Engineering in the News January 2013

This monthly summary includes excerpts from Illinois in the News, a daily service provided by the University of Illinois News Bureau and other media search tools. This collection of January stories focuses on engineering topics and faculty contacted for their expertise by print and broadcast reporters around the world.

BODY WEIGHT AND DRIVING
USA Weekend Magazine (Jan. 31) -- Researchers at Illinois, led by computer science professor Sheldon Jacobson, found that if Americans drove a mile less per day, the national average body mass index would drop by 0.21 points after six years – because if you spend less time in the car, you’re more likely to be physically active.

IMAGING CELL MEMBRANE REVEALS RELATIONSHIPS
Science Daily (Jan. 28) -- Using a completely new approach to imaging cell membranes, a study by researchers from the University of Illinois, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the National Institutes of Health revealed some surprising relationships among molecules within cell membranes. Led by Mary Kraft, a U. of I. professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, the team published its findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Also: Phys.org (Jan. 28), Science 360 (NSF, Jan. 29), Science Codex (San Jose, Calif., Jan. 28), Bioscience Technology (Rockaway, N.J., Jan. 29), Lab Manager Magazine (Midland, Ontario, Jan. 30) .

NPRE ALUMNUS LEADS FUSION EFFORT
Joint Institute for Computational Sciences (University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge National Laboratory; Jan. 29) -- The research of a multi-institutional team from the U.S., Japan, and France, led by Predrag S. Krstic of the Joint Institute for Computational Sciences and U of I alumnus Jean Paul Allain (MS 2000, PhD 2001, NPRE) at Purdue University has answered the question of how the behavior of plasma—the extremely hot gases of nuclear fusion—can be controlled with ultra-thin lithium films on graphite walls lining thermonuclear magnetic fusion devices.

$100 MILLION GIFT TO ENGINEERING AT ILLINOIS
Chicago Tribune (Jan. 28) -- University of Illinois officials announced the largest gift ever to its prestigious College of Engineering, a $100-million donation that will fund student scholarships and allow the school to hire dozens of top faculty. The gift from the Lake Forest-based Grainger Foundation is being made in memory of William W. Grainger, a 1919 graduate of U. of I.'s program in electrical engineering who went on to found W.W. Grainger, Inc., a leading distributor of tools and other electrical equipment. Also: The Republic (from The Associated Press, Jan. 28), Crain's Chicago Business (Jan. 28), The News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Ill., Jan. 28), WTHI-TV (FOX, from AP; Jan. 28), Daily Illini (Jan. 28), Chicago Sun-Times (Jan. 28), ABC7Chicago (from AP, Jan. 28), WAND-TV (NBC, Decatur, Ill., Jan. 28), CBS2 (Chicago, Jan. 28), ASEE FirstBell (Jan. 29), Quad-City Times (Iowa, Jan. 28), Canton Daily Ledger (Jan. 29), Patch.com (Jan. 29), Alton Daily News (Jan. 29), Northwest Herald (Jan. 29), Chronicle of Higher Education (Jan. 29), Inside Higher Education (Jan. 29), The Chronicle of Philanthropy (Jan. 29), Bloomberg (Jan. 29), Businessweek (Jan. 29).

Related story: The News-Gazette (Jan. 29) -- Tiny, biocompatible electronics that can dissolve in water. Home appliances that can talk to the power grid. "Bio-bots" that hunt for tumors inside a body. Breakthrough research in bioengineering and big data at the University of Illinois got a huge boost Monday with the announcement of a $100 million donation from the Grainger Foundation of Lake Forest.

The News-Gazzette (Editorial, Jan. 30) -- This is philanthropy at its best — a donation aimed at helping an institution pursue research that has the potential to improve the lives of people all over this country and the world. That the Grainger Foundation viewed the UI's engineering college as a worthy recipient of its generosity speaks volumes about the quality of this treasured academic entity.

ELECTRONIC CAMOFLAGE
Japan Times (from the Washington Post; Jan. 26) -- The ugly cuttlefish could be the key to revolutionary new camouflage technology. By harnessing the light-gathering and color-shifting abilities of cuttlefish and other undersea animals, bioengineers dream of building a thin electronic “skin” able to turn an entire room into a camera, surreptitiously transmitting images of what’s happening inside. “Just imagine surfaces that would be wallpapered that turn into a camera,” says John Rogers, a professor of materials science at the U. of I. who is also exploring this concept. Also: The Washington Post (Jan. 21).

BACTERIA & EARTHQUAKES
PhysOrg.com (Douglas, Isle of Man, Jan. 28) -- U. of I. physics professor Karin A. Dahmen is part of a mulit-university team that has discovered that microscopic bacteria have a lot in common with earthquakes – when it comes to their jolting movements.

