http://mitworld.mit.edu/ MIT World media in category 'Engineering'. en-us Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:21:27 GMT Fri, 13 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/722 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/722 Astronaut Mike Massimino returns to MIT and shares his experience on the Space Shuttle Atlantis (STS-125). Topics include the challenges of space walking while repairing the Hubble, having the right tools on hand for high stakes repairs, and the long hours of practice that lead up to the task.

As the first astronaut to Twitter from space, Massimino provides funny, personal and insightful anecdotes from the mission including the competition amongst his team to be the last human to touch the Hubble.

Accompanying Massimino on the mission was a rare book loaned from the MIT Libraries’ collections. The book, a limited edition facsimile of Galileo’s landmark publication “Sidereius Nuncius” (Starry Messenger), was chosen to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s astronomical research, the first recorded planetary observations using a telescope.

He presents the well-traveled book to MIT Libraries Director Ann Wolpert. She happily accepts the undamaged book and waives any late fees. The book traveled 5.3 million miles, making 197 orbits of the earth. It is now on display in an exhibit at the MIT Science Library. ]]> Fri, 21 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/700 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/700 Real-world practitioners of systems engineering/engineering systems describe how the young discipline has shaped their very large enterprises.

For the past 10 years, David Lehman has been incorporating key systems engineering ideas within MITRE Corporation. Successes include getting project leaders to think about engineering solutions in the context of political and economic organization, and learning how to communicate these solutions better. MITRE has talked to defense acquisition managers in the field to extract data and create models that get disseminated to other managers. But Lehman is disappointed that Defense Department acquisition methods are still large-scale, and unresponsive to swiftly changing situations. He’d like to show program managers how “to step outside what they’ve been taught,” and create incentives for doing the right things rather than “sticking with regulations.”

Robert Skinner, Jr. wonders if engineering systems approaches can help with some pressing questions: the way to mix transportation and land use decisions in urban areas, for instance, or government pricing strategies for surface transport. One nettlesome issue involves the right scope of analysis, says Skinner. Should researchers be looking at the components of the transportation system, or the whole enterprise? “As we move downward, uncertainty increases and the role of social systems and social science enters into it; politics upper and lower case becomes more significant.” And he adds, “We’re sorely lacking in analogs in the policy world to transmit complex engineering concepts. If analysis gets too far out ahead of the public’s and decision-makers’ ability to absorb it, it all comes to naught.”

“Why are so many complex systems behind schedule and over budget?” asks Heinz Stoewer. A single line of code missing can cause system collapse, says Stoewer. And big problems can flow from human shortcomings in calculations, accounting or risk management. Stoewer believes another reason for failure is that program managers and systems engineers “are too process focused,” and not well enough aligned. They may lack sufficient depth in the key discipline of their projects, leading to faulty product design or production. To improve the chances of success, Stoewer emphasizes the importance of early phases: “I can tell you two dozen programs in trouble because they’re…making enormous efforts trying to get things right when they’re almost done.”

By 2020, Joel Moses hopes that engineering systems will be recognized “as having made significant contributions” to health care, energy, environment, financial services and the military. To achieve such an impact, the field should focus on “maybe the key issue” of system architecture. Each engineering field thinks of architecture in different ways and groups must communicate better with each other. Moses believes educators should teach “what makes for a good system architect,” and that “systems thinking is important, but not enough.” A good system architect sees things holistically. Moses notes as well, “the difference between designing a one-off versus a family of systems.”

]]> Mon, 17 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/699 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/699 The field of systems engineering has only recently emerged, and as this symposium demonstrates, defies precise definition. But MIT has taken this evolving area to heart, nurturing a new division and encouraging a raft of ventures that in their execution, may help shape the field for the next century.

An MIT freshman in 1900 had some very specific requirements to fulfill for graduation, and to prepare for a responsible role in society, says Subra Suresh. Courses included mechanical drawing, military science and rhetoric. These choices became richer over time, with the addition of hundreds of engineering faculty, dealing increasingly with the sciences. Suresh traces how over many decades an engineering concentration on metallurgy shifted from studying mining (iron), to aviation (aluminum), plastics, electronic materials and then biological materials. But at each step, he notes, MIT “always lagged behind about 10 years” in what it taught students.”

The Engineering Systems Division (ESD) is an attempt to “train people the right way.” The curriculum brings the basic rules of nature into engineering practice, and applies discoveries to products and processes that impact people. Students must take into account the “long term societal impact.” ESD is needed to link complex issues along technological and social dimensions. The modern engineer must create new ideas and technologies, and reinvent tools and technologies from earlier times -- as Suresh puts it, “Fix problems associated with the greatest achievements of the 20th century.”

Yossi Sheffi fine tunes the picture, enumerating the key domains under the ESD umbrella, as well as the approaches faculty have adopted, in research, teaching and real-world projects. The primary distinction between other engineers and ESD engineers, Sheffi notes, is that “we try to look at the big picture.” So ESD focuses on critical infrastructure (water, transportation), such extended enterprise as supply chain management and global factories; energy sustainability and health care delivery. To get a handle on such unwieldy subjects, professors examine the human-technological interface, and delve into uncertainty, dynamics, design and implementation, networks and flows, and policy and standards.

MIT’s “engineers without labs” are seeking to “develop insights, principles and tools across all systems,” forging partnerships in industry, around the world. ESD students and faculty must get out in the field, says Sheffi, not just to fulfill course requirements but in order to tackle significant global problems, and to find solutions that are sustainable in terms of social equity, economic development and environmental impact. ESD values and accepts “intellectual risk,” meaning issues that may appear unquantifiable or vague, even without solution, and understands that problem solving means respecting and bringing together all disciplines, including the social sciences and management. ]]> Thu, 13 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/698 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/698 One of the nation’s revered technology leaders dispenses anecdotes and wisdom on the slippery subject of engineering systems (or systems engineering). Norm Augustine just can’t get a handle on the discipline: “No one agrees on what it is, or what it does.” After years in industries like Lockheed Martin, Augustine has come up with “Norm’s Rules,” and can at least define ‘system’ as “having two or more elements that interact,” and ‘engineering’ as “creating the means for performing useful functions.” But these definitions don’t get you too far in the real world.

Augustine shows a fuel control system, which some engineers might view as part of a propulsion system. In turn, aeronautical engineers might think of the entire airplane as a system, and transport engineers view aircraft as merely components in systems incorporating airports, highways, shipping lanes. Augustine continues up the ladder until “our system that started as a fuel controller…seems to have the whole universe as a system.” Like Russian Matryoshka dolls, systems can always be embedded within larger systems. Even if you try to simplify a system in terms of just a few objects with a binary, on-off interaction, things can get complex very quickly. Five elements in a system can exist in more than a million possible states. Says Augustine, “A typical earth satellite has nearly one million parts; a 747 over 5 million. How does that make you feel about flying?”

Distinguishing the significant interactions and the important external influences on a system are central to designing and problem solving. And these days, engineers must include politics, public policy and economics as part of their systems. “The trick is to bound the scope of the system so it’s not too large to be analyzed and not too small to be representative.” Doing this right is “why systems engineers should be paid so much.”

Augustine concludes with his “Dirty Dozen” systems engineering traps, which have led to embarrassing bust-ups, monumental failures, and real tragedies. Notable among these: “the ubiquitous interface,” (or absence thereof). He describes how two flight control groups used different metric units and accidentally sent a Mars-bound spacecraft whizzing off into deep space. There’s the “single-point failure,” exemplified by the collapse of a football field-sized satellite dish due to a poorly designed bracket. There’s software, “which like entropy, always increases:” a Mariner spacecraft headed in the wrong direction due to a missing hyphen in 100 thousand lines of code. The problem with most systems ultimately is that they “contain human elements … and humans sometimes do irrational things.” ]]> Tue, 11 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/697 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/697 These panelists use the lens of systems engineering to focus sharply on some signature global challenges in finance, healthcare, energy and IT.

