AUTUMN 2015 ISSUE 18

DEPARTMENT OF ENGINEERING NEWS

Keeping the lights on in rural Uganda Page 5

Real-time holographic displays one step closer Page 8

What makes an intelligent infrastructure asset? Pages 16

On the origin of (robot) species Page 24 In this issue Welcome I recently attended the launch of the University’s Improving building efficiency 3 £2 billion fundraising campaign and I was Graphene’s potential for energy 4 overwhelmed by the stunning array of donors Keeping the lights on in rural Uganda 5 and the palpable enthusiasm for engineering. The Superconductivity 6 Department’s move west is one of the major projects Cambridge awarded £18 million in funding 7 of the campaign and in the next issue of the newsletter, to support UK infrastructure research we will be ready to share more of our plans for our new 2 Real-time holographic displays one 8 100,000m facility. This transition will be even more step closer to reality dramatic than the Department’s original move, nearly Thinking inside the box 9 one hundred years ago, from its cramped origins on the Health-conscious concrete 10 New Museum Site to Trumpington Street. Air quality concerns inside London’s 11 But do not imagine that we are sitting back basking Paddington Station in the glow of our historic achievements. The stories Institute for Manufacturing 12-13 contained in the pages of this newsletter show that we Design Show 2015 are keeping very busy at the forefront of engineering New understanding of electromagnetism 14 doing our best in both teaching and research to crack could enable ‘antennas on a chip’ hard problems and make a real difference. From Tripos to TripAdvisor 15 What makes an intelligent 16 Take, for example, the accomplishments of the Photonics Group, which is on its way to realising infrastructure asset? the dream of real-time holographic displays. The advances being uncovered by young researchers Professor Steve Young’s pioneering 17 Calum Williams and Yunuen Montelongo could lead to dazzling imagery beyond anything speech technology work recognised imaginable with conventional technology. Read more about their work on page 8. Tony Gee, designer 18 of the Gladesville Bridge Professor Abir Al-Tabbaa heads a team in Civil and Environmental Engineering that is exploring PhD student Camille Bilger receives 19 the different ways concrete can be improved upon – some of which are being used and studied Airbus Group UK TechMaster Award at the James Dyson Building currently being constructed outside my office as I write this letter. 3D printing has left the station 19 The ‘smart’ concrete innovations, including self-repairing concrete blocks, will aid in the Blindingly fast computers within reach 20 development of more sustainable construction materials in the future. Read about how Let’s get statted 21 self-healing concrete works on page 10. Professor Sir John Horlock 1928–2015 22 We are pleased to have welcomed to our ranks in the past year Professor Fumiya Iida, Lecturer in Honours, awards and prizes 23 Mechatronics in the Machine Intelligence Laboratory. One product of his research is a robot that On the origin of (robot) species 24 takes the principles of natural selection and builds increasingly successful ‘children.’ We see Iida’s work as a way to bridge the gaps between biology and engineering incorporating those principles Cover image: Intelligent asset cartoon into better designs. Turn to page 24 for a link to watch this robot in action. drawing by Professor Duncan McFarlane. © Duncan McFarlane. There are many more achievements we are proud of on every page of this newsletter Editors: Jacqueline Saggers including those of our alumni. Please stay in touch, give feedback on our stories, sign up and Christopher Jablonski for our LinkedIn group and tell us how you are using your experience at Cambridge to make Department of Engineering University of Cambridge the world a better place. Trumpington Street Cambridge CB2 1PZ Professor David Cardwell FREng Telephone: +44 (0)1223 748228 Email: [email protected] www.eng.cam.ac.uk Design: www.cantellday.co.uk Printing: Sudbury Print Group To view the short film celebrating the launch of the University’s © 2015 University of Cambridge and Contributors as ‘Yours, Cambridge’ campaign, visit http://bit.ly/1Nmnkjo. identified. The content of Department of Engineering News, with the exception of images and illustrations, is made available for non-commercial re-use in another work under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-ShareAlike Find us... Licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/bync- sa/3.0/), subject to acknowledgement of the original eng.cam.ac.uk/Twitter eng.cam.ac.uk/Facebook author/s, title of individual work and the University L F of Cambridge. This Licence requires any new work with an adaptation of content to be distributed and I eng.cam.ac.uk/LinkedIn X eng.cam.ac.uk/YouTube re-licensed under the same licence terms. For latest news N eng.cam.ac.uk/Flickr I eng.cam.ac.uk/Instagram www.eng.cam.ac.uk/news

2 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 Credit: Phil Guest Phil Credit: n Overlooking the Thames Improving building efficiency An important piece of the energy puzzle

