Category Archives: Engineering

Economic Gains from Science

For policymakers, that means: Invest in the state’s educational system, especially the University of Wisconsin System, and use tax policy to encourage investors to supply the money to make business ideas grow.
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TomoTherapy, 10 years old, already employs 500 people. Co-founded by two UW-Madison professors, it was financially backed by investment groups in Madison, Milwaukee and California. The next step may be to follow Madison-area high-tech businesses Third Wave and Sonic Foundry into the public stock market.

GenTel, employing 17, started at University Research Park, has moved to Fitchburg and plans to open an office in North Carolina. The company has found additional financing from investors, including groups in Madison and Appleton. Aruna sprouted from brainpower and research at the University of Georgia, but it licenses human em bryonic stem cell technology from the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. Because UW-Madison is a hotbed of stem cell research, moving its jobs and income to Wisconsin would make sense.

Asimo Robot: Running and Climbing Stairs

ASIMO Brings Engineering to Life at the Dream Factory:

The Dream Factory is an educational initiative organized by Honda of the UK Manufacturing Ltd (HUM) in association with The Science Museum to provide inspiration and a greater excitement about the subject of engineering. Aimed at Key Stage 3 students (ages 11-13 years), each workshop has been specifically designed to explain a basic engineering principle and show how this is then used in Honda’s leading edge technology. ASIMO joins Punk Science presenters from Discovery Channel’s Scientific Show and the HUM team to help inspire over 500 local school children.

Saving Mankind

Hollywood got it wrong, this is how you stop an apocalyptic asteroid:

Rather than Hollywood’s preferred option, engineers are trying to develop unmanned rockets that can land on space rocks and use the asteroids’ own material to propel them into a safer orbit.
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“It is like throwing rocks out of a rowing boat on a lake. The rocks go in one direction and the boat is slowly pushed in the other under the laws of physics,” said John Olds, the chief executive of SpaceWorks, the firm behind the scheme. “Over several months we think we can make the difference between a hit and a miss.” Astronomers fear that a 400-yard wide asteroid will pass dangerously close to the Earth within 30 years. Typically, one the size of a football pitch strikes every 100 years or so, and it is also almost 100 years since the last major impact which caused an explosion equivalent to a 15 megaton nuclear bomb in Tunguska, Siberia on June 30, 1908.

Car Elevator (for parking)

Interesting photos of a NYC parking garage with elevators and the looks of a fancy mall not a garage. Cars are driven onto a palet and then the automated systems take it from there. Parking as a Destination:

The project is the work of AutoMotion Parking Systems, the American subsidiary of Stolzer Parkhaus of Strassburg, Germany. Stolzer Parkhaus has built 28 automated garages in 11 countries since its first, in Kronach, Germany, in 1996. The software and hardware that moves the cars around in the garages were adapted from systems that store materials in warehouses.
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“Lasers check that the car is aligned,” Mr. Milstein said, and determines that it is not one of the trucks or S.U.V.’s too big for the garage. The driver locks the car, takes the keys and picks up an electronic card from a nearby machine. A large door closes behind the car; motion detectors ensure that no children or pets are left behind.

Then the pallet holding the car slides below ground level, into two subterranean floors of storage. “It’s simple — park, swipe and leave,” Mr. Milstein said. The returning driver pays — using a credit card at a machine, or handing cash to the human “parking concierge” in a booth. The machinery retrieves the pallet holding the car, which rises to ground level, pointing toward the exit. You unlock the doors and drive away.

“You get your car in under three minutes,” Mr. Milstein promises. “It’s as easy as an A.T.M. or E-ZPass.” Rates will be comparable to conventional parking in Manhattan, he said, about $400 a month. For the driver, the advantages of an automated system go beyond convenience and speed. The car remains untouched and unopened, and with the parking area ostensibly off limits.

Engineering is cool. Related: The High Cost of Free Parking

Wave Energy

Orkney to get ‘biggest’ wave farm:

Of the Pelamis scheme, he said: “This will be the world’s biggest commercial wave project – significantly bigger than the major Portuguese scheme. “Scotland has the potential to generate a quarter of Europe’s marine energy and kick-starting the sector is vital if we are to create a significant industry based in Scotland and meet our long-term renewables targets.”

