Reclaiming a Limb
by Alan S. Brown
The video is startling. Less than two hours after being outfitted with a prosthetic arm, an amputee who lost both arms 13 years ago pours a drink and then feeds himself.
The arm is the work of DEKA Research, the product development company headed by Dean Kamen, who designed the Segway people mover. Kamen calls it the Luke Arm, after the prosthetic limb given to Luke Skywalker in Star Wars, and it was the hit of the All Things Digital Conference in North San Diego, Calif., on May 29. Two years ago, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency representatives asked Kamen to create an advanced prosthetic arm.
He prototyped the Luke Arm in about one year, and took another year to develop the controls. The arm provides some tactile feedback, so users can adjust the amount of force they apply. As a result, the arm can pick up something as delicate as a grape.
Kamen designed the Luke Arm to weigh about as much as a human arm. It uses a series of straps and expandable air bladders that make it easy to fit over the shoulders and torso yet anchor it in place for support.
Given the arm’s degrees of freedom—21 for the hand alone—building a useful interface proved a difficult challenge. (This issue’s cover story, which starts on page 24, looks at efforts to add degrees of freedom to robotic and prosthetic hands.) A version shown by Kamen in February had foot pedal and muscle controls. The new arm uses commands sent by the body to nerves that would ordinarily control the arm.
While nerves provide some control, macros enable users to do specific tasks, such as holding a ball or drilling a hole in the wall.
Engineering HR Firm Heads for High School
by Jeffrey Winters
Kelly Engineering Resources, a business unit of Kelly Services Inc., has entered a partnership with the National Academy Foundation to provide money and expertise to the foundation’s new engineering education program.
The program, known as the Academies of Engineering, will prepare inner-city high school students to enter college-level engineering programs upon graduation. The program, which will begin in the fall, was featured in the January issue of Mechanical Engineering under the title “Widening the Pipeline.”
“The National Academy Foundation is pleased to be working with Kelly Services to ensure that high school students across the country receive the critical mentoring, internships, and industry support they need to be exposed to careers in engineering,” said J.D. Hoye, president of the National Academy Foundation.
The Academies of Engineering will launch at 13 sites around the nation in September. In addition to Kelly Engineering Resources, the NAF is partnering with Project Lead the Way Inc. and the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering to provide curriculum and mentoring for the hundreds of students expected to enroll. The NAF has established academies—essentially, “school within a school” programs structured around career-specific curricula—in other fields, such as finance, tourism, and information technology.
Some 50,000 students are enrolled in the 500 academies nationwide. The academies rely on partnerships with companies such as Citigroup, American Express, and Verizon to provide support and mentoring.
In the recently announced partnership, Kelly Engineering Resources will support the Academies of Engineering with a monetary grant and by working with teachers to enable them to share current work practices and experiences in the classroom. Additionally, Kelly employees will serve on advisory boards for the academies.
“We’re delighted to partner with NAF and the Academies of Engineering, which provide a critical pathway for high school students to receive rigorous academic training in high-demand sectors, to pursue higher education opportunities, and to interact with high-level corporate executives and mentors,” said Tim McAward, vice president and business unit leader of Kelly Engineering Resources.
Kelly Services Inc., headquartered in Troy, Mich., offers temporary staffing services, outsourcing, vendor on-site, and full-time placement. Kelly provides employment to more than 750,000 employees annually in 37 countries, with skills as varied as accounting, engineering, information technology, and health care.
Minor in Engineering
by Jean Thilmany
The first Iowa State University students who minored—not majored—in engineering graduated earlier this spring.
The minor is designed for students who don’t want to become engineers, but are interested in technology and in the way engineers work, according to the program’s director. Students who learn engineering fundamentals improve their technical literacy and shore up their problem-solving and critical-thinking skills.
“If someone is interested in learning how engineering is done and doesn’t want to be an engineer, we teach them the issues and the big picture of what defines technology and how engineering is related to science,” said Mani Mina, an Iowa State senior lecturer in electrical and computer engineering who is director of the program.