The system failure that undid the small but influential financial services industry was a few decades in the making, says John Reed. In the ‘80s, a sea change swept over firms trading hundreds of billions of dollars each day. The new mantra was “shareholder value.” Firms ditched time-honored rules of capitalizing trades and guaranteeing risk in order to build investor profits. The crystallization of this philosophy was the mortgage-backed security. Trillions of dollars went into “off-balance-sheet investment vehicles.” When the nation’s mortgage portfolio deteriorated, not just one node in the system collapsed, but all of them. To fix the financial sector, says Reed, “A systems view will be essential, including behavioral considerations, not just economics.”

There’s no point in saying U.S.healthcare is broken unless you can offer a vision. For Denis Cortese, this means designing a “learning organization.” Cortese maps out this organization’s goals: simple value, with “better outcomes, better safety, and better service at a lower cost over time.” His proposed system would focus on the patient’s needs in order to “raise the health of the entire population.”

Cortese doesn’t see a role for the government in his ideal organization. But there must be better metrics for determining value, coordination among large and small healthcare organizations, and “common principles in the payer domain.” Ultimately, we’ll need to define quality healthcare and set outcomes: “It won’t be perfect, but it will be better than where we are today.”

Nine billion people will inhabit the planet by 2100, and many of them will either be acquiring energy for the first time, or wanting more. This has “unpleasant if not catastrophic” implications for greenhouse gas emissions, says Steven Koonin. Powering up while securing affordable energy and minimizing emissions involves better modeling of the physical and biological climate system; overcoming the inertia of our current transportation and building industries; and improving the “patchwork” of our current energy grid. Koonin sees immediate opportunities to cut energy use in half in cities, but we “must bring policy up to speed” to make this happen.

Tackling global problems won’t be possible without an improvement in complex organizational systems, says Irving Wladawsky-Berger, which in contrast to physically engineered systems, haven’t progressed in the past century or so. Change is creeping in, though, as organizations manage increasing amounts of data with more integrated instrumentation and swelling computer capacity. Wladawsky-Berger sees new tools emerging such as cloud computing and networked data centers, leading to the standardization and customization of services for producers and consumers. He believes that the “merging of the digital infrastructure with the physical infrastructure” will lead to new ways of life, including smarter cities with smart traffic systems that reduce congestion and pollution. ]]> Thu, 06 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/696 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/696 It’s a good thing for a world increasingly beset by mammoth challenges that universities are responding with new engineering systems programs. These initiatives, as Daniel Roos attests, are swiftly proliferating in the U.S. and abroad to equip students to address such complex issues as health care, sustainable energy, and infrastructure. Roos celebrates the fifth year of the Council of Engineering Systems Universities (CESUN), one of this symposium’s sponsors, and recaps his survey of group members on the state of engineering systems education.

While some traditionalists resist the interdisciplinary dimensions and broad compass featured so prominently in engineering systems programs, Roos believes that rapid global change necessitates corresponding change in how engineers are trained to think and practice. A case in point: a collapsing 100-year-old automobile and transportation system whose revival must incorporate complex, networked systems: intelligent infrastructure that can improve safety and alleviate congestion; and new, green, digitally wired vehicles integrated in a “smart energy net.”

ESD researchers study the complex social/technological questions that “will increasingly determine the future,” says Susan Hockfield. At MIT, Hockfield's job “is to lower boundaries that still exist between departments, and schools. By bringing together faculty, ESD creates enormous energy."

Charles Vest tells his audience, “Your time has come,” but warns that the U.S. lags dangerously far behind other nations in graduating engineers. Redesigning college-level engineering programs won’t be enough to meet the “grand challenges” posed by our times, if more children can’t be inspired to study engineering. The field lacks luster, and simply doesn’t connect with young people, says Vest. “We have failed miserably in projecting what engineering is, what it can accomplish and what’s exciting.”

The nation faces a great opportunity “to start rebuilding the economy based on real engineering innovations, to produce real goods and services, providing real value to people and society.” Vest wants to draw young people to work “at the frontiers of technology.” He notes a lot of interest in “tiny systems” such as biology, information and nano-technology. But “we need to worry” about the big macro systems of energy, environment, healthcare, manufacturing –“where the rubber hits the road between engineering and society.”

Vest wants to capture the passion of the next generation through some “soul stirring.” Through a campaign involving government, industry, and media, Vest hopes to convince young people that engineers are vital to meeting the “Engineering Grand Challenges” of global warming and sustainable energy, improving medicine and healthcare delivery, reducing vulnerability to human and natural threats, and expanding and enhancing human capability and joy (a somewhat unusual category for engineers, Vest admits).

Vest concludes with some personal comments about engineering systems, including anecdotes about Toyota’s innovations in auto assembly; NASA’s hard-won lessons in integrated design and manufacture of space-bound vehicles; and improvements in hospital care following simple changes integrated system wide. He sees the implosion of our financial system as an opportunity to study an incredibly complex human-technological system and set in place “at least an early warning system.” Vest also finds cheer in the public’s budding grasp of complex systems, as witnessed by increasing discomfort with fuel-based ethanol. ]]> Wed, 27 May 2009 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/673 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/673 John Ochsendorf, a structural engineer, “fell in love with archaeology” during college. His senior thesis at Cornell involved a 600-year-old Incan suspension bridge made entirely out of grass. Ochsendorf learned that this apparently primitive structure owed its astonishing longevity to regular rebuilds by the locals (during a community festival), and the use of renewable, biodegradable resources. While Cornell’s engineering faculty couldn’t see the point of this research -- “grass bridges over highway overpasses”? -- Ochsendorf realized that historical structures held important lessons for modern building technology.

The grass bridge raised several problems that now consume Ochsendorf’s academic and professional life. First, how to consider the whole life of a product when designing it, of particular import since “the 21st century is going to be a wild ride in terms of natural resources,” says Ochsendorf. Some building costs increase over time, consuming material and labor while deteriorating (nb: New York’s 1903 Williamsburg Bridge, with $1 billion in repairs, and still unsafe at any speed).

Ochsendorf suggests alternatives: making permanent structures with high quality construction and reusable materials (such as Roman stone arch bridges); very temporary structures, such as the grass bridge, or a Japanese pavilion made out of recycleable paper; or modular structures designed to change over time. Ochsendorf created “a medieval building for the 21st century,” a sustainable home made out of waste clay tiles, rammed earth from local chalk, and a heavy green roof on which sheep graze.

Ochsendorf also studies the integrity of existing historical structures: how to guarantee the safety of a medieval cathedral, or a 19th-century train station. The Pantheon’s stood for 2000 years, a brittle structure that inevitably develops cracks. Engineers today can’t say for sure “if something will fall down.” Ochsendorf is creating engineering tools to vouch for the masonry, steel and concrete holding up both historical treasures and more commonplace infrastructure. He is also working on high tech tools so engineers can examine building designs before construction to ensure “safe results,” and to create structures that will consume less energy and emit fewer greenhouse gases during their lifetimes. As composers know Mozart, and philosophers know the works of Plato, concludes Ochsendorf, the next generation of engineers must review the works of their forebears, if they’re to maintain existing infrastructure, and create better designs for the future. ]]> Wed, 13 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/586 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/586 Great civil engineers finds an aesthetic appropriate for their building’s material and structure, asserts David Billington, whose life work has been the study of some of the world’s most stunning engineering feats.

He reviews his own intellectual journey, first honoring some of his forebears, including Elting Morison, industrial historian and a founder of MIT's Program in Science, Technology and Society, and R. G. Collingwood, philosopher/historian. Billington describes a momentous turn in his career at Princeton, when architecture students in one of his courses rebuked him: “They told me, we hate what you’re teaching us. ... You’re teaching us stick diagrams and formulas. That’s how you teach structural engineering. Why can’t we study beautiful structures?”

They showed him a picture of the Salginatobel Bridge, built by “an obscure Swiss engineer, Robert Maillart,” about whom there was little published in English. This led to a major stretch of research by Billington, and opened up his lifelong interest in how great engineers delve deep into the nature of their building material, such as Maillart’s reinforced concrete, and discover how to make it beautiful.

