Design News Blogs

General Motors Scales Back Jets

The mighty have fallen!! General Motors (G.M.) in response to a highly embarrassing moment this week is cutting the number of leased corporate jets to a mere three.   “We started the year with seven leased aircraft. Because of travel cutb ... More

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Your Guide to Going Green

Wireless Reference Architectures In the Works

Engineers wanting to deploy wireless networks on the factory floor will soon get a helping hand from Rockwell Automation and Cisco Systems. At the Rockwell Automation Fair in Nashville this week, the two companies announced that they wi ... More

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Read about the latest developments in motion control, factory automation, machine tools, and robotics.

GreenSoft releases REACH application

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Hi, this is Design News contributing editor, Rob Spiegel. Welcome to my Lead-Free Zone blog. This is your opportunity (and mine) to discuss RoHS and other environmental issues. Green regulations have produced waves of industry confusion, and I do not expect things to clear up quickly. So use this blog to inform us of your opinions, to instruct us all on what you're doing about this initiative, or just to blow off some steam.

Who Is to Blame For GM's Collapse? All of Us

It’s great that Chinese companies may want to buy Chrysler or GM. That’s how the free enterprise system works. Companies are priced at a fair market value in public exchanges (if they’re publicly held) and then anyone with the cash can buy them, just like any products are bought ... More

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Engineering materials is a discussion led by Design News Contributing Materials Editor Doug Smock on important new developments and applications that affect mechanical design.

Auto Industry Bailout: Pro, Con And Undecided

Unlike the recent presidential election where I found it hard to fathom that there could be actual “undecideds,” I admit I fall into that embarrassingly squishy category when it comes to the possibility of a bailout (or a bridge loan, as the auto makers like to call it) for the big three car companies. On one hand, having covered manufacturing, and to some extent, the autom ... More

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Where you'll find the latest news and trends in the areas of CAD/CAM software, PLM, innovation, and product development.

New Solar Cell Coating May Eliminate Sun Tracking

Researchers at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have created a nano-engineered coating for photovoltaic (PV) cells that increases sunlight absorption to 96.21 percent. Reported in “New nano coating boosts solar efficiency ... More

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This alternative energy and sustainable power blog covers alternative energy and fuel technologies buzzing through the media.

The secret history of Silicon Valley: How Stanford and the CIA built the Valley

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Looking at the top engineering breakthroughs that came during the 60-year history of Design News.

This flying saucer stays balanced

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After nearly 20 years as an electrical engineer, I suffered two horrible blows last year - literally and figuratively. First, I was hit by a bus and second, my position at a premier semiconductor company was outsourced to penguins in Antarctica . While physically I am in one piece, the bus a ccident has traumatized me. Symptoms include gadgetary hallucinations and horrid lapses in vocabulary. So I've decided to travel the U.S. looking for new gadget s (hellooo Mid America! Like engineers, farmers are a great source of ingenious gadgets). M-I-C...K-E-Y. Just call me The Gadgeteer (someone should tell the bus company whose bus hit me, there's a gadget called brakes!)

More of 'Best Engineering Colleges 2009'

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The latest news and information on analog/digital control, components/hardware, embedded systems, power/thermal management, and sensors for design engineers.

Systems Engineering is not Mechatronics

What is the role of a systems engineer? A systems engineer ensures a company’s product is going to function within cost, specification, while satisfying the user, making the trade off decisions between features, solving problems without an obvious source, and of course much more. An exemplary systems engineer has significant education and experience, leadership, ... More

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In this blog you'll find posts about mechatronics, engineering, and engineering education.  Stefan Wolpert will discuss various aspects of mechatronics, some of which include computers, control, electronics, mechanics and design.  Also, Stefan will explore his engineering education and its integration of mechatronics.

$28 Million Settlement Reached in Death of Woman Killed in Big Dig Collapse

Read more on the Big Dig materials failure and see appalling aftermath photos and diagrams at Design News’ Big Dig coverage page. The family of a woman killed two years ago when the car she was riding in was crushed as a portion of a ceiling collapsed ... More

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Straight talk about today's headlines and how they affect the engineering community.

Chevy Volt, Performance Capabilities Subject to Change

Did I hear that right? A Chevy Volt radio ad this morning concluded with a line like performance capabilities subject to change or may vary. I think it was the former. Should I be surprised given the GM’s rush to get this electric car into production by late 2010? That’s how fluid the battery situation is. The ad touts that you m ... More

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Scanning for Fraud

Art and technology have started to come together in an unlikely place–under the gaze of 3D digitizers. The VanDuzen Archives of Dallas has built a growing business around the use of imaging hardware and digital shape sampling software as tools to authenticate and conserve works of art. And in one recent job, the company helped ferret out a forged copy of Picasso’s Tete ... More

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News about the technologies you turn to when time isn't on your side--everything from rapid prototyping machines and high-speed machining to rapid tooling and rapid manufacturing.

Sales of da Vinci Robots Shows More Than Rising Stock

Despite the rise and fall of Intuitive Surgical, Inc.’s stock over the past week, it’s probably safe to say, one thing is for sure: robotic-assisted surgery is on the rise. In case you missed it, last week, Intuitive Surgical, Inc. the maker of the da Vinci Surgical System, a unit of ... More

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This blog is where biology and mechatronics collide.  Read about Medical Mechatronics, from medical device manufacturing to biomedical engineering to the emerging world of biomechatronics.

Avnet Tech Games Give Product Ideas a Chance in the Real World

This week Avnet announced the winners from its third annual Avnet Tech Games, an annual competition featuring several multi-disciplinary technology events. The competition, held April 5, presented more than 150 students from colleges and universities in Arizona with several technology challenges. Among the Avnet Tech Games events are "AMD Bui ... More

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This blog is your resource for news and updates on the latest developments from design engineering competitions across the globe. Be sure to visit our Design Engineering Competitions and Challenges content package for more coverage, a schedule of upcoming events and entry materials.

When to Embark on a New Engineering Position

Should you move from that company of long standing? Are you waiting patiently for the retirement party and that “gold watch”? Last weekend I sat down for coffee with a design engineer from an industrial lighting products company. With him were two of his twenty-something-year-old kids, helping Dad gather tools for a career move. They were as interested in advice for their ... More

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Negotiating your path to success in engineering’s changing work world.