Feature Channels: Engineering

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University of Adelaide researchers are using new magnetic materials to develop revolutionary electrical motors and generators which promise significant energy savings.

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An Iowa State team topped 98 universities from 28 countries to capture first place in the 15th annual Data Mining Cup. It is the first time a U.S. team has won. A leading European data mining company sponsors the intelligent-data analysis competition "to identify the best up-and-coming data miners."

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The Georgia Tech Research Institute’s software-defined, electronically-reconfigurable Agile Aperture Antenna (A3) has now been tested on the land, sea and air.

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Student-invented battlefield medical device has potential to save soldiers with deep wounds, especially at the neck, shoulder or groin.

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A sponge-like silicon material could help lithium-ion batteries run longer on a single charge by giving the batteries' electrodes the space they need to expand without breaking.

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A new Georgia Institute of Technology study investigated how quickly 32 animals urinate. It turns out that it’s all about the same. Even though an elephant’s bladder is 3,600 times larger than a cat’s (18 liters vs. 5 milliliters), both animals relieve themselves in about 20 seconds.

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The largest city in the Dakotas now saves an estimated 1 million gallons of water a day, thanks to a wastewater filtration project done in collaboration with the South Dakota State University Water and Environmental Engineering Research Center, the City of Sioux Falls and the city’s consulting firm, H.R. Green Engineering of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. For more than a decade, the City of Sioux Falls has set aside $20,000 each year from its capital improvement program to fund graduate research that will increase the efficiency of its wastewater treatment plant. The City of Sioux Falls and its taxpayers have reaped the rewards of investing in research and serve as an example for what other communities might be able to accomplish through a partnership with the Water Research Center.

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University of Washington computer scientists have shown that crowdsourcing can be a quick and effective way to teach a robot how to complete tasks.

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Iowa State University engineers are using LEGO bricks to build controlled environments to study how variations in climate and soil affect plant growth. They say LEGO bricks "are highly convenient and versatile building blocks" for the studies.

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When the frame of a pair of glasses is bent out of shape, it's not that easy to return it to its original form. If, however, your spectacles are made of a shape memory alloy then you don't have a problem. Just place the frame in hot water and bingo! – they're as good as new again. Empa researchers have now shown that these materials can also find applications in the building industry. For example in the reinforcement of bridges.

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Using microscopic polymer light resonators that expand in the presence of specific gases, researchers at MIT's Quantum Photonics Laboratory have developed new optical sensors with predicted detection levels in the parts-per-billion range. Optical sensors are ideal for detecting trace gas concentrations due to their high signal-to-noise ratio, compact, lightweight nature and immunity to electromagnetic interference.

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Beginning with the development of smaller products, such as solar lanterns to replace kerosene lighting, the Schatz Energy Research Center at Humboldt State University is expanding its efforts to produce energy alternatives with a new program to test larger scale renewable energy-powered consumer products.

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University of Washington engineers have designed a low-power sensor that could be placed permanently in a person's eye to track hard-to-measure changes in eye pressure. The sensor would be embedded with an artificial lens during cataract surgery and would detect pressure changes instantaneously, then transmit the data wirelessly using radio frequency waves.

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Engineering researchers at the University of Arkansas have designed integrated circuits that can survive at temperatures greater than 350 degrees Celsius – or roughly 660 degrees Fahrenheit

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The rapid development of lighting technologies, particularly solid-state systems using light emitting diodes (LEDs), has opened a universe of new possibilities as well as new questions about roadway lighting in the U.S. There is a critical need for objective technical information about new types of roadway lighting. The Transportation Research Board (TRB), part of the National Academies, initiated a project to evaluate new lighting technologies and identify new metrics for comparison. The full report is now available free to the public online.

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Report TOMORROW on Thursday June 5, 2014 11 a.m. CDT News Conference in Houston, TX Media will be briefed on investigation findings and safety recommendations. These findings will then be formally presented to the public and two-member presidentially-appointed Board investigating the April 20, 2010, blowout of the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico.

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With precarious particles called polaritons that straddle the worlds of light and matter, University of Michigan researchers have demonstrated a new, practical and potentially more efficient way to make a coherent laser-like beam.

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Biomedical engineering students design a lightweight, easy-to-conceal shirt-like garment to deliver life-saving shocks to patients experiencing serious heart problems. The students say their design improves upon a wearable defibrillator system that is already in use.

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Projects to provide low-cost eyeglasses for people in the developing world and to develop a cell-death detector will share $25,000 in cash to further develop their projects as winners of the 2014 Discovery Competition. Washington University in St. Louis’ School of Engineering & Applied Science created the competition in 2012.

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With better brains, underwater drones would spend less time searching and more time finding their target, including airliners lost at the bottom of the ocean. If one scientist has her way, the next generation of autonomous underwater vehicles will have a much better chance of getting it right.

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Less than a year after patenting a process that could improve stripping greenhouse gasses from industrial emissions, a University of Alabama professor was recently granted another patent with a different solvent to accomplish the same goal.