In studying the work of Maillart and other European engineers, Billington learned that “truly great bridges are extremely interesting aesthetically.” They often result from competitions, satisfying criteria of structural art while wasting neither material nor money. Says Billington, the engineers “get elegance out of discipline -- they find play within discipline.” While most of Billington’s admired bridges were built in the 20th century (by men born in the 19th), he also pays tribute to Christian Menn, designer of Boston’s Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge, completed in 2002 -- an asymmetrical cable stayed bridge that has become a regional landmark.

“Basic form and structure comes from the engineer’s imagination,” says Billington, which puts engineers “far ahead of us academics, who often think we make innovations and explain them to practitioners.” Menn and his peers are “out there doing art,” and Billington’s mission is to teach it. He gives his students a sense of how the engineer’s mind works, by assigning students to build small-scale versions of structurally significant bridges. These models show up in art exhibits, and Billington shows many slides of such work during his talk.

In a footnote, Billington discusses the dismal state of U.S. infrastructure, including the catastrophic failure of the Minneapolis bridge in 2007. This steel truss bridge, like so many in the U.S., was the product of an anonymous design process, says Billington, where bridges are copied decade after decade, in an “unthinking acceptance of designs that are already flawed.” ]]> Mon, 04 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/582 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/582 In the curious way of technological evolution, we first had computers that occupied entire rooms, watched them shrink to desktop, laptop and palm-sized devices, and now find ourselves coming full circle, and then some, Alan Benner reports. He tells this MIT class about warehouse-sized data centers, linking processors, and ensembles of processors, in dizzyingly complex hierarchies. These gigantic operations, some with their own power and air conditioning plants, are central to the enterprise of Internet behemoths Google, Amazon and YouTube, but have not yet percolated out to more traditional companies like insurance firms -- a situation Benner and his IBM colleagues would like to remedy.

Benner describes in broad strokes how these data operations are organized into levels of “virtualization and consolidation,” where the hardware is hidden, yet the data is both fully accessible and secure, no matter where the user and the computers are located. These new enterprise data centers aim to maximize efficiency, both in utilization and power consumption. It’s better to have fewer, bigger and well-integrated machines, says Benner, working as much as possible. Since even idle servers use a lot of power, users should share processing time in a manner that keeps the processors occupied. Benner describes computer architecture and software that aims at “statistically multiplexing jobs,” matching peaks in one group’s workload to nonpeaks in another group’s. Ideally, users remain blissfully unaware of this traffic management, and need never worry whether their information is getting crunched next door, or on the other side of the planet.

Benner hopes that companies will see advantages in migrating their data and services to a bigger, shared infrastructure, especially now with the near-ubiquity of high bandwidth networks. Given the rapid rise of energy costs, and the burdens of supporting a growing IT administration, it may save money “to move work to where it can be done most efficiently,” he says. ]]> Tue, 22 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/579 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/579 These two MIT Museum speakers hope you’ll walk away from their talk with a good case of augmentation envy – or at least a healthy respect for what technology can do for the human body and soul.

John Hockenberry has used a wheelchair for 30 years, since a car accident left him a paraplegic. He tells us the public has viewed spinal cord injuries like his as “something horrific,” or “staggeringly poignant.” But in the last 10 years, disability has moved from being “an extraordinarily fringe activity” to a central issue facing society, that of “marrying technology with humanity in a way that is organic to the body, appropriate to the spirit and sustainable to the community.” Hockenberry believes that the needs and demands of disabled people are helping push science toward creating a set of design principles “that will allow this issue of human restoration and augmentation to merge into a kind of seamless unity.”

In illustration of this claim, Hugh Herr describes the astonishing strides engineers are making in the development of “Human 2.0.” He starts with himself -- a victim of frostbite during a 1982 mountain climbing accident. After losing both feet below the knee, Herr headed for the machine shop, and realized he didn’t have to accept the version of his body provided by nature. So he cobbled together a pair of prostheses perfect for climbing (which made him over 7 feet tall), followed by other foot-ankle replacements made lightweight and responsive through carbon composite materials and computers. These designs are better than his originals, suggests Herr. “What’s fun about having part of your body artificial is that you can upgrade. It’s depressing to me, too bad that you folks have biological limbs.”

Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have fueled the work in Herr’s lab. He’s now building robotic versions of arms and legs that restore capability, using computers and powered systems with sensors and motors. Stroke victims can use similar models, wrapped around an impaired limb, to restore symmetry between their left and right sides. The big prize will be a neural interface, a way of growing and reactivating an amputated nerve, so that it begins to convey sensory information through the complex networks of the brain. “The dream here is that one day I and other people with limb amputations will not only be able to walk across a sandy beach but feel the sand against their prosthesis,” says Herr.

Researchers haven’t imposed limits on their attempts at augmentation – or improvement. An MIT lab has designed a “socio-emotional prosthesis,” Herr tells us – using deep brain stimulators that leave subjects feeling “happy, calm, content.” Hockenberry wonders in conclusion whether we are “blowing away the notion of normal entirely and creating a completely improvisational notion of what it means to be human.” Herr proposes that in the future, “when we have many, many types of intimate technologies that are inside and attached to our bodies, it will unleash a renaissance in expression.” ]]> Mon, 23 Jun 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/569 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/569 Move over, Italy. Rafael del Pino is here to claim Spain’s rightful spot as a major European player in the global infrastructure market. Founded by del Pino’s father in 1952 as a builder of sleeper cars for trains, Ferrovial has diversified into a conglomerate with a hand in construction, real estate, road building design and operation, water treatment and desalination, airport ownership and operation, among other activities, and with 104 thousand employees in 43 countries. Del Pino describes some of the milestones passed, and hurdles overcome, during Ferrovial’s 50 years of expansive growth.

The company’s largest triumphs come from winning contracts in other nations: Ferrovial developed toll roads in Colombia, then Chile, and in 1988 bid on a huge ring highway around Toronto that involved committing 600 million Euros of Ferrovial’s own money. Not all Canadians were receptive to a Spanish company building and running a road with electronic tolls, and indeed, when the system didn’t work correctly at the start there was a great deal of public criticism, followed by a big fight with a new, opposition government.

Ferrovial bought its first airport in northern Chile in the late 90s, “in the middle of a desert, with some copper mines around and not much else.” They got the bid because of “a good relationship to the public works minister,” and because no previous experience was required. In 2004, Ferrovial “became more courageous,” and invested in the U.S., buying the Chicago Skyway from the city. Other acquisitions included a public works builder in Poland, and a joint venture in the U.K. with a company that runs three of London’s Tube lines.

Work with London's Tube lines made Ferrovial's acquisition of BAA (which runs Heathrow Airport) possible. Ferrovial, says del Pino, leverages airports as much as it can, and the BAA enterprise will leave Ferrovial with a net loss in 2008 of at least 300 million Euros, some of which flows from extensive renovations and rebuilding at a key terminal. Del Pino says the company’s shares have fallen by half in one year as a result of this venture and that “we’re being punished by uncertainty with BAA.” He notes sarcastically, “This is how the market reflects our wonderful management skills.” He’s dug in for the long run, though. “We’re a UK company based in Madrid.” ]]> Thu, 19 Jun 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/567 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/567 Frederick Salvucci’s perspective on transportation development is an amalgam of civil engineering, history, economics, policy, and not least, the direct impact on people’s lives. Here he surveys the evolution of transportation in Boston and beyond from the 1830s to the present.

Salvucci covers significant junctures in transportation history, beginning in the 1830s with horses pulling streetcars on wagon wheels, then steel wheels. In the 1870s, electrification of streetcars alleviated the phenomenon of overworked horses succumbing in the streets, causing both traffic jams and a public health hazard. “It was a really messy affair,” Salvucci says.

By World War I, automobiles increasingly crowded Boston streets, competing with streetcars and encouraging the growth of suburbs. Salvucci acknowledges urban planner Sam Bass Warner, Jr.’s book Streetcar Suburbs for telling this story. Not only the location of housing was affected. On the outskirts of Boston, at the ends of the radial subway lines, amusement parks and dance halls arose, luring city dwellers.

