December 2, 2009
Dr. Clarence De Silva from the Mechanical Engineering Department along with a list of fellow contributors recently won the Technical Award for their paper, “Distributed DSP for Fault Monitoring and Control” with the associated paper: De Silva, C.W., Tan, K.K., Huang, S., Lee, T.H., and Wu, R., Proceedings of the Digital Signal Processing Creative Design Contest, Tinan, Taiwan, pp. 59-65, November 2009.
The contest was held on November 19th in Tinan, Taiwan. This Project is carried out in collaboration with Professor K.K. Tan and his laboratory in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), National University of Singapore (NUS). Wu is an undergraduate student at NUS under joint supervision of Tan and de Silva. Tan and Lee are professors, and Huang is a post-doctoral fellow at NUS. The design contest was sponsored by the Ministry of Education in Taiwan.
Congratulations to Dr. Clarence De Silva and to all the other contributors!
October 21, 2009
Professor Hongshen Ma, from the Department of Mechanical Engineering, has received a $100,000 (USD) grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This grant is part of the Grand Challenges Explorations program to support research in Global Health. Professor Ma’s grant will support his work in the development of a low-cost device to detect malaria infection in low-resource regions.
Professor Ma’s approach is to apply microfluidics technologies to create a low-cost and portable diagnostic tool to detect infection levels from a finger-prick blood sample. This device could eventually be used to direct treatment until clearance of the disease and to evaluate the effectiveness of new drugs and potential vaccines.
To view more information on Professor Ma’s research and work you may view his webpage here.
September 29, 2009
Mechanical Engineering alumnus Brent King (B.A.Sc. ’96) has won the $10,000 Manning Innovation Award for inventing the SPIDER, a device that accurately and securely positions a patient’s limb during surgery.
The SPIDER Limb Positioner is used for specialized procedures such as rotator cuff repairs or wrist arthroscopy. Not only does the SPIDER improve the surgeon’s ability to do delicate work, it reduces costs in the operating room. The surgeon can reposition the limb in seconds simply by stepping on a foot pedal. Staff who would otherwise need to hold the limb during the surgery are free to perform other tasks.
Brent King is Co-Owner and Vice President of Operations of TENET Medical Engineering, Inc. and conceptualized and developed the SPIDER after joining TENET’s staff of two in 1997.
Further information on Brent King and the SPIDER is located here.
The Department of Mechanical Engineering congratulates Brent on such a prestigious accomplishment.
September 25, 2009
Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering student David Goosen, Dr. James Olson and fellow collaborator Dick Kerekes were awarded the Van den Akker prize for advancements in Paper Physics at the Fundamental Research Symposium in Oxford UK. The contribution was for their paper entitled:
Goosen D.R., Olson J.A. and Kerekes R.J. “Role of heterogeneity in compression refining” J. Pulp Paper Sci., 33(2):110-114, 2007
The Johannes A. Van den Akker Prize for Advances in Paper Physics was created by the Institute of Paper Science and Technology at Georgia Tech, and was made possible through the generous donations of the family, friends, and students of Dr. Van den Akker, a former senior research associate and Chairman of the Department of Physics and Mathematics at the Institute of Paper Chemistry (IPC). Dr. Van den Akker was known for his brilliant mind, demand for excellence, and leadership in the field of paper physics for over 40 years.
September 11, 2009
In June the UBC Sustainability Office launched a competition for plans to reduce UBC’s carbon footprint- the Alternative Energy X Competition.
Congrats to both James Saunders and Malcolm Shields on this accomplishment.
September 11, 2009
Professor Emerita Martha Salcudean receives Honorary Doctor of Engineering from the University of Waterloo at June Convocation
On June 13, 2009, UBC Mechanical Engineering Professor Emerita Martha Salcudean received a doctor of engineering degree and addressed convocation at the University of Waterloo. Salcudean is the Weyerhaeuser Industrial Research Chair Emerita in Computational Fluid Dynamics. A member of the Order of Canada and the Order of British Columbia, fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the Canadian Academy of Engineering, she has published widely in the area of heat transfer and fluid flow, especially in computational fluid mechanics and the modelling of transport phenomena in industrial processes.
August 28, 2009
The Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of BC with Engineers Canada has recognized Dr. Croft’s noteworthy achievement and service to the engineering profession and has bestowed upon her the Engineers Canada Fellowship.
Dr. Croft’s current research can be viewed at the Mech Faculty page and her own website.
Congratulations to Dr. Croft for being selected for such a prestigious designation and for all her contributions to the Canadian Engineering profession.
August 24, 2009
Alumnus David Velan, BASc ’02, has taken his mechanical engineering knowledge and love of the environment to found EcoDrain, a finalist for the INDEX:AWARD 2009. EcoDrain is a technology company working to recapture heat from shower water. The device is a specialized heat exchanger that transfers heat from hot shower water waste to cold incoming water.
The INDEX:AWARD bills itself as the biggest design award in the world, with 500,000 euros in prize money. Devices are entered into five categories: body, home, work, play and community. As a finalist, EcoDrain is eligible to win the people’s choice award. Vote at www.indexaward.dk
For more information on EcoDrain, visit www.ecodrain.com.
August 19, 2009
Dr. Peter Cripton a Professor from the Department of Mechanical Engineering has been funded from the CIHR Proof of Principle program (phase 1) for one of the many projects that the Department has running currently. The funding, 150k for one year, will fund a research engineer, biologic specimens and commercialization costs for a helmet project.
The University of British Columbia has received more than $26 million in research funding from the latest competition held by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).
Earlier this month, CIHR approved 403 projects across Canada through its Operating Grant program, a total investment of $255.6 million over five years. Forty-three projects led by principal investigators from UBC and its affiliated hospital and health authority partners received funding.
“UBC and its partners have consistently received approximately 10 per cent of CIHR funding, ranking amongst the top three in total funding in Canada,” says Don Brooks, UBC Associate Vice-President Research. “Our continued success in this merit-based funding competition speaks directly to our research excellence in areas such as genomics, brain research and the fight against cancer and HIV/AIDS.”
The majority of UBC’s health researchers, who received more than $60 million in total CIHR funding in 2007/08 through its various programs, work at clinical academic campuses that include Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute, the Child and Family Research Institute, Providence Health Care Research Institute, and BC Cancer Agency.
“This research investment continues our funding of the best ideas and the brightest minds at UBC,” said Dr. Pierre Chartrand, Vice-President, Research, at CIHR. “We are confident that the projects we are supporting will advance knowledge in many important areas, and provide a stimulating environment for young Canadians training for careers in health research.”
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) is the Government of Canada’s agency for health research. CIHR’s mission is to create new scientific knowledge and to catalyze its translation into improved health, more effective health services and products, and a strengthened Canadian health-care system. Composed of 13 Institutes, CIHR provides leadership and support to more than 13,000 health researchers and trainees across Canada. http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/
August 12, 2009
UBC’s ASHRAE Design Team— Ara Beittoei, Brent Kavelaars, Chu Lin, Jensen Metchie, and Tapio Pikkarainen —placed third in the 2009 American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Student Design Project Competition.
The UBC team competed against 14 others in the HVAC System Design category and tied with University of Central Florida as the third-place winner.
The prize includes a trip for one team representative to attend ASHRAE’s January 2010 meeting in Orlando, Florida where the award will be presented.
The team is affiliated with the Mechanical Engineering Design Project (MECH 457) course, where students work on a variety of design projects including HVAC design.
The project was supervised by Department of Mechanical Engineering Instructor Nima Atabaki, Ph.D., P.Eng., and Omicron’s Geoff McDonell, P.Eng., served as industrial mentor to the team.