A Department of Engineering By 2050, the total non-domestic floor inherently unique systems, making it difficult area in the UK is expected to increase by to generalise technology solutions for any project is among those benefiting 35 per cent, while 60 per cent of existing individual property. In 2008, the Energy Efficient from £3 million Engineering buildings will still be in use. This means that Cities initiative commenced a series of projects and Physical Sciences Research substantial retrofitting is likely and planning focusing on developing retrofit analysis tools for what techniques to use to save energy, as the UK’s non-domestic building sector. Council (EPSRC) funding. well as how to implement change with the cooperation of building occupants, is going to Against a world backdrop of increased be essential. concerns about energy security, price Professor Philip Nelson, EPSRC’s Chief We need to find smart solutions fluctuations and, of course, the need to Executive, said: “Improving energy efficiency “ to how we use energy while address climate change, six research projects is an important piece of the energy puzzle. improving the environment that aim to gain a fuller understanding of Worldwide energy demand is rising, as are in which people have to work, how energy is managed in the country’s non- global temperatures and sea levels. We need rest or play. domestic buildings, have been launched. to find smart solutions to how we use energy Funded with £3 million from the Engineering while improving the environment in which Professor Philip Nelson and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) people have to work, rest or play. These on behalf of the Research Councils UK Energy projects will go a long way to help improve Programme (RCUKEP), the research will address our understanding of what goes on in non- how to use technology, data and information, domestic buildings and add to the armoury at mathematics, law and sociology to create better the disposal of those managing these facilities.” energy strategies and behaviours in the public The new projects will be run at Imperial and private non-domestic buildings stock. College London, University of Cambridge, The team is led by Dr Ruchi Among the schemes being funded is a University of Edinburgh, University of Oxford, Choudhary of the Structures Group Cambridge project aimed at creating software University of Southampton and the University and includes a multi-disciplinary that will help to reduce the uncertainty in of Strathclyde. group of researchers from Architecture, Engineering, modelling the energy management of a wide The Cambridge project is called B-bem: The and Judge Business School. variety of buildings. Bayesian Building Energy Management Portal. Non-domestic buildings such as offices, Managing energy in existing non-domestic This article originally appeared on the University supermarkets, hospitals and factories buildings is wrought with many challenges, of Cambridge website account for approximately 18 per cent a number of which arguably are due to the of UK carbon emissions and 13 per cent diversity found among individual buildings and R of final energy consumption. the humans who occupy them. Buildings are www.eeci.cam.ac.uk

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 3 Credit: CORE-materials from Flickr from CORE-materials Credit:

Graphene’s potential for energy conversion n Model of graphene structure and storage

Scientists working with Europe’s functional inks based on 2D crystals They will supplement, and at times replace, is the gateway for the realisation of new existing substances in a range of applications. Graphene Flagship and the generation electrodes in energy storage Two-dimensional materials shall in some cases Cambridge Graphene Centre and conversion devices.” be integrated into existing platforms in order have produced a detailed and “Graphene and related materials have to enhance them. For example, graphene great promise in these areas, and the could be integrated into silicon photonics, wide-ranging review of the Graphene Flagship has identified energy exploiting established technology for potential of graphene and applications as a key area of investment,” said constructing integrated circuits. review co-author Professor Andrea Ferrari, who The roadmap highlights three broad related materials in energy chairs the Executive Board of the Graphene areas of activity. The first task is to identify conversion and storage. Flagship, and is director of the Cambridge new layered materials, assess their potential, Graphene Centre. “We hope that our critical and develop reliable, reproducible and safe In a review article published recently in overview will guide researchers in academia means of producing them on an industrial the journal Science, the researchers, led by and industry in identifying optimal pathways scale. Identification of new device concepts Francesco Bonaccorso, a Royal Society Newton toward applications and implementation, with enabled by 2D materials is also called for, Fellow at the Cambridge Graphene Centre, an eventual benefit for society as a whole.” along with the development of component note the substantial progress made in material Francesco added that the challenge ahead is technologies. The ultimate goal is to integrate preparation at the laboratory level. They also to demonstrate a disruptive technology in which components and structures based on 2D highlight the challenge of producing the two-dimensional materials not only replace materials into systems capable of providing materials on an industrial scale in a cost- traditional electrodes, but more importantly new functionalities and application areas. effective manner. enable whole new device concepts. Eleven science and technology themes Graphene – a two-dimensional material In an open-access paper published in the are identified in the roadmap. These are: made up of sheets of carbon atoms – has Royal Society of Chemistry journal Nanoscale, fundamental science, health and environment, many potential applications, among them more than 60 academics and industrialists lay production, electronic devices, spintronics, energy conversion and storage. Graphene and out a science and technology roadmap for photonics and optoelectronics, sensors, related 2D crystals combine high electrical graphene, related two-dimensional crystals, flexible electronics, energy conversion and conductivity with physical flexibility and a other 2D materials, and hybrid systems based storage, composite materials and biomedical huge surface-to-weight ratio. Such qualities on a combination of different 2D crystals and devices. The roadmap addresses each of these make them suitable for storing electric charge other nanomaterials. The roadmap covers the areas in turn, with timelines. in batteries and supercapacitors and as next ten years and beyond, and its objective is catalysts in solar and fuel cell electrodes. to guide the research community and industry “The huge interest in 2D crystals for energy toward the development of products based applications comes both from their physico- on graphene and related materials. chemical properties, and the possibility of Graphene and related materials are producing and processing them in large expected to revolutionise the fields in which quantities, in a cost-effective manner,” said they are applied, and they have the potential R Francesco. “In this context, the development of to become the materials of the 21st century. www.graphene.cam.ac.uk

4 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 , Women from the village of Okabi taking part in Stephanie’s research exercise