With the Eisenhower administration came the interstate highway system, inspired by the model of the German Autobahn. Salvucci characterizes this period as a time when people held “an unprecedentedly high belief that the government is capable of doing things; not exactly where the government reputation is today!” This roadway network forms the basis of the trucking industry, the "way the American economy moves today," says Salvucci. He commends Eisenhower for accomplishing “something impressive…a whole different economy out of this major investment of the public sector.”

But highway construction also eliminated jobs and razed neighborhoods. An automobile- dependent society rediscovered the virtues of public transportation. Salvucci credits Massachusetts GOP governors John Volpe (1960s) and Frank Sargent (1970s) with enlightened views promoting mass transit, though he admits “I don’t usually say good things about Republicans” unless they’re dead.

Salvucci also pays homage to activist Catholic priests fighting for the interests of residents in Boston neighborhoods threatened by destructive road construction plans. He singles out Richard Cardinal Cushing as “a rough justice guy.”

The lecture concludes with the nursery rhyme about Jack Sprat and his wife, whose complementary tastes Salvucci borrows as a parable for the necessity of balancing and integrating priorities. Land use planning, transportation development, economic growth, and the welfare of individuals are inextricably intertwined. ]]> Thu, 29 May 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/561 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/561 Evelyn Hu meticulously describes designing and building a new generation of optical materials from nano-sized elements. She hopes to harness “the magic of light in nanostructures.”

Hu walks through her research of exploring and exploiting the properties of different optical materials. She first cites the most important aspects of an optical material, such as its color (emission and absorption wavelength); its ability to convert energy efficiently; how long it remains excited when stimulated; and whether we “get more output than we put in.”

Hu looks for optical material in nature, then superimposes another pattern on it, substantially transforming it at the atomic level. In one case, she uses gallium arsenide of a wavelength or so thickness, and pokes such tiny holes in it that photons of light behave differently when they encounter the structure. As Hu says, “I’m sculpting out a particular environment for photons.” Her gallium arsenide nanostructures contain a tiny cavity or “sweet spot” that creates a high intensity electromagnetic field that interacts in a specific way with photons and atoms. Each structure has a unique optical signature. Hu makes an analogy to an organ pipe, an acoustic resonator, which due to its unique geometry, produces a different pitch as air moves through it.

Hu goes on to describe how a nanostructure works with simple low energy, high energy electron states, and how the cavity exerts influence on atoms to create a relationship between electronic and photonic states, what she calls “weak coupling.” Hu has also been mixing matter and light to create new quantum states. She describes placing an atom precisely in the sweet spot, exciting it to release a photon, changing the photon’s state and stimulating an atom again: “If I do this procedure exactly right… we can transfer energy between the environment and the atom almost forever.”

To achieve the optimal effect, atoms and photons must behave predictably and do as they’re directed. To accomplish this, Hu and colleagues have fashioned semiconductor quantum dots 50 angstroms wide as tunable optical emitters, and fabricated photonic crystal membranes with patterns etched out by electron beams. Hu’s found she can control and manipulate the release of photons more and more precisely within her nano environments, creating new quantum mechanical states, and exerting a “much more powerful influence on the nature of light.” This work, concludes Hu, has “profound implications for processing information.” ]]> Thu, 01 May 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/552 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/552 The world is counting on the fulfillment of (Intel co-founder) Gordon Moore’s Law for at least another half century. In Craig Barrett’s view, solutions to the crucial challenges of our time depend on improving on already nano-sized microprocessors every few years.

He points to the astonishing improvements in efficiency and miniaturization in Intel’s semiconductors, which around 1972 came loaded with 2,000 transistors that could be seen with the naked eye. Today’s integrated circuits, 11 generations down the road, bear 1-2 billion transistors that can be seen only with a scanning electron microscope. Intel has had to make other improvements too, says Barrett, as they moved into the nanoscale, attempting to improve functionality and performance without power dissipation. Dual and quad core microprocessors now permit parallel computing within a single PC. Barrett recounts how the first teraflop computer he worked on at Sandia Labs required 10 thousand Pentium processors and took up 2,000 square feet. “The challenge is in the next six to eight years, going to exascale, getting up to a million teraflops,” through multiple core processors, he says, and then there will be a “huge challenge in terms of software paradigms.”

These changes must come, says Barrett, if the world is to confront its “grand challenges,” such as making solar energy affordable, solving issues of carbon sequestration, and figuring out the hydrogen cycle. Those extra teraflops and exaflops will also prove essential to the next generations of visual computing, where scientists (and gamers) want the feel of HD reality on their computer screens. Barrett says silicon photonics will help pave the way for such improvements.

Barrett wants current and emerging technologies put to use as well in education, which he sees as fundamental to helping developing economies. He describes efforts Intel is making to get computers into classrooms around the world, as well as providing training in their use, and helping with broadband connectivity. He also wants computer power brought to bear on the U.S. healthcare scene, which he describes as more of a looming financial crisis than a bankrupt social security system. He’s looking for a political candidate who sees the value of revamping healthcare to take advantage of electronic medical record-keeping, and personalized remote monitoring and diagnostics, “to shift the issue of healthcare from the hospital to individuals and the home.” ]]> Tue, 15 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/546 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/546 In this valedictory panel to the two-day symposium, 10 speakers offer brief takes on how the Second Law of Thermodynamics might prove useful in seeking answers to our current energy challenge.

Even before the oil embargo of 1973, Thomas Widmer recalls, Joe Keenan and his MIT colleagues wrote of an “entropy crisis.” They analyzed the flow of work in industries and saw great inefficiencies that became crippling when fuel prices spiked. Despite 30 years of improvement, says Widmer, “the effectiveness of energy use is still less than 12%.” In selling ideas to policy makers, he advises, talk about “energy productivity” rather than conservation.

Ernest S. Geskin doesn’t believe alternative energies will be viable quickly enough to make a serious difference in climate change, so his objective is to improve combustion. He outlines several methods he’s developing that increase the availability of generated heat, reduce heat losses, and integrate combustion with materials production and processing, such as in steelmaking.

James Keck says that “improving the efficiency and reducing emissions of auto engines and power plant burners requires an ability to model hydrocarbon combustion.” He recommends using a method “firmly based on the Second Law of Thermodynamics: the rate controlled constrained equilibrium method,” which, among other advantages, generates fewer equations, and is applicable to any separable system.

Seeking ways to make reactions more efficient and “less exergy destructive,” Noam Lior recommends a detailed, top-down methodology. His lab has been examining oil droplet and coal combustion in an attempt to understand why exergy losses take place, and to determine “which process will give us the highest exergy efficiency.”

Debjyoti Banerjee’s research focuses on enhanced cooling and explosives sensing. His lab explores phase changes for boiling and condensation, and develops new models in molecular dynamics, harnessing the energy of nanosphere transport processes. A “nanobubble” serves as a heat engine, and Banerjee is examining how “nanofins help in transferring heat.”

Richard Peterson is taking a look “at how small you might be able to make the classic thermodynamic heat engine, so you could integrate it into portable equipment or other devices requiring power, and burn fuel with much higher energy density than found in a battery.” He notes that “your efficiency takes a nosedive as you shrink the engine.”

Erik Ydstie is concerned with dynamic systems like power plants, and how they can be improved, by manipulating their inputs and outputs. By designing better controls to regulate these complex systems, there’s a “lot of scope to improve the efficiencies of these plants. You could get quite a bit of mileage by running them better.”

Ron Zevenhoven “presents the embryo of an idea: Can the infrared radiation that causes the enhanced greenhouse effect be put to better use?” He wants to see whether science can modify the infrared radiation that leaves the earth, in order to cut back on radiative forcing higher up.

Zhuomin Zhang discusses radiation entropy and how near-field thermophotovoltaic devices “may be another way of effectively using energy.” He wonders how to apply the entropy concept to near-field radiation when interference is a problem.

