Upper Peninsula Second Wave, a news website for the UP, published stories about Xiaodi “Scott” Huang’s (MSE) invention of lightweight aluminum brakes and the company he has formed to manufacture them.
See http://up.secondwavemedia.com/features/litebrake121813.aspx
From Tech Today.
Scientists Build a Low-Cost, Open-Source 3D Metal Printer
Until now, 3D printing has been a polymer affair, with most people in the maker community using the machines to make all manner of plastic consumer goods, from tent stakes to chess sets. A new low-cost 3D printer developed by Michigan Technological University’s Joshua Pearce and his team could add hammers to that list. The detailed plans, software and firmware are all freely available and open-source, meaning anyone can use them to make their own metal 3D printer.
Read more at Michigan Tech News, by Marcia Goodrich.
In the News
The research of Materials Science and Engineering PhD Students Chenlong Zhang and Bas Wijnen along with their collaborators Jerry Anzalone (MSE), Paul Sanders (MSE) and Joshua M. Pearce (MSE/ECE) has been covered widely by the national media including: NBC News, CNN Money, Live Science and the International Science Times in articles like “Low-Cost, Open-Source 3-D Metal Printer Could Bring Revolutionary Technology To Millions.”
From Tech Today.
In the News
Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) was quoted in ECOS Magazine on a story: How Green is 3D Printing?
From Tech Today.
In the News
Associate Professor Joshua Pearce’s (MSE) development of a 3D metal printer appeared in the “Leading the News” section of Wednesday’s First Bell. The ASEE news aggregator picked up the story from Matt Roush’s Technology Report on the WWJ-TV website, based in Detroit. See online.
From Tech Today.
In the News
The research of Materials Science and Engineering PhD students Chenlong Zhang and Bas Wijnen along with their collaborators Jerry Anzalone (MSE), Paul Sanders (MSE) and Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) was covered in Newsweek, Scientific American and Gizmodo.
From Tech Today.
In the News
The materials science and engineering research team working on metal 3D printing including PhD students Chenlong Zhang and Bas Wijnen along with their collaborators Jerry Anzalone (MSE), Paul Sanders (MSE) and Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) are covered in the US media, including Hack-A-Day, Treehugger, and 3D Printing Industry (Michigan Tech Releases Open-Source 3D Metal Printer for Less Than $2,000) and also in the British media, in the Register and The Guardian: Metal 3D printing and six key shifts in the “second industrial revolution.”
From Tech Today.
In the News
The New York Times has published an article about the 3D metal printer built by Joshua Pearce (MSE, ECE) and his team, “An Inexpensive Way to Print Out Metal Parts.” Pearce notes that the technology would give small companies a way to build prototypes, and people in developing countries could use it to print repair parts for machines like windmills. See New York Times.
From Tech Today.
Open Source Lab – Dr. Joshua Pearce – How to 3D Print Your Own Lab Equipment
Dr. Joshua Pearce, author of “Open-Source Lab: How to Build Your Own Hardware and Reduce Research Costs” demonstrates how you can create your own lab equipment with low-cost 3D printing.
FREE access to select content from Open-Source Lab: How to Build Your Own Hardware and Reduce Research Costs
by Dr. Joshua M. Pearce
Watch the video by Elsevier SciTech Connect.
Joshua Pearce coauthored the article “Installation of a variable-angle spectrometer system for monitoring diffuse and global solar radiation” in the SPIE Journal.
From Tech Today.
The publication is a proceedings article from the 8th Iberoamerican Optics Meeting and 11th Latin American Meeting on Optics, Lasers, and Applications (RIAO/OPTILAS 2013).
Research Professor Stephen Mashl (MSE/IMP), “New High-strength, High-temperature Powder Metallurgy Aluminum Alloys: Production of Large Powder Metallurgy Net or Near-net Shaped Components Using Hot Isostatic Pressing,” Naval Research Laboratory, ONR.
C2E2 Endowed Equipment Awards Announced
Vice President for Research David Reed has announced the following Century II Campaign Endowed Equipment Fund (C2E2) awards at the recommendation of the C2E2 Committee.
In ACMAL, Owen Mills was awarded $3,000 for a Backscattered Electron Detector.
Read more at Tech Today.
KRC Director Jay Meldrum and Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) were quoted on the effects of snow on solar energy systems in Solar International–a PV Management Magazine
http://www.solar-international.net/article/78589-Snowy-solar.php
From Tech Today.
Snowy Solar
“We do predictions on behalf of commercial lenders being asked to foot the bill for big solar arrays,” said Townsend. Good data “makes them more financeable.” Eventually, the study results will be publicly available through the KRC website and through solar energy simulation programs provided by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
“Everybody who wants to develop solar energy in snowy climates on a large scale will need this data,” said Joshua Pearce, an associate professor of materials science and engineering/electrical and computer engineering at Michigan Tech, who is participating in the project. “In the olden days, you’d only see solar farms in places like Arizona, and Spain. Now, large solar installations are found throughout the northern US and Canada.”
Read more at Solar International.
Solar Researchers Dig Deeper Into Snow Issue
Being way up on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, snow is something Michigan Tech folks know well – last winter some 225 inches fell at the research center – and the scientists there have been studying the snow/PV relationship for a while.
Read more at Earth Techling, by Pete Danko.