Keeping the lights on in

rural Uganda Hirmer Stephanie Credit:

Stephanie Hirmer, PhD the lack of technology uptake. Finding out what these are is the aim of my PhD research, student at the Department working with Dr Heather Cruickshank at the To provide better“ infrastructure of Engineering’s Centre for Centre for Sustainable Development. While the services to rural communities, it is fundamentally important to Sustainable Development, technology itself has been extensively studied, social attributes in project design have received relate to the beneficiaries’ needs writes about her journey to little attention. and aspirations. Moyo in northern Uganda asking To provide better infrastructure services to rural communities, it is fundamentally important Stephanie Hirmer villagers which possessions they to relate to the beneficiaries’ needs and most value and why. aspirations, and I need to travel to the areas to learn this at first hand. Infrastructure failure after choose, initially individually, 20 items from a list “If I have a flush toilet in my house I think I can the projects are handed over to the communities of approximately 50 items that include cow, hoe, be a king of all kings because I can’t go out on is common across the basic utility provisions fridge, water pot, bed and utensils. Following those squatting latrines… also it can protect such as water and electrification, and I am keen prioritisation, they will be asked to give reasons my wife from going outside alone as recently to discover if there is a way of improving project as to why these items are important to them. my wife was almost raped by a thug when longevity by ‘selling’ a service that is valued. Another example arises during the she escorted my son to the latrine at around Today is the first day of fieldwork and we discussion. The villagers use kerosene lamps 10:30pm in the night.” have arrived at the village of Moyo for the day’s to light their homes. Simply offering a solution This is Paul. His declaration of the possession focus group discussions. The village is still very that replaces light from one source with he would most value is met with laughter from familiar to me; not much has changed since my another is not enough. Modern technologies his fellow villagers, but it highlights a very real last visit three years ago when I was working can offer benefits that are indirectly linked to concern – the safety of his family. with the German Development Agency, GIZ, aspects perceived as ‘very important’ in rural It’s also a valuable research finding for me. on the installation of the community-operated communities – in this case, avoiding the use Too often, projects that bring electricity to pico-hydropower scheme. These schemes are of fume-producing kerosene would resonate villages like Paul’s fail because of lack of uptake perfect for small communities with about 50 with the mothers’ hopes of keeping their and maintenance by the rural communities. homes that require only enough electricity to children healthy. But if, for instance, the benefits of electrification power a few light bulbs and a small number of The findings from my research will be fed could be understood in terms of the safety electrical items. In Moyo, however, the scheme back to project implementers. My hope is that value of night-time lighting, this could improve no longer works, and the villagers are once only small adjustments in the project design the sense of community responsibility towards more plunged into darkness while a more will be required in order to communicate these sustaining the technology after its implementers effective solution is being explored. ‘additional’ benefits to the target users, and that have gone home. We meet one of the women to mobilise the the lights will be turned on and kept on in rural Another villager, Michael, explains that he six chosen villagers. We decide to start with the villages like Moyo. places most value in owning a corrugated iron men, as by late morning some of the men in A version of this article originally appeared in the sheet instead of grass-thatched roofing because the village will be drunk. University of Cambridge’s Research Horizons magazine. this would reduce the risk of indoor fires. Here Identifying what is important to rural too, the value of electricity can be highlighted – villagers when implementing basic infrastructure it would avoid the need to cook on an open fire. projects is far more complex than simply asking Understanding the locals’ real needs and “what is important to you?” I have made a ‘value R desires can be a key element in overcoming game’ and explain to the locals that they must www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/sah93

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 5 , John Durrell Lecturer in Superconductivity Credit: Keith Heppell Credit: Superconductivity The turning point from niche to mass markets

An interview with Dr John Durrell, newly appointed Lecturer in Superconductivity, by Philip Guildford, Director of Research

Philip: The discovery of high-temperature where we can make big pieces of bulk superconductivity in 1987 created a superconductor with superb properties. tremendous amount of scientific and media We recently broke the world record for Superconductivity“ intrigues interest, but then faded from public view. the magnetic field trapped in a lump of experts and lay people alike. What happened? superconductor (J H Durrell et al 2014 Zero resistance to electricity, Supercond. Sci. Technol. 27 082001). We huge magnetic fields, and John: Superconductivity intrigues experts and have an industrial process for producing magnetic levitation are all the lay people alike. Zero resistance to electricity, this material. This opens the door to using stuff of science fiction. huge magnetic fields, and magnetic levitation much higher magnetic fields in more are all the stuff of science fiction. Before 1987, everyday applications such as motors and Dr John Durrell, Lecturer in Superconductivity, it had been seen in materials at –255°C. In generators. For instance, we can now imagine Department of Engineering 1987, it was seen in new materials at –183°C. ordinary commercial ships running with Still very cold, but can be achieved with liquid superconducting in the engine room. Mark nitrogen, rather than hydrogen, and much Ainslie in our group is working on prototypes cheaper cooling systems. Everyone got very right now which we expect to be only 25% of excited, possibly too excited, with the idea of the bulk of a conventional motor. In addition, Philip: And for you personally? using these materials in everyday applications. Suchitra Sebastian and colleagues in the It was impossible for the scientists and Cavendish Lab in Cambridge have revealed John: I feel privileged to be looking after engineers to deliver results immediately to a theoretical basis for explaining why the Professor David Cardwell’s group for five match the media hype and inevitably the materials we use superconduct that could years while he is Head of the Department of media’s focus moved on to the next big thing. accelerate our hunt for even better materials. Engineering. I want to do much more than The combination of practical industrial just be the caretaker. I want to maintain the Philip: So what progress has been made processes for making the materials, practical momentum that David has built over the years, since the discovery? prototypes and a strong theoretical foundation keep the team spirit, develop our industrial creates this moment of transition in our field. connections and really make the most of this John: Lots of hard work away from the media turning point for superconductivity. After spotlight has delivered superconducting wires Philip: What lies ahead? five years, I want David and the team to be and materials that are used in all sorts of niche really proud of our results: new scientific and applications such as MRI scanners in hospitals, John: The hard graft of building greater engineering discoveries, demonstrations of very high field magnets for research and in very understanding, improving materials, scaling superconducting machines and companies sensitive devices for measuring magnetic fields. up production and making it all robust working with us to take superconductors into But now everything is set to move up a gear. enough for industrial use. As we work closely new practical applications. with companies, progress to market will Philip: Why is this the moment of transition? leap forward and probably in unexpected directions, as the interface between academia John: In our group in the Department of and industry often generates the exciting R Engineering, we have got to the point unforeseen opportunities. bulk-sucon.eng.cam.ac.uk