MOSAIC ANNIVERSARY
The Christian Science Monitor (Jan. 27) -- This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Mosaic 1.0 Web browser. For all the revolutionary disruption caused by the Internet, it was Mosaic that turned the underlying technology into the world’s instantly available library, social crossroads, and e-commerce marketplace. Mosaic was the work of a group of computer science students at the U. of I. led by Marc Andreesen, who later went on to co-found Netscape.

CHICAGO TECHNOLOGY CENTER PLANS
Chicago Tribune (Jan. 23) -- A University of Illinois-affiliated technology research center in Chicago is the latest regional effort to stem an exodus of high-tech brain power and entrepreneurship to the coasts. A private, nonprofit company, to be called UI Labs, is expected to open offices in or near the Loop to foster collaboration between the region's scientists and engineers from academia, industry and government. The aim is build a research and engineering powerhouse that will attract a broad range of industries to Chicago, along the lines of what the former Bell Labs did for the East Coast. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will offer its vast tech resources, including the National Center for Supercomputing Applications and its Blue Waters supercomputer. It is anticipated other local universities and national research centers will participate as well. Also: Chicago Sun-Times (Jan. 23), Crain's Chicago Business (Jan. 23), News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Ill., Jan. 23), ASEE FirstBell (Jan. 24), St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Jan. 24), State Journal-Register (Springfield, Ill., Jan 25), WLS-AM (Chicago, Jan. 26), Crain's Chicago Business (Opinion, Jan. 25).

Related story: News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Jan. 25) -- In a rare appearance at a University of Illinois board meeting, Gov. Pat Quinn visited with trustees Thursday afternoon to voice support for a major new university-led institute called UI Labs. Also: Sun-Times (Jan. 24).

ALUMNI MOVING FROM GOVT. WORK TO POLITICS
Wall Street Journal (Jan. 23) -- MechSE alumnus Neel Kashkari, who oversaw the U.S. Treasury's much-maligned Troubled Asset Relief Program during the financial crisis, said he is leaving Pacific Investment Management Co. to consider running for public office in Democrat-heavy California as a Republican. Article available by subscription.

NEWS MATERIALS
Red Orbit.com (Dallas, Jan. 22) -- A new class of inherently water-repellent and durable ceramics announced by a group of MIT researchers has big potential in critical industries. “This discovery of intrinsic hydrophobicity is exciting and fresh,” says Steve Granick, a professor of materials science and engineering and of chemistry at the U. of I. “It’s a terrific example of payoff from thinking outside the box.” Also: Product Design & Development (Rockaway, N.J., Jan. 21).

BENDABLE BATTERY
Fibre2fashion.com (Ahmedabad, India, Jan. 22) -- South Korean researchers have developed what appears to be the world’s first imprintable and bendable lithium-ion battery, which could lead to a future for smart clothing. The Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology led the project team that included John A. Rogers, a materials engineer at the Illinois.

WORK COLLABORATION
Crain’s Chicago Business (Jan. 22) -- Sanjay Patel wants to put you inside your PowerPoint. The U. of I. electrical engineering professor came up with a way to marry full-motion videoconferencing with business tools such as presentation software to better allow workers to collaborate. The software, Personify Live, is now on the market and Patel is moving the company headquarters from Champaign, Ill., to Chicago.

ALUM CAREER PROFILE
Science 360 (National Science Foundation, Jan. 18) -- Chemical engineering alumna Rommie Amaro is subject of "Profiles of Scientists And Engineers: Biophysical Chemist." The computational and theoretical biophysical chemist talks about her work, her education, and lifestyle.

$30 MILLION SONIC CENTER ANNOUNCED
The News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Jan. 17) -- Led by faculty at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, a multi-university research team has received $30 million to launch the Systems On Nanoscale Information fabriCs (SONIC) Center. The center – part of a new $194 million initiative called the Semiconductor Technology Advanced Research network (STARnet) – will focus on substantially enhancing the information processing power and storage capacity of integrated circuits (ICs) and related systems, which is critical in maintaining reliability as devices continue to shrink and improve in energy efficiency. Also: Nanowerk (Jan. 17), ElectroIQ (Jan. 17), CIO (Jan. 17), Computerworld (Jan. 17), Sacramento Bee (Jan. 17), PC World (Jan. 17), Nanotech Now (Jan. 18), Wall Street Journal (Jan. 17), Crain's Chicago Business (blog; Jan. 17).

Related story: Guardian Express (Las Vegas, Jan. 22) -- The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has announced the establishment of a research network, including a new center at Illinois, which will conduct experiments to advance the semiconductor industry and make discoveries that will drive innovation for the electronics industry. Also: The Register (London, Jan. 23), HPCwire (San Diego, Jan. 23).