Students in the program are able to better appreciate the work of engineers. The engineering minor should give students an edge in the job market, according to administrators.
Nick Weitl, a graduating senior with a double major in supply chain management and management and logistics, felt his classes were heavy on the business side. He chose the new minor to learn more about engineering.
“This minor has given me a better understanding of how engineering students differ from business students,” Weitl said.
The program’s required classes have no prerequisite courses and aren’t math intensive. It’s designed to complement all majors and to appeal to non-engineering students with varied interests, Mina said.
The program also fits within a national call to transform how engineering is taught and practiced. Mina cites the study Engineering for a Changing World conducted by James Duderstadt, president emeritus of the University of Michigan, which calls for engineering to be established as a liberal arts discipline.
In today’s technical world, Duderstadt said in the study, engineering courses should be part of the general education requirements of a college graduate.
H2 Car Making Progress
by Alan S. Brown
So how close are we to a hydrogen fuel car? A new study by the National Research Council finds that major barriers remain, but says the potential to reduce oil dependence and harmful emissions justifies the cost of the research.
The study examined the FreedomCAR and Fuel Partnership, a collaboration of the U.S. Department of Energy, the Big Three Detroit automakers, and five major energy companies, whose objective is to develop hydrogen vehicle technology.
In addition to finding better ways to make, manage, and use hydrogen, the program seeks to reduce vehicle weight and cost while it improves fuel efficiency. In the short term, many of its research projects could help automakers realize more efficient and less polluting combustion engines as well as better batteries for hybrid-electric and all-electric vehicles.
“Since the Research Council’s first review two years ago, the program has made great strides, and its managers have been generally thorough and receptive to the previous report’s recommendations,” said Craig Marks, NRC committee chair and retired vice president for technology and productivity at AlliedSignal Inc. in Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
Durability and cost of fuel cells remain key barriers to a hydrogen automobile. FreedomCAR is pursuing promising new materials and designs for membranes and membrane-electrode assemblies.
Fuel cell cars will need batteries, and the technology promises to benefit hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and all-electric cars. While lithium-ion batteries meet the program’s technical goals, production costs are two times higher than target. FreedomCAR is researching lower-cost lithium-ion materials and manufacturing methods. Since industry is doing that as well, the study panel recommends that FreedomCAR consider funding other high-energy battery research.
When the National Research Council first reviewed the program, it found hydrogen storage on vehicles to be the most difficult challenge. Freedom-CAR’s goal is to store enough hydrogen for a 300-mile drive. Fuel tanks that can do that are large, heavy, and costly (especially if they have to contain high-pressure hydrogen).
The reviewers praised FreedomCAR for funding three different approaches at three separate centers of excellence.
Finally, the reviewers noted that new technologies like biofuels and hybrid cars have reached the auto market in recent years. It recommended that FreedomCAR review its strategies to ensure its continuing relevance.
Cutting-Edge Exchange
by Harry Hutchinson
NASA is launching a program in which it will place its employees with U.S. companies and organizations involved in what it considers “cutting-edge innovation.” NASA calls it the Innovation Transfusion Program.
Under the program, employees on NASA’s payroll can spend as long as a year working in high-technology environments outside the agency, where they can offer their expertise and, at the same time, gain valuable experience and new ideas to bring back to their jobs at NASA. The program also supports innovation workshops between NASA and external organizations that have novel approaches for addressing problems of interest to the agency.
NASA expects to benefit from creativity and innovation in industry, academia, research institutions, national laboratories, and other government agencies. NASA will pay the salary and travel expenses for its participating employees. The initiative is part of NASA’s Innovative Partnerships Program.
Organizations interested in participating in the program, either by hosting an employee or a workshop, can contact Andrew Petro of NASA’s Innovative Partnerships Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington by e-mail at andrew.j.petro@nasa.gov.
More information about the Innovation Transfusion program is available online at http://www.ipp.nasa.gov/ii_transfusion.htm.