6 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 Credit: Keith Heppell Credit: Credit: Jim NixCredit: (Flickr) Cambridge awarded £18 million in funding n St Pancras International Station to support UK infrastructure research

Funding announced by the Chancellor in the last budget is part of a wider £138 million programme to support the UK’s infrastructure and cities.

The University of Cambridge will receive underpin transformative research for all individual asset, such as a tunnel, building or £18 million in funding to ensure that the UK’s partners and stakeholders bridge, to a complex system such as a railway infrastructure is resilient and responsive to B: A national ‘Observatory’ and living laboratories or a city district. More advanced sensors and environmental and economic impacts, as that will establish a network of linked appropriate data analysis will ensure better announced by the Chancellor in the budget infrastructure ‘observatories’ to test current and product quality, enhanced construction safety, earlier this year. The Cambridge funding proposed urban infrastructure systems, and to and smarter asset management. will be used to support research in the enable rapid trialling of solutions “Building a UK infrastructure research application of advanced sensor technologies community like UKCRIC is important to help us to the monitoring of the UK’s existing and C: A multi-level modelling and simulation design, build and maintain infrastructure which future infrastructure, in order to protect and environment that allows ‘what if’ is resilient, adaptable and sustainable,” said maintain it. experiments to be carried out in a high Professor Robert Mair, Head of Civil Engineering The funding is part of the wider UK performance computing environment and of the Centre for Smart Infrastructure Collaboration for Research in Infrastructure & D: Creation of a Coordination Node (CN) and Construction (CSIC) at the University of Cities (UKCRIC), which is a £138 million capital to integrate activities and industry Cambridge. “The UK needs to do more to investment that will be centred around the collaboration across UKCRIC invest in its infrastructure and infrastructure Olympic Park in Stratford and will include 13 services, which are so important to its citizens. university partners from across the UK. Once the business case for UKCRIC has This is an issue which cannot be ignored, so we The proposed research stems from a been agreed, the collaboration will receive welcome this new investment as a positive way need for UK national and local infrastructure further details on funding allocation and to engage academia and industry in protecting (such as transport, water, waste, energy and capital investments. and growing the UK’s infrastructure base.” information technology systems) to be fit for The Cambridge funding will be used Cambridge is one of 13 universities receiving purpose for supporting societal development to build a National Research Facility for funding from UKCRIC. The consortium is being in a changing world. Infrastructure Sensing on the West Cambridge co-ordinated by University College London. UKCRIC will integrate knowledge, tools site, which will build upon the expertise of and methods from a wide range of disciplines. the University’s Centre for Smart Infrastructure This article originally appeared on the University Its initial case proposes four strands: and Construction (CSIC). The new building will of Cambridge website. be an interdisciplinary centre for sensors and A: Investment in capital equipment and instrumentation for infrastructure monitoring R facilities (national ‘Laboratories’) that and assessment, spanning scales from an www-smartinfrastructure.eng.cam.ac.uk

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 7 Credit: Credit: Williams Calum

n Rendered schematic of holographic pixels in operation showing switching states Real-time holographic displays one step closer to reality