BATTERIES
TG Daily (Batavia, Ill., Jan. 16) -- Scientists from South Korea have developed the world’s first imprintable and flexible battery. The research team responsible for developing the battery was led by professor Lee Sang-young, of South Korea’s Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, and colleagues, including U. of I. engineering professor John A. Rogers.

NPRE FEATURED
Nuclear News (Jan.,Vol. 56, No. 1) -- The American Nuclear Society's magazine featured a story on the virtual laboratory NPRE Prof. Rizwan Uddin and recent graduate Imran Haddish have developed.The story tells how nuclear engineering educators are exploiting interactive qualities of modern video games to teach complex nuclear concepts.

PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES
Illinois Times (Springfield, Jan. 17) -- Column: Writing about the “positive spillover” of public universities, James Krohe Jr. writes: “Take a look at any list of graduates of achievement from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In the tech world alone, one of the cofounders of Mosaic (begetter of the Netscape browser, and begetter of JavaScript) came out of the U of I. So did the founders of YouTube, Oracle (the Intel of server software) and PayPal. Every one of them now lives and works in California, and while none is an ornament to that state’s culture, they do generate lots of tax money for public use. …”

GRAPHENE BEHAVIOR
Nanowerk News (Honolulu, Jan. 15) -- Researchers Joe Lyding and Eric Pop from the U. of I. Beckman Institute and their research groups have developed new insight into the electronics behavior of graphene that could guide future fabrication methods.

ALUMNA & AUTHOR
MSNBC (Jan. 15) -- Ping Fu, a CS alumna and developer of 3D computer technology, talks about her journey from Mao’s Communist China to a CEO in an American boardroom. She is the author of a new book, "Bend, Not Break."

POLLUTION
Washington Post (Jan. 15) -- Soot ranks as the second-largest human contributor to climate change, according to a new analysis released Tuesday, exerting twice as much of an impact as previously  thought. The four-year, 232-page study of black carbon, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, shows that short-lived pollution known as soot, such as emissions from diesel engines and wood-fired stoves, has about two-thirds the climate impact of carbon dioxide “There’s a relatively small amount in the atmosphere,” says the study’s lead author, U. of I. environmental engineering professor Tami Bond. “But it’s very powerful.” Also: Phys.org (Jan. 15), Bloomberg Business week (Jan. 15), The Guardian (UK, Jan. 15), BBC News (Jan. 15), Vereinte Nationen (UNO, Jan. 15), Responding to Climate Change (Jan. 15), The Independent (UK, Jan. 15), MSN NZ News (Jan. 15), Climate Central (Palo Alto, Calif., Jan. 15), Reuters (Jan. 15), UW Today (Jan. 15), Science World Report (Jan. 15), New Scientist (Jan. 15), Huffington Post (Jan. 15), Times of India (Jan. 16), Newser (Jan. 16), New York Times (Jan. 15), Christian Science Monitor (Jan. 15), Nature (London, Jan. 15), New Scientist (Cambridge, England, Jan. 15), Science (Jan. 15), Science Codex (San Jose, Calif., Jan. 15), ThinkProgress (Jan. 16), Science (.pdf; Washington, D.C., Jan. 25).

Related stories: "A Minute With..." (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Jan. 15) -- CEE professor Tami Bond discusses black carbon and global warming in a one-on-one interview.

Scientific American (Jan. 17) -- A new study indicates that the second most important heat-trapping pollutant in Earth’s atmosphere is black carbon, more commonly known as soot, generated mostly from the burning of diesel fuel, coal and woody plant material. Because black carbon only remains in the atmosphere for about a week, decreasing emissions translates into immediate health benefits. “Once you stop the emissions, it’s gone," says Tami Bond, a U. of I. professor of environmental engineering and lead author of the study. "It’s a public health win." Also: Space Daily (Pasadena, Calif., Jan. 17).

COMPUTING INNOVATION CENTER ANNOUNCED
WWJ-TV (Detroit, Jan. 15) -- Dow Chemical has announced a partnership with the University of Illinois to open the Dow Innovation Center, a research center at the University's Research Park. The center "will develop data management solutions to drive value and accelerate discovery in the research and development organizations throughout Dow." UI Chancellor Phyllis Wise said, "The new center will draw upon the strengths in high performance computing, informatics, and computer science at the University of Illinois to enhance technology and research within Dow." Also: ASEE FirstBell (Jan. 15), News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Ill., Jan. 14), Daily Illini (Jan. 14), CNBC (Jan. 14), The Street (Jan. 14), Zacks.com (Jan. 15), R&D Magazine (Rockaway, N.J., Jan. 16), Campus Technology (Jan 15), Daily Illini (Jan. 24).

DRIVING AND WEIGHT LOSS
Men’s Fitness (January) -- A U. of I. study by computer science professor Sheldon Jacobson and colleagues suggests that cutting commute times in a car can lead to weight loss. Also: St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Jan. 17).

