All Features
NIST
Manufacturing Day, or MFG Day, has grown to mean many things since it was officially proclaimed in 2012. Some celebrate on the first Friday in October with an event at a manufacturing facility or a school. Others participate in a regional celebration at an events center. Some areas have a…
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
A team of scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) has investigated the behavior of hafnium oxide, or hafnia, and its potential for use in novel semiconductor applications.
Materials such as hafnia exhibit ferroelectricity, which means that they are…
William A. Levinson
The difference between common (or random) cause and special (or assignable) cause variation is the foundation of statistical process control (SPC). An SPC chart prevents tampering or overadjustment by assuming that the process is in control, i.e., special or assignable causes are absent unless a…
Matthew T. Hughes, Srinivas Garimella
Not only people need to stay cool, especially in a summer of record-breaking heat waves. Many machines, including cellphones, data centers, cars, and airplanes, become less efficient and degrade more quickly in extreme heat. Machines generate their own heat, too, which can make hot temperatures…
Baxi Chong
Adding legs to robots that have minimal awareness of the environment around them can help them operate more effectively in difficult terrain, my colleagues and I found.
We were inspired by mathematician and engineer Claude Shannon’s communication theory about how to transmit signals over distance…
Mike Figliuolo
Meetings give me a rash. A really bad one. One that not even calamine lotion can soothe. The only things worse than meetings are reports. Standard daily reports, weekly reports, hourly reports. Reports on the status of reports. If I wasn’t already insane, these things would drive me insane.
Take a…
David Suttle
You often hear about self-driving cars and their levels of autonomy. When can drivers completely remove their hands from the steering wheel? This also applies to robots. How can robots become fully autonomous?
What are autonomous robots?
Let’s look at the levels of freedom for self-driving cars…
David Cantor
One of the most concerning uncertainties surrounding the emergence of artificial intelligence is the impact on jobs. Human jobs.
Innovation and progress are cornerstones of mankind. From the invention of the wheel to machine learning, the effect on our lives transcends generations and influences…
Daniel Marzullo
If you could experience the perfect workday, what would you be doing? Have you ever taken the time to think about it?
Whether you’re an entrepreneur climbing the corporate ladder or you’re selling donuts out of the back of your car, it’s essential to pause and reflect periodically on the work you…
Eric Whitley
Manufacturing has come a long way from manual labor and assembly lines. The industry has evolved through various phases, from the Industrial Revolution to mass production, and now to Industry 4.0. Each phase has brought its own set of challenges and opportunities, shaping the way goods are produced…
Etienne Nichols
Supply chain management is crucial to any medtech company’s ability to deliver safe, effective, and high-quality devices to their customers.
But as anyone in the industry can tell you, consistently getting the products and services you need to manufacture your devices is harder than it sounds. In…
InnovMetric
Today, manufacturing companies have sophisticated 3D measurement labs with portable and CNC coordinate measuring machines (CMMs), laser scanners, laser trackers, and digital gauges, and every brand of hardware uses its own software solution. When relying on multiple software programs, multiple…
Peter Nathanial, David Zuluaga Martínez, Theodoros Evgeniou, Francois Candelon
Last month, the heads of seven major American AI companies emerged from the White House with an agreement on “self-regulation.” On the other side of the Atlantic, Europeans debate the long-awaited EU AI Act, the next major digital regulation following the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA). The DSA is…
MIT News
The Singapore MIT-Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART), MIT’s research enterprise in Singapore, has launched a new interdisciplinary research group aimed at tackling key social and institutional challenges around the rise of artificial intelligence and other new technologies. The group,…
Gleb Tsipursky
Many employees are asking, “Do we really need to go to the office?” as the leadership at major companies like Amazon, Apple, Disney, Starbucks, and JP Morgan mandate three or more days a week of office-based work. Employees are adamant that they are doing their jobs effectively at home, and data…
Del Williams
To move delicate products or powders, most processors do extensive homework before purchasing a tubular drag-cable conveyor to ensure that it meets their needs for function and price. After the purchase, the conveyor must be expertly assembled and tested to ensure smooth production startup and…
William A. Levinson
Inflation is a serious national issue. Credit agency Fitch Ratings just downgraded the U.S. credit rating—as in the “full faith and credit of the United States”—from AAA to AA+.1 This doubtlessly reflects the fact that our national debt exceeds $31 trillion, or almost $100,000 for every American,…
Vivian Lam
The microscope is an iconic symbol of the life sciences, and for good reason. From the discovery of the existence of cells to the structure of DNA, microscopy has been a quintessential tool of the field, unlocking new dimensions of the living world not only for scientists but also for the general…
Chandrakant Isi
Apple’s Vision Pro announcement has sparked a renewed interest in the world of augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). Looking through the lens of industrial environments, these technologies have already made significant contributions in manufacturing, maintenance, and training processes.…
Enver Yucesan
It’s frustrating for customers to be told that a coveted mobile phone is out of stock, or worse, be bumped off an overbooked flight. Disgruntled consumers could turn to rival products or hurt the business’s reputation with negative reviews. But holding excess stock to avoid disappointing customers…
Gleb Tsipursky
Have you wondered how to foster remote and hybrid diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace? Many companies have consulted with me about developing and implementing their strategies for returning to the office and establishing permanent work arrangements. During my interviews with…
Stephanie Ojeda
Untitled Document
Workplace safety incidents are a key driver of risk in manufacturing organizations. There are the obvious risks to workers, whose ability to make a living directly depends on their employer’s approach to safety.
There are also huge risks to companies themselves, which face…
Vanessa Bates Ramirez
If you’ve seen the Terminator movies, you may remember the shape-shifting humanoid robot T-1000. Made of liquid metal, it could instantly self-heal bullet wounds and other injuries, its metal simply oozing back together and making any damage disappear. Decades after the concept of self-healing…
Mark Graban
I can’t count how many times during the past 20 years I’ve heard executives complain that their people aren’t enthusiastically participating in their lean program. Leaders lament that while the company has spent a small fortune to put everybody through continuous improvement training, hardly…
Michael Platt, Elizabeth Z. Johnson
Most leaders would attest that true collaboration—the pooling of knowledge, perspectives, and brainpower of talented people—is a desired yet often elusive outcome. To change that, and boost the likelihood of generating breakthrough results, draw on parallels with improvisational jazz during your…