Ahmed Ghoniem says that while we won’t run out of cheap fossil fuels for some time, “we need to think about an insurance policy” in response to the predictions of a four to six degree rise in Earth’s temperature by the end of the century. “The dirty little secret is once you burn the fuel you automatically generate entropy -- you lose about 20% right off the bat.” Ghoniem asks whether “combustion and heat engines can be reinvented to reduce entropy generation, practically and at scale.” ]]> Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/543 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/543 This Nobel Prize-winning scientist admits to staying up late the night before his talk to bone up on thermodynamics. He puts his research to good use, discussing the history and application of the laws of thermodynamics, which have served as “the scientific foundation of how we harness energy, and the basis of the industrial revolution, the wealth of nations.”

Taking Watt’s 1765 steam engine, Stephen Chu illustrates basic principles of thermodynamics -- that energy is conserved, that you can do work from heat, especially when you maximize the difference in temperature in the system and minimize heat dissipation from friction. Chu offers another form of the laws: You can’t win; you can’t break even; and you can’t leave the game.

The game hasn’t changed all that much in the past few centuries. Nations now burn coal for electricity, achieving around 40% thermal efficiency. Natural gas can be harnessed at higher efficiencies still, and if we could deploy temperature-resistant metals for boilers, even less energy would go to waste. This is a pressing matter, points out Chu, because the planet can no longer afford wanton use of carbon-based fuels. With too much CO₂, our global “heat engine” has begun to tip toward a point of no return. So the big question for Chu is whether science can design “entropy engines that can generate sustainable (carbon-free) energy sources.

He describes efforts to capture sunlight with improved solar cells, but notes that a silicon shortage, expensive chips, and a learning curve dictated by Moore’s law mean the technology won’t be widely deployed for 10-15 years -- not fast enough in the battle against climate change. Chu likes the efficiencies of power generation from wind, but there’s a limit to turbine size, and the U.S. high voltage transmission network needs a complete and expensive makeover to take full advantage of wind. Forget corn as biofuel, he counsels, since it “barely breaks even in terms of CO₂ saved,” and focus instead on perennial grasses like miscanthus. Chu’s lab and others are looking for microbes that can help turn these plants more readily into fuels.

Another potentially rich energy source, Chu says, involves converting sun light into fuel the way plants do in photosynthesis. But “how does nature split water?” asks Chu. Science hasn’t entirely figured out the molecular machinery that turns water into oxygen and hydrogen. Deriving bioenergy through artificial photosynthesis may mean considering entropy and other basic laws in a different light, Chu suggests. “Nature turns out to be very good.” ]]> Thu, 27 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/540 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/540 Robert Silbey is an old hand at teaching chemistry (40 years and counting), yet each time he turns to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, he’s “always very nervous.” From this panel of educators, we get a sense of how challenging a classroom subject the Second Law can be.

Joseph Smith notes that the teaching approach “depends on the application,” and applications are both theoretical and practical. Students must first ask what is entropy, and why is it needed, says Smith. He focuses on “idealizations that often get ignored,” such as isolation, equilibrium and system boundaries. “If we don’t get those straight in the beginning student’s mind, then there’s a lot of confusion.”

To Howard Butler’s way of thinking, “teaching the Second Law is much more difficult and challenging a task than teaching Newton’s Second Law of Motion,” both because the concepts involved are so much more complex and abstract, and because the Second Law takes on very different forms depending on which thermodynamic domain is being considered.”

Andrew Foley “tries not to worry too much about what entropy is.” Instead, he handles the whole concept as if it were an accounting problem: “money being moved through a mint.” We can “shove the property of energy instead of money, and produce a form of accounting for energy equations.” Says Foley, “First Law, Second Law -- it’s all accounting.”

As engineering and biology converge, “it’s important that students understand the thermodynamics of biological molecules,” says Kim Hamad- Schifferli. She demonstrates the Boltzmann distribution with such biological examples as the coiling of DNA from its double-stranded to single-stranded form. Hamad- Schifferli acknowledges that entropy is very difficult for students to grasp viscerally, and that “one thing that helps greatly is the lattice model -- the entropy of mixing two gases, for example.”

Bernhardt Trout also invokes Boltzmann, “who believed in atoms vehemently, without substantive proof.” This is because “he didn’t want to believe in the soul, he wanted to believe we are nothing but matter and motion.” Trout says that while we can get a more accurate, mathematical description of atoms, “we owe it to our students to teach them about these most fundamental issues to try to reengage the original questions in the original context in which they existed.”

Jeffery Lewins reminisces about being “Keenanized” during his college years. He notes that “in the great book, Professor Keenan uses the energy-entropy volume space quite late to discuss equilibrium.” Lewins suggests that more can be made of this space in teaching.

Enzo Zanchini discusses “a rigorous definition of entropy valid also for nonequilibrium states.” He considers closed systems, and lays out a thorough set of basic definitions, going over the First Law and energy, and the Second Law and entropy.

“There are so many textbooks on thermodynamics, so many schools of thought, says Michael von Spakovsky because “there is not a whole lot of agreement on a lot of things.” He recounts how a unified theory developed at MIT helped resolve key issues in thermodynamics, by proposing “a broader, self-consistent quantum kinematics and dynamics. … Entropy becomes an intrinsic property of matter, including single particles.” ]]> Sun, 16 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/537 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/537 “Biology is messy,” says Kenneth Dill, and it’s “heavily about entropy.” Just look at how biological systems repeat entropy at every possible turn: a parent cell making two daughter cells, sending one DNA molecule to each; and the process of biochemical reactions, with water getting stripped off the molecules. Dill is convinced that the “language of biology in the future will be nonequilibrium statistical mechanics.” He’s engaged in experiments that explore how dynamical laws apply to very small biological systems, such as those inside cells.

Traditional macro-scale dynamics, explains Dill, have laws where concentration gradients or temperature gradients drive flux. But inside cells, there are elements that sometimes contain five molecules, and then in the next instant, 500 molecules. The question is how to think about these highly fluctuating quantities in terms of dynamics. To that end, researchers have been devising experiments to describe the dynamics of micro systems.

Dill’s colleagues have built a microfluidics apparatus that plots the diffusion of microscopic particles over time, their probable routes and rates. To help frame this work, and make predictions about comparable systems, they use an analogy to entropy, described as caliber. Just as there can be maximum entropy, there can be maximum caliber -- “an extremum principle that predicts the dynamical laws, just as maximum entropy predicts equilibrium,” says Dill. This way of modeling fluxes deals with the likely trajectories and speeds traveled by particles within a certain time period.

Dill also describes how statistical mechanics applies in the “dog-flea model.” Scientists calculate the probabilities of fleas jumping from one dog to another, and of going up against a concentration gradient. Dill says this model can be used “to argue in the simplest way how diffusion works,” to predict flux distribution.

Scientists have also worked out an experiment to model two-state kinetic processes, such as single ion channels opening and closing. Colloidal particles wiggling in adjacent laser traps can jump over barriers from one trap to the other, depending on the height of the barrier and the depth of the well. This allows researchers to count trajectories, and to measure “the full dynamical distribution functions.” The value of the maximum caliber approach, Dill says, is that you get data about the first moment of the system in state “and from them you can predict everything else.” Says Dill, “One of the great things about having an extremum principle and partition-based approach is it turns out all kinds of analogies with normal thermodynamics.” So far, researchers have only taken the earliest steps to illustrate this new tack. “The potential power of caliber hasn’t been tested yet,” believes Dill. ]]> Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/529 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/529 These nine panelists describe ways in which the Second Law of Thermodynamics can be stretched, or applied in less traditional ways. Adrian Bejan has constructed a law that “covers every configuration in physics, from animate, to inanimate, to us, the societal." Bejan demonstrates how his law describes and predicts the tree-shaped flow of all rivers, animal locomotion and human settlement distribution. With it, says Bejan, “thermodynamics becomes a science of systems with configuration…”

Bjarne Andresen acknowledges “many fights about the Second Law,” before declaring his belief that “entropy survives as a concept, and applies equally in the chemistry lab, to the quantum computer and to black holes.” He discusses the importance of carefully defining the system under examination beforehand, “otherwise you get into fights with your neighbors."

