Category Archives: Engineering

Scrap Computer Chips Reclaimed as Solar Cells

IBM Pioneers Process to Turn Waste into Solar Energy

The new process uses a specialized pattern removal technique to repurpose scrap semiconductor wafers — thin discs of silicon material used to imprint patterns that make finished semiconductor chips for computers, mobile phones, video games, and other consumer electronics — to a form used to manufacture silicon-based solar panels. The new process was recently awarded the “2007 Most Valuable Pollution Prevention Award” from The National Pollution Prevention Roundtable (NPPR).
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The new wafer reclamation process produces monitor wafers from scrap product wafers – generating an overall energy savings of up to 90% because repurposing scrap means that IBM no longer has to procure the usual volume of net new wafers to meet manufacturing needs. When monitors wafers reach end of life they are sold to the solar industry. Depending on how a specific solar cell manufacturer chooses to process a batch of reclaimed wafers – they could save between 30 – 90% of the energy that they would have needed if they’d used a new silicon material source.

PhD Student Speeds up Broadband by 200 times

John Papandriopoulos

Local whiz speeds up broadband by 200 times:

A Melbourne PhD student has developed technology to make broadband internet up to 200 times faster without having to install expensive fibre optic cables.
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Harnessing the potential power of telephone lines and DSL broadband, the technology will deliver internet speeds up to 250 megabits per second, compared with current typical speeds of between one and 20 megabits per second. Dr John Papandriopoulos, who has patent applications for the technology being processed in the US and Australia, won one of Melbourne University’s top academic prizes yesterday, a Chancellor’s Prize for Excellence in the PhD.

It sure seems like many of these breakthroughs never actually make it into my life. It would be nice if this one did. On the research page of his web site he uses the under-utilized blink tag 🙂 He also has a some nice explanations on his site:

Our technology, developed as part of my Ph.D. thesis work with advisor A/Prof. Jamie Evans, aims to manage this crosstalk interference, consequently allowing telecommunication providers to maximize the data-rates of their networks. We can do this dynamically, and adaptively, to try and get the “best compromise” of interference between neighboring lines to maximize performance. In research circles, this is known as “Dynamic Spectrum Management” (DSM).

Practice First, Theory Later

The best engineering school in the United States?

What makes Olin special – and what puts it at the top of my “Engineering Schools I Wished I Had Gone To” list—is its “practice first, theory later” approach. Olin was designed to make students plunge into hands-on engineering projects on day one. “Instead of theory-heavy lectures, segregated disciplines, and individual efforts,” I wrote in that article, “Olin champions design exercises, interdisciplinary studies, and teamwork.”

Experts say a deep reform of engineering education in the United States is long overdue. We need a new type of engineer trained to face today’s challenges, not those of post World War II, when many curricula were created. Could this new engineer be … the Olin engineer? That’s what I set out to find out when my editors assigned me the story on Olin.
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What I found during my reporting, and what I tried to convey in the article, is that Olin is like no other engineering school I’d ever visited. Pretty much everything about it is unique. The installations are brand new, the faculty is young and motivated, the curriculum innovative. Professors don’t have to worry about tenure, students don’t have to worry about tuition. The students I met were bright, ambitious, outspoken, and diverse in their interests and personalities. They all want to lead, succeed, excel. They behave almost like MBA students training to be CEOs except they’re dressed in pajamas programming robots. For outsiders, it can be an overwhelming experience to meet a classroom full of Olin engineers.

The Importance of Science Education

The Science Education Myth by Vivek Wadhwa:

The authors of the report, the Urban Institute’s Hal Salzman and Georgetown University professor Lindsay Lowell, show that math, science, and reading test scores at the primary and secondary level have increased over the past two decades, and U.S. students are now close to the top of international rankings. Perhaps just as surprising, the report finds that our education system actually produces more science and engineering graduates than the market demands.

The study certainly sounds interesting. I can’t find it (update Vivek Wadhwa provided the link – which will work Monday, also see his comment below), but found an article (which wasn’t easy) by the authors of the report: The Real Technology Challenge. The main point of the article, The Real Technology Challenge, seems to be that the USA should focus on globalization (and focus on educating scientists and engineers to work in a global world).

As I have said before I disagree with those that believe the USA is producing more science and engineering graduates than the market demands. Smart leaders know the huge positive impacts of a large, well educated science and engineering workforce.

Countries that succeed in producing more quality graduates while creating the best economic environment to take advantage of technology innovation (follow this link – it is one of the most important posts about what makes silicon valley so powerful a force at doing just that) are going to benefit greatly. My guess is the USA will be one of those countries; not by reducing the focus on science and engineering education but by increasing it. If not, other countries will, and the USA will suffer economically. The USA also needs to continue to push the economic and entrepreneurship advantages – doing that well is very difficult to achieve and the USA maintains a stronger advantage in that realm – but I will be very surprised if other countries don’t continue to make gains in this area. Even so doing so is much more challenging than just improving education (which is difficult itself just not nearly as difficult) and the USA can continue to benefit from this combination with the right policies.