Finalists Line Up for Innovation Showcase
by Harry Hutchinson
Ten teams of students will get a shot at turning their inventiveness into a business in the ASME Innovation Showcase this fall. The value of joining the competition isn’t so much the $10,000 first prize as it is learning how to develop a business plan and present it to potential investors.
The ASME IShow gives college students the chance to compete for seed money to bring their products to market. Teams must prove the commercial practicality of their products to a judging panel and audience of successful innovators, industry experts, venture capitalists, and intellectual property specialists.
The competition is the creation of the ASME Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, in collaboration with the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance and the Idea to Product competition at the University of Texas. The groups hope that participation will cultivate the qualities of entrepreneurship and innovation among young men and women about to embark on engineering careers.
The initial request for proposals for this year’s competition drew a total of 32 responses, from which a panel has selected the final 10. Last year, a total of 13 proposals came in.
The 10 finalist teams will attend NCIIA’s Advanced Invention to Venture Workshop, which covers topics including intellectual property protocol, marketing, and business plan development. Teams are matched with mentors to help them refine their product, develop a business model, and create a product pitch.
A judging panel will rate teams on their written product service plan and on their live presentation and responses to questions at the competition.
The top cash prizes are $10,000, $7,000, and $5,000 in 2008.
 Gavin McIntyre (left) and Eben Bayer, founders of Ecovative Design, at last year’s IShow.
This year, a team from Baylor University will promote a project called Whole Tree, which intends to develop products using coconut husks and shells that significantly enhance the value of coconuts as a renewable resource, potentially increasing the income of more than 10 million coconut farmers in developing countries. Potential products include binderless particleboard, erosion control netting, and reinforcement for polymeric composite materials that are widely used in industry.
A Johns Hopkins University team will present a head impulse test device to improve diagnosis of vestibular disorder, which is associated with dizziness and is believed to affect as many as 90 million people.
A second team of students from Johns Hopkins has developed SurgyPack, a device for bowel packing that they say could aid abdominal surgery, and reduce surgical time and costs.
Robopsy, developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is a small robotic device that inserts a probe through the skin for biopsy. According to the MIT team, the system “demonstrates the feasibility of developing cost-effective medical robotics which we hope will eventually see widespread application.”
Mashavu, a proposal from Pennsylvania State University, is a worldwide communication system using Internet and cell phone technology that would allow medical professionals to supervise and advise in the health care of children in the developing world.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute students have a scheme for automated landmine removal. The team proposes the development of disposable robots, perhaps costing less than $50 each, that could swarm across a minefield and detonate land mines. According to the team, “By reducing de-mining costs and speeding up the entire process, this technology will save countless lives and limbs worldwide.”
 The 2007 first-place product, Greensulate, is insulation made from agricultural waste.
There are two teams from the University of California, Berkeley. One aims to develop an advanced affordable solar water heater. Its current plan focuses on using solar energy to provide domestic hot water for low-income households in urban areas of Guatemala. The team says the technology will decrease consumption of biomass and other fuels, will reduce exposure to indoor air pollutants, and will improve personal hygiene and overall health.
The second team proposes the Berkeley Electro-Coagulation Arsenic Remediation system, or BEAR, a community-based, low-cost treatment method to remove arsenic from contaminated groundwater. An electric current passing through the water dissolves a carbon steel foil. After mixing, the arsenic binds to the resulting ions and is filtered out. An estimated 140 million people are affected by naturally occurring arsenic in their water supply.
The University of California, San Francisco, is presenting a technology called NanoFlow, for very precise and long-term delivery of a wide variety of therapeutic molecules. Using a patented nanoporous membrane technology, a device small enough to be implanted under the skin can deliver therapeutic molecules at a constant rate over an extended time.
Virginia Military Institute will pitch its extremely low-frequency seismic detector, a wireless communication system with a signal that can pass through the ground. It would let trapped miners communicate with the surface to facilitate rescue after a mine collapse.