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A new technology under development at the Georgia Institute of Technology could one day provide more efficient delivery of the bone regenerating growth factors with greater accuracy and at a lower cost.

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A team of researchers from the University of South Carolina received two patents for a new method to rid carpets, mattresses and other furniture of harmful allergens and pests that cause asthma.

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A team of researchers from the National University of Singapore’s (NUS) Faculty of Engineering has developed a cost-effective solution for the control of indoor air pollution, especially from the haze. The new system is easy to use and ideal for use in a range of indoor environments.

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An interdisciplinary Kansas State University research group is taking used coffee grounds from a campus coffee shop and using them as compost to cultivate gourmet mushrooms at the student farm.

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The drive to replace the gasoline economy with better batteries might be accelerated thanks to unique battery testing capabilities at Cornell, and a new testing and prototyping center that the university helped to establish.

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Bicycling enthusiast and civil and environmental engineer Alec Gosse studies traffic data to seek infrastructure compatible with bicycles.

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A new TV documentary airing 3 times in May follows a team of mechanical engineering students from Michigan Technological University as they build a better handcycle for wounded veteran athletes, with support from GM,.

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Each helmet model’s ability to reduce concussion risk is assessed through 120 impact tests that are analyzed using the STAR Evaluation System, with each test weighted based on how often that impact condition occurs on the field.

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A simple new technique to form interlocking beads of water in ambient conditions could prove valuable for applications in biological sensing, membrane research and harvesting water from fog.

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Union College professors working with students to create a tensegrity robot that can move.

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One interdisciplinary team of Kansas State University students and faculty placed first and another team received honorable mention in the site design category in the EPA's second annual Campus RainWorks Challenge competition.

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Nanoengineers at the University of California, San Diego are asking what might be possible if semiconductor materials were flexible and stretchable without sacrificing electronic function?

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University of Washington electrical engineers have developed telerobotics technology that could make disaster response faster and more efficient. They are working with a team of eight other organizations as part of the SmartAmerica Challenge, an initiative to encourage new technologies that help society in our increasingly connected world.

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Significant funding from NIBIB has enabled researchers to develop a unique technology to help physicians perform ultrasound-guided procedures involving needle placement such as needle biopsies, central line insertion, and local anesthesia.

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Virginia Tech Unmanned Aircraft System researchers will be available for interviews May 12 through May 15 at the 2014 Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International conference in Orlando.

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1) Reducing soot. 2) Hydropower. 3) Understanding driver behavior. 4) A performance record in high-temperature superconducting wires.

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Light-weight garage doors can be the weak link to allowing high winds and pressure changes from a tornado into a home that can lead to the removal of the roof and collapsed walls.

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Technion researchers have developed an underwater imaging system that allows submariners to view objects above the water's surface - without a periscope. Researchers at Israel's Technion have developed an underwater imaging system that allows submariners to view objects above the water's surface - without a periscope.

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Iowa State University engineers and plant scientists are working together to study and develop better crops. The research team has organized an International Workshop on Engineered Crops April 28-29 in Des Moines, Iowa.

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An ASU team has performed the first virtual implantation of a pioneering artificial heart, led by engineer David Frakes, with Phoenix Children's Hospital.

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It all comes down to bridging a gap. The J. Lohr Structures Laboratory helps companies develop new materials and products—self-consolidating concrete columns and prestressed concrete bridge girders-- that bridge a physical gap. Many of those newly developed products are used in public works projects funded by federal, state and local governments, thus bridging a commercial gap.

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Wayne State University, in partnership with the University of Michigan and Drexel University, has launched a two-and-a-half-year study of the imagination — or l'imaginaire — of high-speed rail (HSR) in America. The study is part of a larger comparative international study piloted by Dr. Max Bergman at the University of Basel and led by French, American, South African, Indian and Chinese research teams that is exploring the role of the “imaginaries” in choices relative to train and rail infrastructures. In other words, the study will examine what motivates decision makers (both leaders and users) in regard to championing or using trains both in and of themselves and within the context of the future of transportation as a whole.

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There was a time when no one thought about light bulbs—one blew, you screwed another one in. Nowadays, it’s more complicated, as energy efficiency concerns have given rise to a slew of options, including incandescent, compact fluorescent lights, and light emitting diodes.

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A unique and low cost method to coat materials is the subject of a pending international patent. Ranga Pitchumani of Virginia Tech’s Mechanical Engineering Department and Atieh Haghdoost, a recent doctoral graduate from Pitchumani’s Advanced Materials and Technologies Laboratory developed the process.

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A credit-card-sized anthrax detection cartridge developed at Sandia National Laboratories and recently licensed to a small business makes testing safer, easier, faster and cheaper.

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A Kansas State University engineer has developed a patented technique that improves military security and remotely detects improvised explosive devices. The same technique could help police during drug searches.

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Newswise hosts the first live, interactive virtual event for major research finding for journalists. Newswise and Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center are collaborating to offer direct access to the investigator via Newswise Live, an interactive virtual event.

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Can modern engineers learn best practices from ancient road builders? Christine Fiori, who has led the first formal engineering study of the Inca Road, thinks so.