2017

Thumb Drive

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:12:58 +0000

Thumb Drive Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:12

Thank you to sponsor National Instruments!

This product will miniaturize three-phase inverters and increase efficiency, operability, and application versatility using FPGAs. A recent challenge set out by Google and IEEE called The Little Box Challenge points out that “inverters are too big” and “Making them smaller would enable more solar-powered homes, more efficient distributed electrical grids, and could help bring electricity to the most remote parts of the world.” Our system sets out to make a smaller inverter system that could be used in many renewable applications. The product’s main application is for electric vehicles.

The controller that helps solve this problem is the myRIO from National Instruments. This device has reconfigurable inputs and outputs and contains an FPGA along with a microcontroller. The product will use the FPGA in the myRIO to implement a switched mode power supply three-phase inverter as well as a boost converter. The FPGA will increase configurability, increase speed, decrease price, and lower power consumption. A custom PCB will be designed to house the hardware. NI’s Labview will be used for hardware and software simulations. With these simulation tools, we can better design our three-phase inverter and boost converter to be as efficient and reliable as possible.

National Instruments will benefit from the creation of the three-phase inverter system because it will showcase myRIO capabilities, as well as how myRIO can help advance some of the research and development of renewable systems. The three-phase inverter system is also applicable to many more applications such as other motor/generators systems, solar and wind energy, power generation/transmission, reactive power compensation, microgrids, and battery storage. Application users will benefit by getting real-time feedback of their system.

The greatest capability of the device being created is reconfigurability. By implementing the inverter with FPGA control, the product provides a much more favorable architecture for power electronics. Most commonly SMPS systems are not implemented with an FPGA. Doing so will provide the system with superior performance in terms of speed, price, and power consumption, as well as real-time feedback on the system through an iOS application.

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The Surge INs

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:11:45 +0000

The Surge INs Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:11

Thank you to sponsor Tensentric!

One challenge that laparoscopic surgeons face today is a lack of adequate training procedures for minimally invasive surgery. Simple training simulators exist today to help a surgeon improve their dexterity and overall skill with the various tools they use. For example, a surgeon might practice with laparoscopic tools by tying a shoelace with them. However, there is no simulator that can simulate the realistic forces and tensions that a surgeon would experience when interacting with human tissue.

The LapticVR simulator is a laparoscopic surgery simulator that allows a surgeon to practice various surgical procedures that they would perform with laparoscopic tools. The device is a box that represents the abdomen of a patient and has laparoscopic tools inserted through port holes. A virtual reality headset is used to display a 3D model of the inside of a patient’s abdomen and the surgeon’s tools. The surgeon can see the movement of the tools in 3D space as he/she moves them in real life. Haptic force feedback is applied to the real tools as the virtualized tools come into contact with human tissue in virtual reality.

Medical professionals will benefit the most from this product by giving them a realistic environment to hone their laparoscopic surgical skills. Medical training facilities will need these devices for initial training of surgical students.

When it comes to surgery simulators, haptic force feedback is essential in creating a realistic and effective surgery environment. The LapticVR simulator is unique in that it accomplishes this fundamental requirement for training procedures. Also unique to our product is a 3D virtualization of the patient’s abdomen and the tools which helps the user develop the required hand-eye coordination.

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The Heartthrobs

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:10:50 +0000

The Heartthrobs Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:10

Thank you to sponsors Plexus and professors Frank Barnes & Kim Frey!

Congestive heart failure is a condition that occurs when the heart does not pump blood as well as it should, leading to further health problems. Once manifested, it becomes difficult for persons with heart failure to manage this condition on their own. Heart failure can exist as a dormant condition for extended periods of time, leading to an increased need for additional monitoring and hospital care. Because there are few reliable, self-monitoring methods for determining if the heart has re-entered an unstable state, one of two situations often occurs. First, the patient returns to the hospital unnecessarily, resulting in extra cost and time for the patients and their doctors. Alternatively, the patient does not return to the hospital as early as they should, resulting in an increased risk of death or serious complications. With current home monitoring methods, if a patient’s condition worsens, they frequently have no more than three days to check in to a hospital without serious consequences. This combination of sudden-onset symptoms and relying on patient self-monitoring leads to many trips to emergency rooms that could be avoided by a more accurate method of early detection.

The heart@home is an in-home wearable device that allows heart failure patients to better monitor the condition of their heart, reducing emergency room visits and increasing the quality of CHF management. The heart@home allows patients to proactively monitor their condition without making frequent trips to their doctor or the emergency room. The patients can do this while living their lives with minimal disruption. This is accomplished by taking a phonocardiogram and electrocardiogram and transmitting these signals to the doctor. Additionally, wearing the device and taking a measurement once daily would allow patients to detect changes in their condition earlier than present methods allow. Currently, patients are told to monitor their weight and come in if they experience rapid weight gain. However, this often means that patients will only know to go to the hospital after significant issues have already developed. The heart@home would allow doctors to monitor externally invisible changes in the patient's condition, allowing patients to seek treatment earlier as needed.