In the News
The story about the KRC snow study on photovoltaic performance was published by the Associated Press and has been widely covered in the media including the Miami Herald, Charlotte Observer, Seattle PI, Fox Detroit, Houston Chronicle, The Republic (Indiana), KTVU San Francisco, Detroit News, Oakland Press, Michigan Radio (NPR) and many more.
From Tech Today.
In the News
The Mining Journal in Marquette published an editorial about Michigan Tech’s study of the effectiveness of solar panels in snow climates. It was picked up by Associated Press wire service in a roundup of editorials of interest and republished by the Escanaba Daily Press, among other news outlets.
From Tech Today.
MTU solar energy study should produce usable results
We’ll be interested, along with a great many people, we suspect, to see results of a study launched by Michigan Tech University in Houghton recently to determine if and to what degree snow affects solar panels.
Read more at the Mining Journal.
Assistant Professor Yongmei Jin (MSE/IMP), “Collaborative Research: Virtual Processing, Operating and Damage of Low Volume Solder Interconnects for 3D Applications,” NSF.
Assistant Professor Yongme Jin (MSE/IMP), “Experiment and Computational Study of Magnetostrictive Fe-Ga Alloys,” NSF.
Associate Professor Yu Wang and Professor Jaroslaw Drelich (MSE/IMP), “Colloid Science of Surface Charge Heterogeneity as Related to Oil Sand Processing,” American Chemical Society-Petroleum Research Fund.
Read more at Tech Today.
Through research at the University’s Open Sustainability Technology Lab, Michigan Tech was a launch supporter of the Ethical Filament Foundation, whose goal is to create an environmentally friendly and ethically produced filament for the rapidly growing 3-D printing market. The foundation hopes to open up a new market for value added products that can be produced by waste picker groups in low-income countries. The launch of the Ethical Filament Foundation was covered in the media such as TechCrunch
http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/07/ethical-additive-manufacturing
From Tech Today.
Charity Targets 3D Printing’s Plastic Waste Problem With Standards For An Ethical Alternative
The Foundation has been founded by techfortrade in partnership with Dreambox Emergence which provides 3D printing units for community based manufacturing in Guatemala, and Michigan Technological University.
Read more at TechCrunch, by Natasha Lomas.
Commentary: Open-source hardware for research and education
The software industry has had a similar revolution of shoulder-standing, in the form of the free and open-source computer software movement. Free and open-source software (FOSS) is available in source-code form and can be used, copied, modified, and redistributed without restriction, or with restrictions only to ensure that it remains open to future recipients and users.
Two recent open-source design and production developments are driving those reductions: Arduino microcontrollers and the RepRap three-dimensional printer.
Read more at Physics Today, by Joshua Pearce.
3D Printing a Greener Alternative to Traditional Manufacturing
“The bottom line is, we can get substantial reductions in energy and CO2 emissions from making things at home,” Dr. Joshua Pearce, who conducted the study, said. “And the home manufacturer would be motivated to do the right thing and use less energy, because it costs so much less to make things on a 3D printer than to buy them off the shelf or on the Internet.”
Read more at 3D Printer World, by John Graber.
Pearce Pens a 3D Printing Guide for Scientists on a Budget
Joshua Pearce is not one for understatement. “This is the beginning of a true revolution in the sciences,” says the author of “Open-Source Lab.” For cash-strapped researchers, he could be right.
Read more at Michigan Tech News.
Slideshow: 3D Printing Is Cheap & Green for Plastics
A team led by Michigan Technological University’s Joshua M. Pearce conducted preliminary lifecycle analyses of three small plastic objects: a child’s building block, a spout for a watering can, and a citrus juicer. The three objects chosen were considered typical of those people might want to print at home, and because open-source .STL files are easily available. They were also chosen to test different variables, such as the effect of fill percentage on environmental impact or geometrical complexity. The team included Pearce, associate professor of materials science & engineering, electrical engineering and computer engineering, and Megan Kreiger, graduate student in materials science & engineering.
Read more at Design News, by Ann R. Thryft.
In the News
“America Makes,” the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute, driven by the National Center for Defense Manufacturing and Machining (NCDMM), proudly welcomed eight new members including Michigan Tech for their work in 3D printing.
Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) published an article in Elsevier Connect 3D-Printing Your Lab Equipment–It’s Cheaper Than You Think.
From Tech Today.
3D-printing your lab equipment—it’s cheaper than you think
3D printing and open-source designs are emerging as powerful tools for accelerating science
3D printers do what engineers like to call additive manufacturing – that is, they make real physical objects by laying down sub-millimeter-thick layers of material (currently mostly plastic) one after another in a specific pattern governed by a digital design. This allows 3D printer users to make products to their own specifications, so they do not have to “make do” with what is available off the shelf at their local store or even on the Internet.
Read more at Elsevier Connect, by Joshua M. Pearce.
Graduate student Jephias Gwamuri (MSE) along with Durdu Güney (ECE) and Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE) co-authored a chapter, “Advances in Plasmonic Light Trapping in Thin-film Solar Photovoltaic Devices,” in Solar Cell Nanotechnology, edited by A. Tiwari, R. Boukherroub and M. Sharon published by Wiley.
From Tech Today.
PI Larry Sutter (MSE), Zhanping You (CEE), and Stan Vitton (CEE) received $9,999 from the Michigan Department of Transportation for a one-year project, “2014 Transportation Materials Research Center.”
From Tech Today.