Engineering Out Loud

How do you prove a country tested a nuclear weapon, and who's keeping an eye on this stuff? Researchers at Oregon State and University of Michigan are part of the crew doing this work.  

How are Oregon State researchers impacting the apps on your phone? Danny Dig and his team have been improving software for companies like Microsoft, IBM, Intel, Boeing, and Google for years by developing tools that find and fix bugs. Dig is an associate professor of computer science at Oregon State and an adjunct professor at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign .

How do you help reduce risk in the nation's  most dangerous occupation ? Researchers at Oregon State University are partnering with Blount International to help make timber harvesting equipment safer. To understand a specific type of accident that occurs in the field, they've designed and built a machine to recreate it in the safety of a shipping container. BONUS CONTENT Video of a timber harveste...

How do you harness the energy of the ocean? Oregon State alumni Alex Hagmuller and Max Ginsburg cofounded Aquaharmonics to try and figure it out: starting with a wave energy device prototype they tested in a bathtub. Today, they're backed by millions of dollars from the U.S. Department of Energy , partnering with Sandia National Laboratories , and are on course for ocean testing with a full-size w...

Can you build skyscrapers or other massive structures with wood? Mass timber buildings are changing skylines and changing the way engineers and architects think about building big with wood. They go up faster than steel and concrete. They cost less. They're made from sustainable resources, and they're getting taller and taller.

How do you talk to a robot? How about 250 robots? Julie A. Adams , professor of computer science, describes her research on human-robot interaction and the benefits and challenges of drone swarms.

Cyberattacks are getting more frequent, bigger, and more destructive. New research at Oregon State University aims to stop hackers by combining the muscle power of artificial intelligence with the brains of cybersecurity experts. The project is led by  Galois Inc.  and includes collaborators at  University of Edinburgh  and  Synaptiq . https://engineering.oregonstate.edu/season-4-partners-research...

How can we prepare most effectively for the Cascadia subduction zone earthquake? An interactive website called  O-HELP , developed by Oregon State researchers, zooms in to any point in Oregon and displays the various risks, giving planning agencies, utilities, and individuals a head start.  BONUS CONTENT O-HELP Cascadia Lifelines Program Living with Earthquakes in the Pacific Northwest Preparing f...

How do you forecast and model huge waves in the open ocean? As part of the National Marine Renewable Energy Center, researchers at Oregon State University and the University of Washington are modeling and forecasting extreme waves to help inform wave energy technology.     

Is it possible to revolutionize nuclear power in the United States? Oregon State Nuclear Engineering Professor Jose Reyes co-founded NuScale Power to do just that. He's joined by fellow Oregon State Nuclear Engineering Professors Qiao Wu and Todd Palmer to discuss NuScale's revolutionary reactor design and its test facility here on campus.  

Are faster networks with more users and devices possible? Researchers at Oregon State with help from Tektronix are advancing technologies to push the boundaries of speed in data collection and transmission. Matt Johnston, Arun Natarajan, and Tejasvi Anand explain their research that spans the networking chain from sensors to wireless and wired transmission.

Goran Jovanovic , professor of chemical engineering at Oregon State, was interested in finding ways to convert carbon dioxide into useful products using renewable energy. When the U.S. Department of Energy rejected a proposal in 2005, Jovanovic sent out an email to former Ph. D. students around the world, looking for potential collaborators. A copy of that email landed in the inbox of  Thana Sornc...

What are magnetic nanoparticles and how can they be used in medicine? Oregon State Associate Professor Pallavi Dhagat and graduate student Phil Lenox explain the very sensitive techniques they are developing using magnetic nanoparticles to detect a biomarker for disease in just a drop of blood or look deep inside the human body. BONUS MATERIALS Oregon State Applied Magnetics Laboratory Micro-scale...

Biosensor technology is used to detect a wide variety of substances — from drugs, to cancer biomarkers, to chemical contaminants in our food and drinking water. Diatoms — tiny, single-celled plants found in water all over the planet — are playing a big role in a new type of biosensor being developed by Alan Wang at Oregon State. The new technology has a high selectivity and sensitivity, and is muc...

How do you prove someone tested a nuclear weapon? Researchers, Steven Czyz, Lily Ranjbar, and Salam Alhawsawi from the Radiation Detection Group at Oregon State are developing devices smaller than Pop-Tarts that use the metallic alloy CZT to detect radioactive isotopes of the noble gas xenon. This helps prove if someone tested a weapon, supporting the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty  (CTBT)...

Advances in 3D graphics have made movies and video games more realistic, but can also have an impact on science. Associate Professor Eugene Zhang and Assistant Professor Yue Zhang describe their research to help medical doctors better target cancerous tumors by using 3D modeling and simulation. BONUS MATERIAL Associate Professor Eugene Zhang's website . Associate Professor (Senior Research) Yue Zh...

It's no secret that women and minorities have historically been underrepresented in science and engineering and have faced a lot of bias upon entering those fields. But what is Oregon State University doing to change that? To find out, we talk to Joe McGuire , one of the College of Engineering's associate deans, and Anne Gillies , the search advocate program director at Oregon State about how they...

In this week's episode, we feature two stories from the Oregon State Robotics Group . Ravi Balasubramanian , mechanical engineering assistant professor, is designing robo-inspired implantable mechanisms to improve orthopedic surgeries of all types--with a specific focus on tendon transfer surgery related to restoring function of the hand. We talk with him in part 1.  In part 2, we explore Project...

In this episode, we hear from Greg Herman, professor of chemical engineering, about a sensor he's developed that has the potential to monitor glucose levels via a contact lens. In Part 2, we explore the research of John Mathews, professor and head of the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer science, whose goal is to enable people with serious spinal cord injuries to regain the use of para...

Nordica MacCarty, a faculty member in the Humanitarian Engineering Program at Oregon State, talks about improving the lives of women and children in the developing world through cleaner-burning cook stove technology. We also follow the unlikely journey taken by assistant professor Chinweike Eseonu, three women from the tiny town of Monroe, Oregon, Spanish instructor Loren Chavarria, and three dete...

In part one, we'll uncover the extreme challenges of air travel for people with disabilities, the risky measures they take in order to fly, and the serious harm they face every time they board an aircraft. And we'll meet Associate Professor Katharine Hunter-Zaworski who, for more than three decades, has been is fighting to remove barriers and improve access to transportation for people with disabi...

Inclusivity means listening to all voices — creating a beautiful polyphonic sound. Learn about Distinguished Professor  Margaret Burnett's  mission to change the way software is designed to be more gender inclusive. Also, meet her former student  Kyle Rector , now at University of Iowa, who designed software to help people with vision impairments learn yoga.

In part one, we meet computer science Assistant Professor Stephen Ramsey , who uses computational modeling to look deep into the human genome. His goal: predict who among us is more susceptible to heart disease. The information could determine not only who will benefit most from preventive action, but may even lead to new drugs for treating cardiovascular disease.  We then shift from humans to the...

The Monte Carlo method conjures images of a suave gambler beating the house in Monaco. In reality, Monte Carlo methods are computational algorithms that use randomness to solve problems.  In this episode we hear from Todd Palmer , professor of nuclear engineering, about his use of Monte Carlo simulations in nuclear power. In addition, find out how Haizhong Wang , assistant professor in transportat...

In this episode, we find out how researchers are utilizing unmanned autonomous vehicles (UAVs) to gather data. Dr. Dan Gillins , affiliated faculty member, along with his brother Matt Gillins, a graduate student at Oregon State, is conducting research on the feasibility of using UAVs to conduct bridge inspections. Gillins' research seeks to determine if UAVs can help defray some of the cost and el...