Miguel Rubi discusses how to use the Second Law to extract information about the evolution of small systems. Unlike “canonical thermodynamics,” which describe systems in terms of energy, volume and mass, mesoscopic thermodynamics focuses on systems in terms of positions and movement of particles. Some examples of processes explicable by this kind of thermodynamics include the translocation of ions, RNA unfolding under tension, and muscular contractions.

Signe Kjelstrup argues that mesoscopic nonequilibrium thermodynamics (MNET) can address a longstanding problem in classical nonequilibrium thermodynamics, by addressing “activated processes.” Biological systems have heat flow, says Kjelstrup, and “that is as of yet not included in the description of enzyme kinetics. It should be there to quantify lost work in these important systems.”

“An important question arising in nonequilibrium thermodynamics is not just entropy but temperature,” says David Jou, in particular, “the physical meaning of temperature.” Jou invokes the extended thermodynamics of viscoelastic systems, and looks for a simple model valid for a modest range of equations.

Miroslav Grmela suggests that any time one goes from details to some kind of pattern, “there is an entropy involved…by providing some kind of dissipation, some pattern recognition process.” Grmela believes that thermodynamics … “find a natural formulation in the setting of contact geometry.”

Lyndsay Gordon’s talk involves Maxwellian valves. He discusses “a machine based on an osmophoretic engine,” a simple system with a liquid membrane, solvent and solute, “that is fluctuating completely forever,” without information. “This thing goes by itself,” he says.

Eric Schneider discerns “laws of ecology” in such gradient systems as the energy flow between the sun and earth. “We can determine “…heat and entropy production in the system,” as well as “ecological successions and directional processes that directly tie them to Darwinian evolution.” He advises his colleagues “to encourage policy makers to use exergy analyses on future energy development projects.”

Symposium organizer George Hatsopoulos wraps up by noting “that as far as I know in thermodynamics, there is no statement that says the Second Law implies the increase of entropy. The Second Law only says that the entropy cannot decrease, but there’s nothing wrong with entropy staying put.” We have evidence that in some cases it appears the entropy increases, but that’s not the “Second Law.” ]]> Fri, 22 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/528 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/528 The pace of global carbon emissions may be such that humanity’s best efforts to stabilize them below current levels by 2050 won’t be enough to prevent a significant increase in Earth’s temperatures. Margaret Leinen, drawing on the U.N.’s recent climate reports, and the latest research from the field, shows the dire graph: a red line of CO₂ emissions marching steadily upward, with accompanying graphics depicting hoped-for impacts of international efforts to mitigate greenhouse gas release.

The current global abatement “wedges” consist of technologies not yet developed or widely deployed, such as energy efficiencies, cellulosic biofuels, solar, wind, and nuclear. Leinen notes that most of the abatement in renewables “comes into play 20-30 years out,” and the “reality is there will be increases in CO₂ in the atmosphere for the next 20-30 years while we try to address the problem.” Policy makers have not begun to grapple with the notion of delayed onset of emissions, says Leinen. Among scientists, there’s growing concern that “we’re going to be dealing with catch-up for a long enough time that we will suffer the consequences of emissions regardless of whether we put policies in place.”

These projections suggest to some scientists that we must take more radical, immediate steps and geoengineer our way out of global warming. But other scientists, says Leinen, are loath to discuss these approaches, much less let them see the light of day. Carbon capture and sequestration, “viewed as necessary mechanisms for emissions reductions by some” says Leinen, and which have captured the interest of politicians, are viewed by another scientific camp “as soft engineering, or geoengineering light.” When a Nobel scientist wrote an article proposing the use of stratospheric aerosols to decrease sunlight hitting the earth, alarmed scientists lobbied prestigious journals not to publish it. Leinen’s own area of research, ocean iron fertilization, attempts to stimulate phytoplankton activity, which would help sop up atmospheric CO₂. These approaches all face opposition because of their possible, negative impacts. But, says Leinen, these arguments “ignore the fact that we’re faced with a situation in which we must have an entire portfolio of activities” for reducing CO₂. She worries that lack of discourse, or constant dispute will put scientists in a position “where policy makers want to move to (the new) techniques … and we won’t have studied them sufficiently to provide good scientific answers about whether they work.” ]]> Tue, 12 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/526 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/526 “This machine of ours is running out of control” is Thomas A. Christopher’s sobering assessment of the consequences we face as a result of our insatiable appetite for energy. His talk is notable for its lucid and detailed descriptions of energy markets, nuclear and power plant design and operations, and for Christopher’s blunt message about our energy future.

As the cost of fuel goes, so goes the price of electricity, Christopher warns. And the cost of fuel, whether coal, which produces 60-70% of our electricity, or natural gas, is spiking upward. Christopher sees resource shortages today unlike any he’s ever known, and electricity markets are consequently extremely volatile. Consumers are buffered – for the moment – by legislation many states impose on utilities. But as fuel prices continue their rise (because China and India import U.S. coal; the U.S. increasingly imports natural gas; and utilities expensively retrofit plants to reduce emissions), and domestic demand increases 3% per year, electricity costs will follow. Depending on where you live in the U.S., Christopher says to expect rate increases of 15% to 50% a year.

And this is where nuclear power comes in; the economics make it inevitable, Christopher says. A combination of slimmed-down reactor construction designs and a less cumbersome federal permitting process will make possible a new generation of nuclear plants -- the first to come online in decades. Christopher describes 17 thousand page permitting documents describing such safety features as how a plant will withstand the crash of a fully loaded jumbo jet into its reactor containment building or spent fuel pit. With the growing demand for renewable energy, the U.S. government is attempting to encourage the first handful of these $4 to $6 billion projects by backing up bank loans. After Seabrook and Shoreham led to protracted licensing processes and escalating construction costs, few banks want to be first to jump into the financing game, notes Christopher.

While the new plants have larger capacities (1650 megawatts) than the 104 older plants running in the U.S., and even if several should come online by 2015 (the earliest projections), Christopher points out that the U.S. demand is growing by 20 to 30 thousand megawatts per year, and energy conservation won't cut into this demand sufficiently to keep prices down. Because of spiraling costs, "The country needs nuclear power as one part of the electricity generation mix." Nevertheless, he concludes, "given that nuclear is only 20% of the content--the truth is our society is going to have to get adjusted to high electricity prices." ]]> Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/520 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/520 The nine panelists set out to address, very briefly, some of the key questions of the symposium.

Seth Lloyd discusses the Maxwell demon paradox and the spin-echo effect, and how in some cases, in an apparent violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics “entropy goes up and whoa, goes down then up.” He notes that when the laws of thermodynamics appear not to be true, “we simply revise our opinions and re-describe” them, which is “a pathetic situation.”

Owen Maroney invokes “straightforward statistical mechanical assumptions” in his discussion of whether “something can violate the Second Law or not,” and raises Szilard’s engine and Landauer’s erasure principle.

Silviu Guiasu aims to show there is no contradiction between microscopic reversibility of classical mechanics, as described by Hamilton’s equations of motion, and macroscopic irreversibility as described by the increase of entropy.

Ping Ao believes the dynamics behind Darwinian evolution “provide a natural framework” for thermodynamics, and it remains to translate “global statements to precise mathematical language.”

Jochen Gemmer discusses bubbles in Hilbert space, while examining how we might overcome the apparent contradiction between quantum dynamics and thermodynamics.

Bernard Guy focuses on the link between the Second Law and the problem of time, seeking clues for understanding the opposition of reversibility and irreversibility. He sees clashing constructs of time and space in the separate worlds of cognitivists and physicists.

Gian Paulo Berretta praises the seminal work and “pioneering intuition” of Keenan and Hatsopoulos, which inspires new answers to such fundamental issues as whether entropy is an intrinsic property of matter, and if irreversibility is an intrinsic feature of microscopic dynamics.

Speranta Gheorghiu-Svirschevski believes a nonlinear approach can help reconcile the Second Law and quantum evolution. In particular, she looks for ways to “reconcile locality and separability,” while acknowledging that general wisdom says it’s not exactly possible.