Patients

The home users are adult heart failure patients who want to take charge of their heart monitoring in order to reduce unnecessary visits to the doctor and increase early detection of issues. They must be willing to familiarize themselves with a new device, use it daily, and live in the United States.

Doctors/Hospital Staff

The doctors involved must feel that new technology can enable them to provide better care for their patients. The technology would enable hospitals to reduce unnecessary visits, freeing up resources for other needs.

Insurance Providers

The home user may obtain heart@home through their insurance company. The insurance companies interested in heart@home would be companies that want to keep patients out of the emergency room as much as possible, thus saving costs and increasing patient satisfaction.

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Power House / Future Weeders of America

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:03:16 +0000

Power House / Future Weeders of America Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:03

The Future Weeders of America team.

The Power House team with instructor Andrew Femrite.

Thank you to our sponsor, Professor Al Gasiewski!

Currently, the two approaches to weeding are far short of ideal for the average user. One method involves arduously going through a yard, finding the individual weeds, and physically uprooting them by hand. This method is very time consuming, and requires several workers to be done quickly. The physical aspect of it can also be very strenuous. The other existing method is much more brute-force and involves spraying yard-weeding chemicals throughout an entire yard in the hopes that it targets the specific weeds. While this is much quicker, it is far less efficient and involves wasting a tremendous amount of chemicals that are potentially harmful to the lawn and the environment.

The Robotic Yard Weeder autonomously navigates a typical yard by use of D-GPS (Differential Global Positioning System) and Lidar sensors to give state vector information for mapping the area, ultrasonic sensors to alert distance from obstacles, and a color camera to help determine boundaries of the yard, while determining the optimal route to navigate the yard. While searching, the Robotic Yard Weeder detects dandelions using a color and object detection algorithm. Once the unwanted dandelions are found, they are eradicated by the Robotic Yard Weeder.

The Robotic Yard Weeder will be of great benefit to anybody involved with yard-work, from residential homecare to larger-scale grounds keeping at various institutions. The average consumer would greatly benefit from a device that will perform all their weeding for them, offering more free time. On a larger scale, institutions that must hire large groups of groundskeepers to maintain their lawns would greatly benefit from such a product. Rather than paying great deals of money for harmful chemicals or several laborers to perform the weeding, they could use several of our Robotic Yard Weeders and turn them loose on their lawns, knowing that they are efficiently performing their weeding while saving money and reducing any negative environmental impact.

Our product has multiple unique capabilities. The Robotic Yard Weeder can eradicate weeds in a mass area without the use of pesticides or manual labor. It is also fully autonomous and requires no human intervention to weed a lawn. The Robotic Yard Weeder can map and determine the boundaries of any typical lawn. It is also the only yard weeder that has image processing capabilities to distinguish a dandelion from ordinary grass.

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Ohmegatron

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:02:20 +0000

Ohmegatron Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:02

Thank you to our sponsor, Distinguished Professor Zoya Popovic!

Modern microwave ovens provide a quick method of heating food. However, they have several drawbacks. First, food tends to be heated unevenly. Due to the distribution of fields within the oven, certain areas of the food are heated more than others, even with the use of a turntable. Secondly, microwave ovens tend to use a magnetron to produce the electromagnetic waves. While time tested, they are bulky and have a short life span. Safety is another concern. On most commercial microwave ovens, there is a window for the user to view the food, and this leaks electromagnetic waves. Having no leakage is optimal for the user’s safety. A second user concern is that research shows people are dissatisfied with the microwave’s user interface. The biggest complaint is that there are too many buttons and that makes the device complicated.

There are a few current microwaves using modern solid state devices, but they have poor efficiency. This is because the device is unable to sense the load provided by the food, and simply dissipates the reflected energy as heat.

Solid-state devices make use of semiconductors in a solid material to allow charge-carriers to flow. This contrasts earlier analogue technologies such as the vacuum tube, which are both bulky and do not offer the amount of precision control as the more modern solid-state devices do. The solid-state microwave (S3MO) will provide a way to evenly and efficiently heat food through power regulation, and will be easier for the user to operate. This smart device adjusts settings such as cook time and power distribution and dissipation cavity to accommodate for different foods. It will also have a touch screen interface that displays the food cooking and is used as the method of input for the user. Therefore, S3MO will make operating the microwave simpler and make it safer since the window is eliminated for a touch screen. Seeking to replace the conventional vacuum tube microwave, S3MO benefits household consumers, company break rooms, restaurants, and anyone who already uses microwave ovens.