Researchers from the Department A relatively large area exists in which additional functionality can be added of Engineering have designed a A large amount of surface area is through the patterning of nanostructures “ new type of pixel element which (optical antennas) to increase the capacity being underutilised, which could be used to store information. could make three-dimensional of pixels in order to make them suitable for holographic displays. Calum Williams holographic displays possible. “In a typical liquid crystal on silicon display, the pixels’ electronics, or backplane, Real-time dynamic holographic displays, long the provides little optical functionality other realm of science fiction, could be one step closer than reflecting light,” said Calum Williams, “Optical nanoantennas produce a strong to reality, after researchers from the Department a PhD student in the Photonics Group interaction with light according to their developed a new type of pixel element that and the paper’s lead author. “This means geometry. Furthermore, it is possible to enables far greater control over displays at the that a large amount of surface area is modulate this interaction with the aid of liquid level of individual pixels. The results are published being underutilised, which could be used crystals,” said co-author Yunuen Montelongo, a in the journal Physica Status Solidi. to store information.” PhD student in the Photonics Group. As opposed to a photograph, a hologram Calum and his colleagues have achieved The work highlights the opportunity for is created when light bounces off a sheet of a much greater level of control over holograms utilising the plasmonic properties of optical material with grooves in just the right places through plasmonics: the study of how light antennas to enable multi-functional pixel to project an image away from the surface. interacts with metals on the nanoscale, which elements for next generation holographic When looking at a hologram from within this allows the researchers to go beyond the display technologies. artificially-generated light field, the viewer gets capability of conventional optical technologies. Scaling up these pixels would mean a the same visual impression as if the object was Normally, devices which use plasmonic display would have the ability to encode directly in front of them. optical antennas are passive, meaning that switchable amplitude, wavelength and Currently, the development of holographic their optical properties cannot be switched polarisation information, a stark contrast to displays is limited by technology that can post-fabrication, which is essential for real- conventional pixel technology. allow control of all the properties of light world applications. at the level of individual pixels. A hologram Through integration with liquid crystals, This article originally appeared on the University encodes a large amount of optical information, in the form of typical pixel architecture, the of Cambridge website. and a dynamic representation of a holographic researchers were able to actively switch which image requires vast amounts of information to hologram is excited and therefore which R be modulated on a display device. output image is selected. www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/cw507

8 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 , Brain Art

Thinking inside the box

New research into the phenomenon of design fixation may help in the development of new tools and strategies that help to stimulate the creative process without inadvertently

limiting it. Ars Electronica Credit:

It’s a common occurrence: when faced with against such episodes in the future. The results a problem which is similar to one which has are published in the journal Design Studies. been faced before, most people will default What causes fixation varies from person Fixation can“ stop the creative to what worked in the past. As the saying to person, and from project to project, but process cold, severely limiting goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But while this common factors include a commitment to the way in which we see a approach often works, it can also limit thinking initial ideas, project constraints that prevent problem and the variety of and prevent alternate, and possibly better, exploration, and organisational cultures that solutions we explore. solutions from being considered. In psychology, give people ownership of their ideas, which this phenomenon of being ‘stuck in a rut’ or gives them the incentive to defend them. Dr Nathan Crilly failing to ‘think outside the box’ is known as the Common factors that prevent fixation ‘Einstellung’ effect, ‘mental set’ or ‘fixation’. include diverse teams, making and testing Fixation occurs in all sorts of settings, such models and facilitation of the creative process biases and learn to resist them. as with the interpretations that scientists make by people who are familiar with fixation risks. Despite their awareness of the risks of of their data, the decisions that managers make However, experience can be a both a blessing fixation and the steps they take to guard against in organisations, and in the diagnoses that and a curse when it comes to preventing it, designers also recognise that fixation is a physicians make. It’s also an issue in design fixation. As designers gain more experience, difficult problem to control. According to Nathan, and engineering, where knowledge of earlier they learn how certain approaches succeed or it is important to gain a better understanding solutions can inadvertently narrow the range of fail, with the experience of failure particularly of the various creative behaviours that people answers that designers explore when responding prominent in their minds. This accumulated exhibit and the barriers that block that behaviour. to new problems. knowledge can cause designers to become “By understanding the nature of fixation, “Whether designing a new toy, a new increasingly conservative, with experienced we’ll be able to develop the tools and bridge, or a new piece of software, fixation designers sticking to a restricted set of solutions. techniques that effectively address it in the can stop the creative process cold, severely While experience of failure can lead to contexts where it occurs and understand how limiting the way in which we see a problem fixation, other forms of experience can help these tools should be presented to the people and the variety of solutions we explore,” said Dr to prevent it. For example, by working on a who will use them,” said Nathan.The research Nathan Crilly of the Department of Engineering. variety of different projects, designers are has been funded by the UK Physical Sciences “However, there is still a lack of in-depth exposed to the many ways in which any & Research Council (EPSRC). research on fixation in the real-world settings given problem can be solved. This experience that experimental research is meant to simulate. of variety acts to remind designers that the In particular, we have little knowledge of how current problem they are addressing must fixation occurs in professional design projects have multiple possible solutions. that have conflicting objectives, long timescales Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, as and experienced team members.”To address designers accumulate design experience, they this gap in knowledge, Nathan conducted a also accumulate experience of fixation, either qualitative study, which found that although in themselves or in those they interact with. Nathan Crilly various formal methods are used to promote These episodes of blindness might only be creative thinking, reflecting on prior episodes recognised in retrospect, but by reflecting on R of fixation is the most effective way of guarding them, designers can learn to recognise their www-edc.eng.cam.ac.uk/people/nc266.html

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 9 , Self-healing concrete

Health-conscious concrete

Roads that self-repair, bridges filled with first-aid bubbles, buildings with arteries… not some futuristic fantasy but a very real possibility with ‘smart’ concrete.