Plumpynut – Food Savior

A Life Saver Called “Plumpynut”

Every year, malnutrition kills five million children — that’s one child every six seconds. But now, the Nobel Prize-winning relief group “Doctors Without Borders” says it finally has something that can save millions of these children. It’s cheap, easy to make and even easier to use. What is this miraculous cure? As CNN’s Anderson Cooper reports, it’s a ready-to-eat, vitamin-enriched concoction called “Plumpynut,” an unusual name for a food that may just be the most important advance ever to cure and prevent malnutrition.

“It’s a revolution in nutritional affairs,” says Dr. Milton Tectonidis, the chief nutritionist for Doctors Without Borders. “Now we have something. It is like an essential medicine. In three weeks, we can cure a kid that is looked like they’re half dead. We can cure them just like an antibiotic. It’s just, boom! It’s a spectacular response,” Dr. Tectonidis says.
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Plumpynut is a remarkably simple concoction: it is basically made of peanut butter, powdered milk, powdered sugar, and enriched with vitamins and minerals. It tastes like a peanut butter paste. It is very sweet, and because of that kids cannot get enough of it. The formula was developed by a nutritionist. It doesn’t need refrigeration, water, or cooking; mothers simply squeeze out the paste. Many children can even feed themselves. Each serving is the equivalent of a glass of milk and a multivitamin.

Computational Science and Engineering by Gilbert Strang

New book, Computational Science and Engineering by Gilbert Strang, is available. The website includes some sections of the book. Video Lectures of Gilbert Strang on Linear Algebra, Spring 2005.

China Reaches for the Moon

China’s Long March to the Moon

The missions by China and Japan are part of a broader resurgence of interest in the moon by space agencies around the world. The U.S. and India also are planning unmanned lunar-exploration missions next year. It is the biggest burst of such work since the 1970s. The last humans to stand on the moon were American astronauts from the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
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For China, the aim is explicitly political, as well as scientific. “Lunar exploration reflects a country’s comprehensive national power,” said Ouyang Ziyuan, the chief scientist for China’s moon program, in an interview with the official Communist Party newspaper, People’s Daily. It will “raise our international prestige and strengthen the cohesion of our people.”

China aims to have a unmanned mission to the moon in 2012 and a manned mission to the moon by 2020.

Why Planes Fly: What They Taught You In School Was Wrong

So we all know how planes fly, right? The top of the wing is rounded and the bottom of the wing is more straight. Air takes longer to travel over the top of the wing than the bottom, which results in more pressure on the bottom, hence the lift. Right? As it turns out, no.

This is what I was taught, and it’s what I’ve always believed (it’s even in most lower-level text books), but it’s simply not true. The concept is called the Bernoulli Principle, and it accounts for very little of the lift that makes flight possible. The main reason planes fly is far simpler: wings force air downward, which in turn pushes the wings upward.

The primary actor here is the the Coanda Effect, with the Bernoulli Principle taking a supporting role. It all starts with the air wrapping downward along the back of the wing (Coanda).

Nanoengineers Use Tiny Diamonds for Drug Delivery

Nanoengineers Mine Tiny Diamonds for Drug Delivery

Northwestern University researchers have shown that nanodiamonds — much like the carbon structure as that of a sparkling 14 karat diamond but on a much smaller scale — are very effective at delivering chemotherapy drugs to cells without the negative effects associated with current drug delivery agents.
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To make the material effective, Ho and his colleagues manipulated single nanodiamonds, each only two nanometers in diameter, to form aggregated clusters of nanodiamonds, ranging from 50 to 100 nanometers in diameter. The drug, loaded onto the surface of the individual diamonds, is not active when the nanodiamonds are aggregated; it only becomes active when the cluster reaches its target, breaks apart and slowly releases the drug. (With a diameter of two to eight nanometers, hundreds of thousands of diamonds could fit onto the head of a pin.)

“The nanodiamond cluster provides a powerful release in a localized place — an effective but less toxic delivery method,” said co-author Eric Pierstorff, a molecular biologist and post-doctoral fellow in Ho’s research group. Because of the large amount of available surface area, the clusters can carry a large amount of drug, nearly five times the amount of drug carried by conventional materials.

Larry Page and Sergey Brin Interview Webcast

This interview and audience question and answer took place last week at the end of the Google Zeitgeist conference. Some interesting notes from Sergey:

I like to see us not focus on maintaining Google’s culture but to improve it – continuous improvement (he specifically mentions how the infrastructure they have in place now allows them to experiment in ways that were not possible before – a reminder of Google’s focus on the scientific method and Experimenting Quickly and Often).
Google still follows their model of focusing 70% of the effort on core business (search) and 20% on related activities and 10% on “anything goes” (new business areas).

While not directly related to Google he is very interested in the innovation in nanotechnology and carbon nanotubes and the present time.
on moving toward universal power supplies – we are talking to some companies about solutions “but I gotta be honest with you it is a harder problem than I thought”

Larry:

focus on Google’s mission – to organize the world’s information
believes there is great potential in solar power and would love to see successful companies in that industry
improve power supply efficiency on servers

Both:

discussed poor web usability practices based on sites that adopt flashy technology that make it slower and more difficult for users – flash, excessive Ajax… Larry also mentioned doing testing on the user experience – no surprise for Google and no surprise that most poorly overly fancy sites care more about what a pointy haired boss might think on seeing the flash than on users experiences and testing.