Key Features

Evenly distributed heating for a variety of foods, less cold spots
Less (if any) need to stir dishes to deal with uneven heating
More power-efficient heating than current solid state microwaves because of the feedback system
No turntable, so won’t ever need to clean, fix, or replace this part
Minimal moving parts, more reliability
Reduced size of the microwave, more portable
Can make use of entire microwave space as opposed to being limited within the turntable area
Touch screen with simpler user interface (less buttons and a clear instructions)
Screen that shows the food cooking

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Ocean’s 7

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:01:00 +0000

Ocean’s 7 Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:01

Thank you to our sponsor, the RoboSub Club!

In previous years the University of Colorado Boulder RoboSub team has discovered many problems in its electronic design including wire management, power delivery, and excessive CPU overhead. In addition the team has had limited vehicle control in previous years. The goal of Ocean’s 7 is to eliminate these problems with its power system, backplane, and controls system.

The backplane will standardize power distribution and data transfer throughout the vehicle. This will help eliminate wires simplifying wire management. Each board designed by Ocean’s 7 will connect to the backplane via board-to-board connectors. Additional board-to-board connectors will be available to the RoboSub team for any incidental boards the team may create.

The power system will first merge together two 14.8V, 100A battery inputs into a single 200A input. This input will be redistributed to motors and the power conversion board. Ocean’s 7’s power conversion board will use switching buck/boost converters to output voltages and currents required by the RoboSub team. These different power rails will then be redistributed along the backplane. Our buck/boost converters will be designed to optimize power usage.

The control system will be a custom board, which takes information about desired velocities from the CPU and offloads the fine controls from the processor. This will give the RoboSub team more optimal stability control, while also offloading processes from the CPU.

The RoboSub autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) will benefit from a more cohesive internal electronics system. The RoboSub team will have an easier time assembling the product since it will slot together in the backplane, and will be able to focus on other tasks like computer vision. The systems will give the RoboSub team a leg up in the AUVSI RoboSub competition by optimizing controls and distributing power throughout the vehicle.

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metaTAIT

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 16:38:19 +0000

metaTAIT Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 10:38

Thank you to sponsor Tait Towers!

The current challenges with hologram technology are image quality and machine environment. Images are often distorted and have few, or even only one, viewing angle(s). Some technologies simply use mirrors to produce the image, which are hard to control. Another issue is noise and air disruption with current technology, as it is not designed for a complete user experience. There is also no current model to effectively manipulate parameters to find the machine’s ideal mode of operation. Finally, with current hologram projectors, rods and poles can be seen in the middle of the structure, which also makes the user experience less immersive. Our product, RotoVision, will be developed to mitigate these critical issues.

The use of high-speed rotating, one-dimensional LED display strips will take advantage of human persistence of vision to create a three-dimensional image. This image will be viewable from any angle, without interference in the image from the mechanical components. This technology will allow for more control over visual effects for use in the entertainment industry.

Who Will Benefit:

Tour Developers
Tait Towers Engineers
Set Designers
Future holographic image researchers

Our technology produces a 3D image using rotating LEDS that produce a different view of the image depending on the viewing angle (multi-angle representation). All rotating components are on perimeter of structure so that the structure looks invisible to the human eye. The user can adjust the rotational speed and brightness to better understand hologram technology and persistence of vision effects. RotoVision will be significantly more quiet and produce less wind.

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If There's a Will, There's a Wei

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 16:30:30 +0000

If There's a Will, There's a Wei Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 10:30

Thank you to sponsor Inovonics!

The current options for seniors that are at risk for life-threatening events, such as heart attack or seizure, are very limited. Those options, such as hospice care, visiting nurses, and nursing homes, are often expensive and impractical. Technology based solutions have long been discussed, but rarely are successful, due to many seniors’ inability to learn the solutions.

The Lifeline is a long-lasting, wrist based activity and heart rate monitoring device. It lasts much longer than other products, reducing overall maintenance while still being reliable. It allows caretakers to keep track of patient’s vitals while maximizing the patient’s mobility.

The main customer for this product are nursing homes or caretakers for the elderly. The device allows for maximizing mobility of the patient while enabling the caretaker to keep track of the patient’s vitals. The long-lasting functionality of the Lifeline allows the caretaker to not have to worry about managing the device while they are trying to care for their patient.

An elderly person can do initial setup for the device and wear it comfortably on a daily basis for a long period of time. This will be accomplished through both power saving and energy harvesting techniques. The device takes baseline and periodic heart rate, temperature, and movement readings to help set bounds and detect any irregular patterns. If they have a life-threatening event, the correct people can be automatically notified and the elderly person can get help as soon as possible. This will be done via sending a text message to an emergency contact. On top of this, by utilizing a long-range radio, we can ensure that the device is usable throughout the user’s home and beyond.