Skin is renewable and self-repairing – our first In 2013, researchers in Cambridge joined line of defence against the wear and tear of forces with colleagues at the Universities of everyday life. If damaged, a myriad of repair Cardiff (who lead the project) and Bath to create We want concrete“ to be a material processes spring into action to protect and heal a new generation of ‘smart’ concrete and other for life that can heal itself again the body. Clotting factors seal the break, a scab cement-based construction materials. and again when wounded. forms to protect the wound from infection and “Previous attempts in this field have focused healing agents begin to generate new tissue. on individual technologies that provide only Professor Abir Al-Tabbaa Taking inspiration from this remarkable a partial solution to the multi-scale, spatial living healthcare package, researchers are and temporal nature of damage,” explained asking whether damage sensing and repair Professor Al-Tabbaa. By contrast, this study, research groups are also beginning to test can be engineered into a quite different funded by the Engineering and Physical combinations of each of their techniques, to material: concrete. Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), provides an find the best recipe for maximum self-healing Self-healing materials were voted one of exciting opportunity to look at the benefits of capability. With the help of industrial partners, the top ten emerging technologies in 2013 combining several ‘healthcare packages’ in the field trials are testing and refining the most by the World Economic Forum, and are being same piece of concrete. “ promising combined systems in a range of actively explored in the aerospace industry, Mechanical damage can cause cracks, real environments and real damage scenarios. where they provide benefits in safety and allowing water to seep in; freezing and This will include testing them in non-structural longevity. But perhaps one area where self- thawing can then force the cracks wider. Loss elements in the Department of Engineering’s healing might have the most widespread effect of calcium in the concrete into the water can new James Dyson Building which is currently is in the concrete-based construction industry. leave decalcified areas brittle. And, if fractures under construction. Concrete is everywhere you look: in are deep enough to allow water to reach the “This is when it will become really exciting,” buildings, bridges, motorways, and reservoir reinforcing steel bars, then corrosion and said Professor Al-Tabbaa. “To be truly self- dams. It’s also in the places you can’t see: disintegration spell the end for the structure. healing, the concrete needs to be responsive foundations, tunnels, underground nuclear The team in Cambridge is addressing to the inherently multidimensional nature waste facilities, and oil and gas wells. After damage at the nano/microscale by developing of damage, over long time scales. We want water, concrete is the second most consumed innovative microcapsules containing a cargo concrete to be a material for life that can heal product on earth. of mineral-based healing agent. It’s like having itself again and again when wounded.” But, like most things, concrete has a a first-aid kit in a bubble: the idea is that finite lifespan. “Traditionally, civil engineering physical and chemical triggers will cause the has built-in redundancy of design to make capsules to break open, releasing their healing sure the structure is safe despite a variety of and sealing agents to repair the lesion.“While adverse events. But, over the long term, repair various cargo and shell materials have been and eventual replacement is inevitable,” said developed for other applications ... they are not Professor Abir Al-Tabbaa, from the Department generally applicable to cement-based matrices of Engineering and the lead of the Cambridge and are far too expensive for use in concrete, component of the research project. which is why we have needed to develop our The UK spends around £40 billion per year own,” explained Professor Al-Tabbaa. Abir Al-Tabbaa on the repair and maintenance of existing, As the Cambridge researchers move mainly concrete, structures. However, repairing closer to the best formulations for the This article originally appeared in the University and replacing concrete structures cause microcapsules, they have begun collaborating of Cambridge’s Research Horizons magazine. disruptions and contribute to the already high with companies who can scale up the level of carbon dioxide emissions that result from production to the levels required to seed R cement manufacturing. tonnes of cement. Meanwhile, the three www-geo.eng.cam.ac.uk

10 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 Credit: Tmailliw via Flick Tmailliw Credit: Air quality concerns inside London’s n Paddington Station Paddington Station

A risk assessment produced by Department of Engineering researchers has found troubling levels of pollution inside London’s Paddington Station.