Dorion Sagan says that “ever since Darwin, life has been considered an exception to the Second Law.” On the contrary, “entropy, rather, energy spread, and evolution are inextricably linked.” Sagan suggests that “life may just be another energy spreading system,” and “death is the name we give the inevitable disruption of a specific part of life’s network.” ]]> Mon, 16 Jul 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/463 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/463 Philosophers and AI researchers may argue the point, but Bruce Donald believes his microscopic invention qualifies as a robot. Donald’s machine is about as wide as a strand of human hair. He likens it to a car, because it’s controllable: “You can steer it anywhere on a flat surface, and drive it wherever you want to go.” Unlike previous attempts at such a microelectromechanical system, Donald’s robot has no tether, but operates via electrical charges on a silicon grid. It’s a real speed demon, proceeding in nano-sized hops (one billionth of a meter, 20,000 times per second), ultimately achieving two millimeters per second, or the equivalent on a more human scale of 80 kilometers per hour. To the tunes of a Strauss waltz, Donald demonstrates two robots dancing in straight and wavy lines around each other, and then coupling to form a single system.

Donald envisions many possible applications for this work. Since his robots can push and shove things in their path, and can also latch onto each other, they might prove quite useful assisting in techniques involving protein design, manipulation of cells and biomedical engineering. The next five to 10 years, Donald predicts, will see an even smaller generation of robots, which “will be doing useful things in the lab.” ]]> Thu, 07 Jun 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/454 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/454 This session goes a long way toward demonstrating the “happy face of the atom,” as moderator David Kaiser puts it, replacing the mushroom cloud image with a multidimensional picture of the uses of nuclear technology.

As a plasma physicist, Ian Hutchinson works on controlled fusion -- a very hot area of nuclear technology in more ways than one. By fusing together isotopes of hydrogen, you can achieve the energy source of stars, says Hutchinson. This promises infinite reserves of clean energy. These reactions are only possible at super high temperatures, and “to bring these down to a human scale,” the gases created must be contained by powerful magnets in machines called tokamaks. MIT and other labs have produced fusion energy and now a major international project to create a large fusion reactor is under way. The big challenge, says Hutchinson, is understanding the “great stirrings and eddies inside the plasma” that cause gas leaks and disruption to the fusion process.

We are now entering a time when “angst seems to be subsiding and we are able to discuss the benefits of nuclear technology in the security arena,” says Dwight Williams. He describes some major upgrades to the detection devices commonly used to prevent people from getting “bad stuff on an airplane or through a port.” Williams explains active system devices, which can induce a radioactive signature in something that was not originally radioactive, and thus signal an item’s “elemental content.” A machine using thermal neutron activation analysis can penetrate all kinds of shielding, to produce gamma rays and a 3D image of the contents of a bag. Since explosives share some of the features of jam, marzipan and chocolate, says Williams, advanced nuclear techniques will help inspectors distinguish between the benign and dangerous.

Medical applications of nuclear technology deploy different types of radiation to kill tumor cells and spare healthy tissue. But, says Jeffrey Coderre, shielding healthy cells to prevent radiation’s side effects turns out to be a tricky proposition. Coderre investigated the nature of radiation damage and determined it was a function of damage to stem cells (rather than damage to blood vessels). He describes how the radioisotopes used in medical radiation, virtually all of which come from Canadian reactors, can be used in a variety of ways: to view areas of rapid bone growth, or tumor sites in bone; to sterilize syringes and drapes used in hospitals; and in a radiation helmet called the gamma knife to get focused radiation into difficult brain tumors.

Alan Jasanoff provides a one-stop tour of medical imaging techniques, differentiating between those scans that use high energy radiation (such as computed tomography and positron emission tomography); and low wavelength radiation, based on radio waves, such as nuclear magnetic resonance imaging. PET scans detect molecular tracers that have been consumed in a sugary drink to find areas where cells are rapidly dividing, for example. New applications for this well established imaging method include locating plaques in the brain that cause Alzheimer’s disease. MRI, unlike CT or PET scans, has minimal destructive impact on tissues, and allows 3D mapping of blood vessels, and more recently, the tracing of microscopic fibers in the brain. Jasanoff’s lab uses calcium-sensitive contrast agents to detect events in the brain. ]]> Mon, 04 Jun 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/451 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/451 Though Stephen Quake’s research is confined to the smallest of scales, his achievements have already made a large impact on the study of biology. Quake’s area of microfluidics involves fabricating tiny devices akin to those a plumber uses, but useful on the molecular level. Quake modestly describes his “plumbing tools” as “very simple stuff, not rocket science,” but these mini valves and chambers, which enable him to manipulate the behaviors of fluids in minute volumes, are already proving useful in some of the toughest problems of bioscience.

Quake has fashioned microfluidic technology to analyze DNA sequences in a large-scale way, and to determine protein structure. Borrowing from computer engineering, Quake uses nanoliter amounts of fluids on chips in order to grow protein crystals. These new methods allow for much finer control and manipulation of protein crystal growth than conventional structural biology methods. His lab has figured out not only how to tie single DNA molecules into knots, but how to sequence them. Confronting the limits of conventional microscopy, Quake’s lab “stumbled upon the discovery of small colloidal particles that act as microlenses.” These tiny beads concentrate light and provide a “higher effective aperture, which works phenomenally well.” Now as they automate their miniature DNA and protein factories for mass production, they can observe their work in real time.
]]> Wed, 30 May 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/449 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/449 With wit and candor -- including some jabs at engineering school traditionalists --Yossi Sheffi questions the future value of the current MIT engineering education, and proposes an alternative.

In days past, engineers answered the call to invent gizmos, gadgets and complicated devices, but in our time, they must increasingly respond to challenges involving complex systems. “Process design is where many of tomorrows’ challenges lie,” says Sheffi. How to fashion a global supply chain, for instance, that consistently ensures items are available on time, on the shelf, at a low cost, a chain that is responsive to external demand and shocks –this is difficult, he says. But it is this kind of know-how that provides a competitive advantage. Walmart, says Sheffi, “didn’t come up with new exciting stuff but they dominate the market…through process, not product innovation.”

The kind of engineer who can succeed and lead in this global market -- one that is increasingly fed by graduates of schools in China and India, notes Sheffi – may no longer be the type educated at MIT. The Institute is top-rated, but is mired in an approach “fit for mid-20th century manufacturing-based society,” and is now “resting on past laurels.” Yet, why change, Sheffi ponders. “We are #1. Rah rah.” But look at MIT’s School of Engineering “among friends,” he suggests, and you must admit there’s “significant calcification, duplication and conservatism.” He finds multiple fluid mechanics and thermodynamics courses among the various departments. “How many courses have ‘control’ in their name? 228!” Students are a key barometer of this stodginess, says Sheffi. There’s been a 20% decline in engineering graduates in the last eight years.

So MIT must shift gears, and embrace two basic missions: continuing to produce world-class experts (geeks) – practicing engineers who design complicated systems – and generating world-class leaders (chiefs), who will deploy their technological expertise in the real-world. “My hypothesis is that the great leaders of the next century will have to have a technological background, because we’re going toward a technologically innovative society.” These leaders will be problem definers as much as problem solvers, and, says Sheffi, “either we or China will educate them.”

Sheffi suggests a School of Engineering-wide undergraduate program, where all the fundamentals courses are rethought and taught differently. This means sacrificing problem sets for case studies, and “learning how a subject fits into the grand scheme of things.” MIT should integrate humanities with engineering subjects, ensuring undergraduates understand business, ethics, legal language, environmental concerns, organization and process design. There should also be a formal leadership workshop, required time in a foreign culture and along the lines of the European Union, a five-year educational model. If MIT builds it, others will follow, assures Sheffi.

]]> Sun, 06 May 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/444 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/444 Geothermal energy remains the poor cousin in our current stable of renewable resources, in spite of offering enormous benefits. That’s Jefferson Tester’s inescapable conclusion, after participating in a Department of Energy investigation into the technical and economic viability of tapping into this potentially vast energy pool. He describes the findings of the DOE report to a live and online MIT Museum audience.