Mr Stephen said the industry had the potential to create thousands of jobs and attract millions of pounds of investment. Scottish Power’s director of renewables, Keith Anderson, said: “This is a massive step forward. “It will be a test of the actual devices that will be used commercially and, if successful, should help propel Scotland into the forefront of marine energy throughout the world.”

NSF Robotics Report

Cool NSF Robotics Report:

Today, NSF supports mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, computer scientists and other researchers as they develop future generations of intelligent robots. These engineers and computer scientists cooperate with biologists, neuroscientists and psychologists to exploit new knowledge in the study of the brain and behavior. NSF also supports education activities that use robots as a platform for studying mechanics, electronics, software and other topics.

Robots and Biology:

A research team at the University of Illinois led by Fred Delcomyn is one group that has developed a six-legged robot modeled after cockroaches, in this case the American cockroach Periplaneta americana. The researchers hope to mimic the insect’s extraordinary speed and agility by learning and applying the biological structure and principles in the robot’s design.

Insect flight, particularly the airborne maneuvers of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, has been the decade-long research pursuit of Michael Dickinson at Caltech. Dickinson has tethered flies to poles and mimicked them with robots to examine the mechanics of their muscles and the flight control behind the rapid rotation of their wings.

Stimulate Innovation

What if America Had an Innovation Czar?, good ideas from Keven Kelly:

1. More large prizes, like the Grand Challenger, for specific results. Cheap, effective, popular. The best Mars rover gets sent to Mars, etc.
2. Reform patent law, to reflect reality of current conditions (no submarine patents, etc.).
3. Mandate science fairs in high schools, the secret sauces for American innovation.
4. Open-source scientific literature.

Water Jacket

Four youths design India’s first water jacket:

Four engineering students, have designed a water jacket, a wearable vest capable of holding water that when strapped to the body, provides a cushioning effort to the wearer by distributing the weight of the water evenly.

“About 20 kg of water can be stored in this jacket – 10 in the front chamber and an equal volume of liquid in the back chamber. The chambers are designed to maintain a balance in the body so that no part of the body gets strained,” says T R Neelakantan, one of the innovators, who was recently awarded National Innovation Foundation’s (NIF) fourth national awards by President A P J Abdul Kalam in New Delhi.

The other three contributors are Balaji T K, Kunal Kumar and Arun Rosh, all students at the S R M Engineering College, Chennai.

Hiring Software Developers

Interviewing and Hiring by Tom Van Vleck

“Let’s take a break from talking to people. Why don’t you have a seat in this empty office, and write a small program. Use any language you want to. The program can do anything you’d like. I’ll be back in about 30 minutes, and ask you to explain the program to me.”
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It seemed reasonable, if the job was programming, to ask people how they felt about actually doing some. And sure, it caused interview stress. We allowed for that in our evaluation; but the job was going to be stressful at times too, and we needed people who could enjoy it. The important thing was not what the candidate wrote, but the account he or she gave of it.
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And you’d be surprised how many people couldn’t do it. Couldn’t write a simple program and talk sensibly about it. They’d huff, and bluster, and make excuses, and change the subject, rather than actually write some code. “Oh, I think of myself as more an architect than a coder.”

Mobilizing Tomorrow’s Engineers

Girl Day And Global Marathon: Mobilizing Tomorrow’s Engineers:

For the past seven years, the National Engineers Week Foundation has focused on diversifying the ranks of engineering with efforts to reach young women and girls, especially during the annual Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day, this year slated for Thursday, February 22 during Engineers Week 2007, February 18-24, and in a more recent venture, the Global Marathon For, By and About Women in Engineering, scheduled for March 22 and 23.

“Girl Day,” as it’s known among engineers, is the only outreach of its kind aimed at a single profession. On February 22, and then in programs continued throughout the year, women engineers and their male counterparts reach as many as one million girls with workshops, tours, speaking engagements, on-line discussions and a host of other activities that showcase engineering as an important career option for everyone.

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