The team found that during one week in such levels multiple times throughout the week Paddington on four-out-of-five days and SO2 September 2012, the air quality was at least as we analysed,” Boies said. “And it is likely that if a was higher within the station on all three days it bad as air by a busy roadway nearby. And in longer study was permitted by station operators, was measured. many cases it was worse. Dr Adam Boies, Energy significantly more exceedances would have “While the long-term solution for reduced Efficient Cities University Lecturer in the Energy been recorded.” pollution levels is likely electrification, we need Group, along with Dr Jacob Swanson and PhD The team installed kits at five locations inside not wait until electrification comes to take student Uven Chong of the Energy Efficient the station to measure the mass of particulate action,” Boies said. The studies were part of the Cities Initiative, published their findings in the matter on two platforms, near food outlets that Energy Efficient Cities Initiative (EECi), which journal Environmental Research Letters. cook with gas, on the ramp of the main station aims to determine the impacts on UK cities of “There is an obvious risk associated with exit and on the roadside outside. They also energy use for transportation and in buildings. exhausting diesel emissions into a semi-enclosed monitored nitrogen oxides, sulphur dioxide, “We found that very little was known about the environment, yet it has not received much study,” and particulate matter size and number at two air quality of stations housing diesel trains, thus Dr Boies said. “These results show that regulators locations. The measurement campaign ran from we set out to conduct the first known study to should consider setting standards for train station 17 to 21 September 2012, with measurements determine whether air quality concerns existed air quality in the same way we regulate outdoor beginning at around 4a.m. and lasting until with such stations” Boies said. air quality. It is too soon to state what the health battery ran out roughly 8 hours later. “There are many solutions to air quality impacts for workers or patrons of the station are, Paddington Station’s hourly mean problems, so long as we understand the root but further study could provide those answers.” particulate mass concentrations averaged 16 cause,” Boies continued. “I am hopeful that Paddington Station is a terminus, with trains µg/cubic metre whilst the hourly mean NO2 with further work, air quality in one of the UK’s only entering from one side and the rest of the concentrations averaged 73 parts per billion and most important transportation modes can be building largely enclosed. The station delivers SO2 concentrations averaged 25 parts per billion. drastically improved.” 38 million passengers to their destinations There were five instances when the hourly mean each year, acting as a hub for train services to NO2 concentrations exceeded the 106 ppb the west and southwest. Around 70 percent hourly mean limit set by the European Union of trains at Paddington are powered by diesel for outdoor air quality. These standards allow 18 Regulators should consider engines; trains manufactured before 2006 are such hourly exceedances per year. At times the “ setting standards for train station not subject to European regulations on their hourly averages exceeded the annual average air quality in the same way we emissions. Additionally, there are currently no EU standard for ambient air quality of 25 µg per regulate outdoor air quality. air quality regulations for rail stations in the UK, cubic metre. but the pollution could be harmful to health – The team compared the station results with Dr Adam Boies particularly for station staff and workers at food those from Marylebone Road, a busy street outlets, who are inside the station all day. about 1.5 km away. Particulate mass from at “If the same standards that apply for outdoor least one measurement site within the station R air applied to indoor air, we found that pollution was higher than at Marylebone Road on three www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/amb233 levels within Paddington Station exceeded out of four days, whilst NO2 was higher within www.eeci.cam.ac.uk

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 11 Institute for Manufacturing Design Show 2015

Teams of third-year Manufacturing Engineering Tripos (MET) students in the Department of Engineering have completed a major design project to develop a new product with real business potential, which they then presented at the Institute for Manufacturing (IfM) Design Show 2015.

The MET is a programme for third and fourth-year engineering students who have successfully completed the first two years of an engineering degree. MET takes the best engineers and provides them with the management competence, business acumen and interpersonal and organisational skills they need to become world-class leaders.

The following are the 2015 projects.

The Dot.Motion The Dot.Motion is a laser music visualisation system. When music is played through it, a series of laser patterns are created which ‘dance’ on the wall in time to the music. A laser beam is reflected off a pair of mirrors, which are attached to two speakers. As music is played through the speakers the mirrors vibrate, n Reelcycle creating dynamic and exciting patterns which appear to ‘dance’ in time to the music. passing electricity through a junction between into a heating element at a steady rate, have The focus on the aesthetic design of both the two dissimilar metals produces a temperature movement on three axes (radial movement product itself and the effects produced offers difference. Various ways of making the thin of extruder, vertical movement of bed, rotation a refreshing change from the low-quality and layers that are produced into cubes were of bed), and control all these actions. explored, drawing inspiration from industrial unimaginative options currently available. Team: Ellie Griffiths, Melissa Leonard, Titas processes such as injection and dip moulding. Additional key features include a strobing effect, Sokolovas and Edmond Wang filters to improve visual output and multiple Team: Jack Fellows, Martha Geiger, Archie laser colours to enhance the user experience. Lodge and Kaimei Zhang ReelCycle Team: Robert Alner, Louise Ashenden, Jørn Emborg and Daniel Yanev 3D printing is exploding in popularity, but Beacon ACE generates considerable scrap plastic. The Our project is an automated variable product recycles this back into a cartridge Ice Ice Maybe candle-maker for the luxury gadget for the printers, saving £30/kg for the A compact and stylish on-demand ice- market, aimed at arts and technology operators. Unlike existing machines, it maker that frees up freezer space used by enthusiasts. The machine can be is fully integrated, making it the most traditional ice makers. Innovative cooling programmed to print many different consumer-friendly on the market. technology forms cubes from any liquid, or candle types. Despite 3D printing’s innate appeal and cools your drink directly. Unlike current commercial 3D printers which use potential, it is currently expensive, unreliable Our on-demand ice-maker is compact, easy to plastics, we decided to extrude wax and use that and complicated to use. Many businesses use, and attractive enough to be stored or kept process to form candles. The overall vision for already use 3D printers for prototyping on the counter, like a coffee machine. It can be our product is a candle-maker where the candle during the design process, but many are now developed to produce a number of ice cubes produced is influenced by external inputs from increasingly harnessing it in more conventional from fresh, filtered water, or from your drink in the surrounding environment (such as motion, manufacturing, particularly in niche industries seconds – so melting ice doesn’t dilute it. manual control, noise, light etc.) such as motor sports and personalised medicine. The team looked at a variety of ways to cool Our aim for the project was to produce a The ReelCycle makes 3D printing cheaper water to form ice rapidly, and form it into functional prototype that would be able to and greener to use. It allows businesses and cubes – a difficult technical challenge. They print a simple candle design from wax pellets. individuals to produce new reels of plastic, which exploited the thermoelectric effect, where This prototype would need to store wax, feed are used in 3D printers as cartridges. These