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HydroDynamix

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 16:29:15 +0000

HydroDynamix Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 10:29

Thank you to our sponsor, the CU RoboSub Club!

There are a variety of obstacles the CU RoboSub team will encounter during the 2017 RoboSub Competition, an International Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Competition. Of these obstacles, the final three are worth the most amount of points and are the most difficult. It requires the competing teams’ autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) to be able to locate Benthos ALP-365 pingers using a hydrophone system, which emit underwater acoustic signals at a randomly selected frequency in the 25 - 40 kHz range. In previous years, the CU RoboSub team has not been able to successfully accomplish those tasks.

Implementing a hydrophone array system on the CU RoboSub’s AUV capable of locating the pingers is crucial for helping the CU RoboSub team advance further in the RoboSub competition. A solution is a hydrophone array system that interfaces with five hydrophones to locate the direction of the underwater pingers. Data collected from the hydrophones can be used to calculate heading data that will be transmitted to the CU RoboSub for navigation and guidance toward underwater pingers. The hydrophone array will need to use appropriate filtering techniques to attenuate the effects of background noise, calculating the heading data in a timely manner, and transmitting the data to the main CU RoboSub computer reliably and in real-time.

An algorithm that can be used to calculate the heading data is Time Delay on Arrival (TDOA). Variations of the TDOA algorithm have been used by other teams who have participated in the RoboSub competition and their implementations have been proved to be successful, indicating TDOA feasibility.

Customer

The CU RoboSub is an autonomous robotic submarine designed by the CU Robotics team that competes internationally with other robotic submarines developed by students from many universities. In previous years, the CU RoboSub team has only been able to compete in the first few tasks, where the AUVs are guided by visual markers. The hydrophone system will allow the team to compete in the remaining two tasks where pingers will be used to guide the AUVs.

Product Capabilities

CU RoboSub hydrophone array system can receive underwater audio and use the signals to identify the direction toward Benthos ALP-365 pingers with respect to the current position of the CU RoboSub.
The hydrophone system supports synchronous A/D conversion of audio signals by multiple hydrophones.
The hydrophone system attenuates the effects of background noise, therefore giving the CU RoboSub the capable of determining the general direction toward the Benthos ALP-365 pingers inside the competition course.
The hydrophone system can calculate the heading data in a timely manner, allowing reliable, real-time data transmission to the CU RoboSub main CPU.

Project Risks

If damaged, hydrophones will transmit faulty data audio readings from Benthos ALP-365 pingers.
Housing of the hydrophone system may become unstable or damaged during testing or the course of the competition. This may lead to a total system failure in the event of a water leakage.
Collaboration with the capstone team responsible for developing the backplane of the CU RoboSub is essential to ensure the Hydrophone Array can establish end-to-end communication with the CU RoboSub’s main CPU and to ensure adequate power is provided to the hydrophone system.

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Fluffy Logic

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 16:26:52 +0000

Fluffy Logic Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/19/2017 - 10:26

Thank you to our sponsors, Professor Al Gasiewski and the Center for Environmental Technology (CET)!

Power companies currently rely on both fossil fuel generators and solar panels to fuel power grids, but seek to reduce overall reliance on fossil fuels. Power grids that are fueled by photovoltaic sources at high levels of integration require the prediction of both direct and diffuse solar flux. These predictions must reach an hour into the future, and offer highly accurate solar insolation estimates, with high spatial and temporal resolution.

The Solens is a compact, weather-proof, cost-efficient Internet-of-Things (IoT) device that takes images of the sky, compresses those images, and then sends them to a server. Once the images are received, they can be used to gather data on cloud coverage, which can be used to predict solar power availability. This will assist power companies in real time resource allocation, and the data from several units can be aggregated to cover a large geographical area at low cost.

Power companies will greatly benefit from being able to predict the availability of renewable power sources. Currently, power companies have backup fossil-fuel power sources available to power the entire grid, and these generators produce a significant amount of pollution. With Solens, power companies will be able to predict when their photovoltaic arrays are not able to handle the load, and can start peaking power plants only when absolutely necessary, which will minimize pollution and non-renewable resource use. As peaking power plants are typically gas turbines, and have a much higher cost per kilowatt, this is both more environmentally-friendly, and cheaper for utility companies and therefore consumers. Data collected by the Solens system can also be used to determine the best places for future photovoltaic array installations, which aids in short-term weather forecasting.

Key Benefits

The Solens covers cloud prediction in a large area at a lower cost than current solutions.
Power companies can use Solens to minimize fossil fuel usage in favor of solar energy.
The spatial resolution and self-contained nature of the Solens are unmatched.
Weather researchers and astronomers can use the cloud data for short-term, localized forecasts.

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