made this pathfinding work possible, including: Caroline Alden, Research Scientist, CIRES Esther Baumann, Senior Research Associate, Applied Physics Division, NIST Sean Coburn, Research Scientist, University of Colorado Boulder Kevin Cossel, Physicist, Applied Physics Division, NIST Fabrizio Giorgetta, Senior Research Associate, Applied Physics Division, NIST Andrew Goldstein, CEO, LongPath Technologies Inc. Kuldeep Prasad, Engineer, Fire Research Division, NIST Eleanor Waxman, Chemist, Applied Physics Division, NIST Ted Weaver, Former CEO, LongPath Technologies, Inc. Robert Wright, Research Engineer, University of Colorado Boulder.

Rieker lab personnel, including graduate students Ryan Cole, Amanda Makoweicki, Torrey Hayden and Paul Schroeder��are��working to find new ways to detect fugitive emissions using Dr.��Rieker's��frequency comb laser-based system.�� Their technologies could curb a potent contributor to climate change, while saving industry billions of dollars in lost gas.

The Methane Emissions Technology Evaluation Center in Fort Collins, Colorado is like a movie set for the oil and gas industry, complete with wellheads that leak on command. It's where companies like��CU Professor Greg Rieker and team's��spin-off�� company, LongPath Technologies, test new products. CGTN's Hendrik Sybrandy reports.

Associate Professor Greg Rieker was��selected to receive the Mechancial Engineering Outstanding Research award��based on his contributions to the��scientific��community at large��over the past year. Department Chair Mike Hannigan said��selection��wasn't easy given the department's many talented individuals executing exceptional work, but those who were chosen��truly do exhibit a level of excellence worth recognizing. Dr. Rieker credits his lab team,��graduate students, and their outstanding research contributions to the recognition.��

Professor Rieker demonstrated Dual frequency comb spectrometer monitoring of active gas controlled releases for participants attending a tour of the CaMI Field Research Station.��The site is home to a methane emissions detection centre with a dual frequency comb laser spectrometer, Picarro cavity ring-down spectrometer and optical gas imaging camera which provide continuous and intermittent detection and emissions quantification over a seven square kilometer area.��

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CU Boulder��Associate Professor Greg Rieker��of the Department of Mechanical Engineering has been awarded not one but two of the top international awards in his field. He was selected to receive the Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award in April 2019.

The Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award is co-sponsored by publisher Elsevier and The Combustion Institute and is the highest honor an early career scientist in the field of combustion can receive. Awardees must demonstrate excellence in fundamental or applied combustion science. The award is named after Professor Hiroshi Tsuji, known for the Tsuji Burner and his research in laminar and turbulent combustion.

Rieker said he is thankful to his research group, to Professor John Daily for nominating him and ushering in the resurgence of combustion research at CU Boulder, to his mentors Nate Newbury, Ian Coddington and Ron Hanson, and to his wife and “secret weapon,” Julie Steinbrenner.

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LongPath Technologies Inc. was born out of an urgent need to find low-cost solutions to monitor the vast oil and gas infrastructure across the U.S. Our idea was to develop a system akin to a radar for methane, the main component of natural gas. Our system would deploy a single, centralized laser sensor that sends invisible, eye-safe beams over a sparse pattern of kilometer-long paths to detect, locate and size methane leaks among dense oil and gas infrastructure components. We’ve now made this idea a reality using the laser frequency comb, whose invention led to the Nobel Prize for��, the joint institute of NIST and the University of Colorado Boulder.��Read the by Greg Rieker.

Applying��frequency comb laser technology based on��Nobel Prize winning work to real-world methane leak detection, the Rieker Lab��team including CU Boulder mechanical engineering professor Greg Rieker,��atmospheric scientist Caroline Alden, chemist Sean Coburn, and engineer Rob Wright��created��an instrument that was mobile, portable, and robust.����Commercialization of their first-of-its-kind��technology has led to LongPath Technologies, Inc. spurred by��connections to the College of Engineering and Applied Science and the larger CUbit initiative.��

Prof. Rieker gives a lightning talk at the 21^st Century Energy Symposium on frequency comb laser technology as a decarbonization solution. View the .��

Junior Mechanical Engineer Cameron Casby presents a poster on his work with our high pressure optical facility at the Discovery Learning Apprentice end of year exhibition.

Anthony Draper's and Ryan Cole's paper "Broadband dual-frequency comb spectroscopy in a rapid compression machine" has been published in Optics Express.

Prof. Rieker receives the .�� As part of the award, he gave Wednesday’s plenary lecture at the conference entitled: “Frequency combs in combustion."

Amanda, Nate, and Prof. Rieker attend the 11^th US National Combustion Meeting where Amanda and Nate gave talks on spatially resolved spectroscopy and wildfire combustion.