Innovation Showcase is held in conjunction with ASME’s International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition. The teams will make their presentations on Friday, Oct. 31, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Sheraton Boston Hotel. The ASME Congress opens at the hotel on the same day.
This is the second year that the CEEI has sponsored the ASME IShow.
Last year’s first-place team was from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Team members Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre had just started a company called Ecovative Design in Troy, N.Y., and came to the competition in November to pitch Greensulate, a bio-degradable and fireproof building insulation material made from agricultural waste resources.
They took the top prize, $5,000, and went on to win another award in a competition at Oxford University later in the month. Ecovative is negotiating a contract with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority for just over $133,000 to cover testing of the material.
According to Bayer, Ecovative will be in a research and development phase for another 14 months. Much of its testing is being done at Rensselaer to assure that the material complies with building codes. The company is a full-time occupation for Bayer and McIntyre, and also has four part-time employees.
The company plans to commercialize its manufacturing process and eventually will set up a pilot plant to demonstrate its manufacturing technology. Bayer said that the company is also developing packing material and a biodegradable cooler using the same core binding principle as that used to make the building insulation.
Team updates and details on the ASME IShow are available on the Web at www.asme.org/events/ishow, or by e-mailing Patti Jo Snyder of ASME at snyderp@asme.org.
Briefly Noted
ASME and the Standards Organization of Nigeria last month formed an agreement that would enable both organizations to play a joint role in the development of standards and conformity assessment programs beneficial to the Nigerian national economy. Under terms of a memorandum of understanding signed in New York City, ASME and the Standards Organization of Nigeria established a cooperative information exchange that aims to further the development and use of national standards furthering economic growth, industrial safety, and environmental protection throughout Nigeria.
FARO Technologies Inc., a manufacturer of portable computer-aided measurement hardware and software, will expand operations to sell its products in Mexico. The company, which has been selling in the country through a distributor, will establish account managers in key locations, including Monterrey and Mexico City.
ASME dedicated two Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks in May: Texas Instruments’ Digital Micromirror Device, an optical micromachine of the sort that powers a variety of display technologies, ranging from pocket projectors to digital cinema projectors; and Johnson Controls’ automatic temperature control system, an 1895 invention that helped launch the modern building controls industry.
Dassault Systèmes of Paris has released Abaqus 6.8, its unified finite element analysis software suite from Simulia.
Altair Engineering of Troy, Mich., has upgraded its product lifecycle management platform to HyperWorks 9.
TireStamp Corp. of Troy, Mich., a manufacturer of tire pressure monitoring and asset management technology, announced that Baltimore-based Cambridge Iron and Metal has selected TireStamp’s TireVigil Pro system for monitoring the tires on its fleet of trucks. The Cambridge fleet hauls steel, brass, copper, and other metals to steel mills and other manufacturing customers. TireVigil Pro continuously analyzes tire pressure and temperature data to give fleets the ability to both monitor and react to developing tire problems, such as slow leaks, under- or overinflation conditions, mismatched duals, and overheating while at the same time it provides them with ongoing analysis of tire performance across the fleet.
Quantum Fuel Systems Technologies Worldwide Inc. of Irvine, Calif., said that its German solar partner, Asola Advanced and Automotive Solar Systems GmbH, has won a $17 million contract from Sunworx GmbH, for the supply of high-efficiency silicon photovoltaic solar modules. Sunworx, a leading solar system supplier in Germany, will take delivery of these modules in 2008. Quantum and Asola recently announced the tripling of solar module production capacity in Germany by this fall.
DTE Energy Services Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich., has agreed to purchase the E.J. Stoneman Power Plant from Integrys Energy Services Inc., a subsidiary of Integrys Energy Group Inc. DTE Energy Services plans to convert the 50-megawatt coal-fired plant in Cassville, Wis., to burn wood waste, a renewable resource. Integrys Energy Group, based in Chicago, is a holding company for energy-related subsidiaries.
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