ALUMNUS INVENTOR
Dubois County Free Press (Huntingburg, Ind., Jan. 13) -- U. of I. alumnus Arthur Segal, the inventor of the carbide-tipped saw blade and the founder of the North American Products Corp., died Jan. 12.

GENOMICS
Science Daily (Chevy Chase, Md., Jan. 10) -- One of the most difficult problems in the field of genomics is assembling relatively short “reads” of DNA into complete chromosomes. In a new paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, an interdisciplinary group of genome and computer scientists has solved this problem, creating an algorithm that can rapidly create “virtual chromosomes” with no prior information about how the genome is organized. The research was co-led by U. of I. bioengineering professor Jian Ma.

BIO-BOTS
Chicago Tonight (WTTW-TV, Jan. 8) -- A breakthrough has been made in forward-engineering in the form of soft, biocompatible robots that are able to walk by themselves. Developed at the University of Illinois, these functional machines, dubbed bio-bots, were made using only hydrogel, heart cells and a 3-D printer. Also: Today's Science (Jan. 2013).

FIRST PYROELECTRIC MEASUREMENTS AT NANOSCALE
Science Daily (Jan. 8) -- "Measuring the pyroelectric response of thin films is difficult and has restricted the understanding of the physics of pyroelectricity, prompting some to label it as 'one of the least-known properties of solid materials'," Martin added. "This work provides the most complete and detailed modeling and experimental study of this widely unknown region of materials and has direct implications for next generation devices. Also: R&D Magazine (Jan. 8), ScienceBlog (Jan. 8), Phys.org (Jan. 8), Nanotech Now (Jan. 9), Product Design & Development (Rockaway, N.J., Jan. 9) , The Green Optimistic (Jan. 9).

KICKSTARTING STUDENT FIRM
The News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana; Jan. 8) -- Local business start-up Oso Technologies has turned to the Kickstarter "crowdfunding" website in hopes of raising $75,000. The Champaign-based company was started in 2011 by five University of Illinois graduate students. The company launched its fundraising campaign Friday, and as of Monday afternoon it had pledges for $34,286 — or nearly 46 percent of its goal. Also: ASEE FirstBell (Jan. 9), WCIA-TV (CBS, Champaign, Ill., Jan. 8), Boing Boing (Jan. 16), Techi (Chicago, Jan. 17).

BASEBALL
Baseball Prospectus (Holbrook, N.Y., Jan. 8) -- Is it possible to predict the landing point of a fly ball just after it leaves the bat? Probably not, says U. of I. emeritus physics professor Alan Nathan. But there’s room for a great deal more research on the issue.

BATTERY RESEARCH
Daily Herald (Chicago, Jan. 7) -- The U.S. Department of Energy has chosen Argonne National Laboratory, in Lemont, Ill., to become America’s capital for battery technology. A new initiative will coordinate the clout and brainpower of five Department of Energy national laboratories, five universities – including the U. of I. – and four private companies that independently have been working to advance battery technology.

STUDENT COMPANY FEATURED
HME News (Jan. 4) -- A story about IntelliWheels, a company started by MechSE grad student Scott Daigle, is listed as the number two story in HME online magazine for December. HME News is a leading source of information in the durable medical equipment industry.

DRIVING AND BODY WEIGHT
WMBF-Channel 32 (NBC; Myrtle Beach, S.C., Jan. 2) -- If weight loss is a New Year’s resolution, you can increase the odds of success simply by driving less. A new study, led by U. of I. computer science professor Sheldon Jacobson and graduate student Banafsheh Behzad, shows that cutting the commute time in a car could have the same impact as reducing the number of calories consumed. Also: Business Day (Johannesburg, Jan. 2), WTVG-Channel 13 (from HealthDay News, Norwalk, Ct.; ABC; Toledo, Ohio, Jan. 2).

POLLUTION CONTROL
Central Board News (Drolshagen, Germany, Jan. 2) -- U. of I. researchers have developed mats of metal oxide nanofibers that scrub sulphur from petroleum-based fuels much more effectively than traditional materials. This could lower costs and improve performance for fuel-based catalysis, advanced energy applications and toxic gas removal. Co-led by Mark Shannon, a professor of mechanical science and engineering at the U. of I. who died last fall, and chemistry professor Prashant Jain, the researchers demonstrated their material in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. Editor’s note: The article is in German.
___________________

PLEASE NOTE: Some web links are short-lived by design of the publisher. In most cases, articles are archived on the publisher's website and can be retrieved electronically. Some articles may be archived on sites that are fee-based, and some may have re-distribution restrictions.

If you have any questions about the College of Engineering, or other story ideas, contact Rick Kubetz, editor, Engineering Communications Office, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 217/244-7716.