The 18-member research team accepted as givens the fact that U.S. will demand ever more power, having just passed the one million megawatt milestone. But there are threats to the supply system, with increasing prices for natural gas and difficulties expanding coal production, not to mention issues around electric transmission lines and energy storage. Renewables like solar and wind won’t make much of a dent in the next 20 years, researchers believe, and nuclear power continues to meet public resistance.

Meanwhile, for the last 30 years, geothermal systems have been successfully demonstrating their capacity to generate electricity. Some areas of the world are blessed with steam or hot water located fairly close to the surface (think of Yellowstone’s Old Faithful geyser). In Iceland and locations in the U.S. west, says Tester, “instead of mining minerals from the ground, we’re mining heat.” Right now, the U.S. produces 3000 megawatts of geothermal electricity. But “not all the earth is so blessed” with hot springs, says Tester, so the trick is “to replicate what nature has done.”

In several critical demonstrations around the globe, researchers are working on such enhanced/engineered geothermal systems (EEGS). They drill down to depths of 5 kilometers and beyond, deep enough to reach hot rock. Then they circulate water into these underground heat reservoirs, where it warms up enough to generate electric power. The work shows great promise, Tester believes.

Tester’s report assumed that if geothermal were “going to be anything more than a minor curiosity,” it would have to supply energy at the level of nuclear or hydropower in the U.S. today – 100 thousand megawatts. EEGS could become such an energy player by 2050, if in the next 15 years, government and industry kicked in for a handful of field demonstrations -- first in some shallow, high grade sites in the West, which would quickly and economically start producing energy, and then eventually in some sites requiring more expensive mining at depths greater than six kilometers -- such as in the eastern U.S. The total investment of $600-800 million would be less than the cost of a single clean coal plant, notes Tester. Currently, unlike other renewable energy projects, “geothermal has no money in the budget.” Comments Tester, “If I look to the future of my children, and my grandchildren, I’d want to make sure we’re looking at all the options.”

]]> Wed, 11 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/439 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/439 “The great innovations are in front of us as a society,” believes Rich Templeton. This means glowing opportunities for young people entering the workforce, especially those pursuing science and engineering. “The world is getting technologically more sophisticated, and people who understand how this world works will be advantaged, no matter what their occupation: researcher, scientist, lawyer or salesperson.”

In the 130 years since Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, one billion land line phones have been installed. In the 20-year-history of the cell phone, three billion units have come into circulation around the globe. That number may go up to four billion soon. “I don’t know of any other product that two-thirds of the world’s population uses,” Templeton remarks. He views the explosion of consumer markets as an enormous incentive to entrepreneurs and others moving into the job market. He urges listeners to consider the emerging economies of China and India as a welcome change, not a threat. “We’ve got three billion additional consumers…who will drive the economy, overnight. We’ve never seen that type of transformation … in the history of the world.”

The convergence of electrical engineering and life sciences will create a robust area for product development. Templeton envisions such equipment as portable, low power, and low cost ultrasound machines, capable of operating in remote villages, or implantable devices to diagnose and monitor an individual’s health.

Templeton himself is a product of an engineering education, but to his college advisor’s chagrin, chose to head first into sales. It’s a choice he’s never regretted. “It wasn’t about making money, it was because I enjoyed it,” Templeton says. He’s found that a technical background immeasurably helped in his relations with customers. When students ask about choosing a career path, he advises, “Relax, do what you think you’ll have fun doing, and work on things you’re not familiar with, challenging stuff that scares you because you don’t have a background in it.” ]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0400 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/429 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/429 Innovators from some of the nation’s top tech schools demonstrate their methods for making science and engineering education more engaging, if not fun.

At Tufts, Irene Georgakoudi hands out Legos to a freshman class on optics and lasers. While conveying properties of light and principles of laser operation, she hopes to excite students about physics and engineering. Teams design and build instruments out of Legos, and conduct experiments, gathering and recording data. Georgakoudi says with some sophisticated add-ons like motors, light sensors and control modules, Legos can “enhance understanding of basic concepts, promote creative thinking, provide practical experience with building and controlling instruments and promote teamwork.”

Shekhar Garde of RPI aims to feed the minds of an even younger audience. His Molecularium, an animated musical film introduction to the world of molecules, targets K-4 children. If this country is falling short in producing scientific and technological talent, Garde believes, we must convince kids that “atoms and molecules are amazing and interesting, and that it’s cool to learn about them.” Instead of a planetarium experience, Garde and colleagues focused on expanding the minuscule – water molecules, carbon atoms – and telling a story about the transformation of matter with cartoon characters. He’s hoping to move to an even bigger medium, IMAX film, with foundation help.

From her research studying how long air traffic controllers need to adapt to new technologies, Amy Pritchett figured that introducing novel technologies and methods to her institute peers would not be instantaneous. While many instructors have already developed technologies suited to their particular curriculum, other faculty remain completely uninterested. In her own industrial engineering course, students use a website for asynchronous dialogue to review each other’s designs. Pritchett believes what’s needed in the classroom is “not new technology but work processes,” especially those designed around cognition. Only by demonstrating that new technologies are effective and reliable in the classroom, and by showing how to implement new applications, will faculty want to sign on.

At the University of Michigan, Peter Chen has come up with an introduction to computing systems that allows first year students “to experience the joys of engineering,” harnessing both enthusiasm and creativity. His Microprocessors and Music course demands that students conceive a product, then design, build, test and report on it. In the process of creating music machines, students pick up the basics of digital logic, computer architecture and embedded systems. Chen “plays” some of these products, which, he says, gave students a sense of pride and accomplishment. The course yielded overwhelmingly positive reviews among students as well as deep interest in pursuing computer engineering careers.

]]> Mon, 05 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0500 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/427 http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/427 “Are we going to tinker on the edges of a system no longer operative or talk about how to design the supersonic jet of the conceptual economy’s high performance learning
enterprise?,” asks Deborah Wince-Smith, throwing down the gauntlet for fellow panelists. She describes our current education system as rooted in the 19th century, and failing to provide students with the tools to participate in a global, “conceptual economy.” Learning must engender innovation -- what Wince-Smith calls “I to the 5th power: the intersection of imagination, insight, ingenuity, invention and impact.”

At Tufts University, says Lawrence Bacow, “We imbed engineering in liberal arts,” generating interaction between arts and sciences students and engineering faculty and students. Among liberal arts students, this fuels both technological literacy and such an interest in engineering that there’s been a trend-reversing net migration from arts and sciences to engineering. “By not isolating arts and science students in an engineering ghetto, we’ve created a more literate engineer,” says Bacow.

Richard Lampman says Hewlett Packard looks to hire “a whole person who needs to be able to interact on a broader basis…who can be an entrepreneur, work in global cross-cultural teams.” For him, the, the principal consideration in education “is how to get students capable of doing more than just solving problems -- that’s table stakes. To go beyond that, they need a lot more.”

To find developers for Microsoft, Rick Rashid travels increasingly to India, China and Europe. He can’t meet the demand in the U.S. “for people who are mentally agile, can solve problems under pressure and can work with other people.” He’s witnessing an enormous drop off in relevant graduates nationwide, with a disproportionate loss of women and minorities. “If you step back broadly and look at engineering, you can be very concerned, but look just at my area, computer science, and it’s reasonable to start thinking about panicking,” says Rashid.

Vernon Ehlers says his role on the panel “is to represent the ignorant people of this country” -- not the children who know they want to be engineers, but the “passionless kids” who don’t get the basic principles of math and science. As someone who grew up in a town of 800 with no early college ambitions, Ehlers understands these kids. He says, “If we’re serious about meeting the manpower needs of the nation, we literally have to start with preschool.” He also advises “teaching teachers to be excited about math and science, so they can convey this to their kids.

Diane Jones didn’t know what a Ph.D. was until college. Getting a science education was a “pretty difficult” path for her, and she learned that her field was elitist. That’s one reason she counsels “looking for talent in new places,” like the community colleges where she’s taught. You’ll find smart kids there, she says, and it’s where to head “if you really want to go after women and minorities.” She also sees engineering, especially IT, as the way up for first generation students in this country. ]]>