12 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 The Inclusion Chair The Inclusion Chair is a revolutionary mobility device that tackles the social exclusion of locomotor-disabled individuals in India from their culture of interacting and living at floor level. One cohort of 2.13% of India’s 1.3 billion population is often neglected and hidden behind closed doors: the disabled population of India. Where social interactions and living occur at floor level, locomotor disabled individuals are unable to participate when using the only medical device on the market: a conventional wheelchair. Our mechanical system allows a user to lower themselves to floor level for social interactions whilst maintaining the functionality of a conventional wheelchair at sitting level. We have created a modular design that n ProSort n Inclusion Chair allows for a vast amount of customisation to accommodate different body shapes as well reels are produced using scrap printed parts, or into new products. With further development, as variances in disability types. The design inexpensive pellets, thereby reducing material the project could contribute to a reduction in not only uses sustainable materials such as waste and saving money on printing materials. the proportion of plastic bottles sent to landfill. a bamboo frame, it also incorporates low- Team: Jack Agass, Will Harborne, Nirali Patel At the heart of the project is a simple and cost and easily accessible materials to enable and Theo Snudden effective machine that cuts waste bottles into simple manufacture. strings. The strings are then wound around Team: Tian Xi Lim, Mateus Pniewski, Georgia a mould in a unique pattern and heated in Ware and Stephanie Wen ProSort CC-60 an oven. The heating causes fusion of the The ProSort CC-60 is a mechanical device crossing strings, resulting in beautiful hollow to collect, sort and stack shuttlecocks forms when the assembly is cooled and L.E.D. Zeppelin dispersed over badminton courts after the mould is removed. This process takes training drills. For club and professional advantage of the properties of the string to L.E.D. Zeppelin is an interactive toy aimed players: tedious, manual sorting is history! produce aesthetically pleasing products. at the children’s, young persons’ and office executives’ toy markets. Although crucial to player development, drills Team: Benjamin Evans, Susannah Evans, lead to hundreds of shuttlecocks being dispersed Michael Lin and Naythran Thayakaran A pair of helium airships do aerial battle under around the badminton court. Players must the remote control of two (or more) players, manually gather and stack shuttlecocks back firing infrared beams at each other in order into long columns, typically 20 each, ready for Fabricate to score ‘hits’ and disable the opponents’ the next set of drills. This is a time-consuming, This project is the development of a process control systems. Our product is built around tedious and tiring task for players, especially for recycling fabric into a composite suitable the Arduino micro-controller using a custom- straight after intense training drills. Doing this task for diverse applications. Cotton sourced from coded radio control system and game logic. by hand was the only viable option, until now. old clothing acts as the fibre in a matrix of Two-way communication is possible between silicone rubber. the airship and the controller allowing in- The CC-60 collects, sorts and stacks up to game feedback and score tracking displayed 60 shuttlecocks. Players no longer have to 250,000 tonnes of recyclable fabric is wasted to the player via the controller. We plan to waste time and energy gathering and sorting in the UK each year. Various binding agents continuously improve the product while shuttlecocks by hand. can transform this fabric into a product of the increasing market share with the eventual aim desired characteristics and shape. Multiple Team: Sarah Barrington, Tianyi Li, Thomas of approaching a national toy retailer. experiments revealed that silicone rubber Louth and Milan Patel was superior in dimensional accuracy, as well Team: Freddie Ashford, Ben Brebner, Mudit as producing a detailed surface finish and a Dubey and Elizabeth Fletcher Strings ‘n’ Things rubbery texture. The project direction then Strings ‘n’ Things is a new and innovative became optimising the process to create a recycling process. Plastic bottles are cut useful composite. The kit targets the growing into long continuous strings which can craft market, which is currently worth £745 then be wound or woven into lampshades, million. It can be used either with the included vases, ropes or mats. moulds or personalised moulds produced by the customer for their specific application. Strings ‘n’ Things enables low-volume recycling R to be economically feasible and provides a low- Team: Amy Spruce, Dan Jones, Rabbiya Naveed To watch videos about each of these products energy method of transforming waste bottles and Will McDermott visit http://bit.ly/1NpBljb

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 13 Credit: Peter Shanks (Flickr) Peter Credit: n Circuit board New understanding of electromagnetism could enable ‘antennas on a chip’

New understanding of the nature collect energy from free space to feed into the device. One of the biggest problems in modern of electromagnetism could electronics, however, is that antennas are still If you want to“ use these materials lead to antennas small enough quite big and incompatible with electronic to transmit energy, you have to to fit on computer chips – the circuits – which are ultra-small and getting break the symmetry … this is the smaller all the time. missing piece of the puzzle ‘last frontier’ of semiconductor “Antennas, or aerials, are one of the limiting of electromagnetic theory. design – and could help identify factors when trying to make smaller and smaller systems, since below a certain size, the Professor Gehan Amaratunga the points where theories of losses become too great,” said Professor Gehan classical electromagnetism and Amaratunga of the Department of Engineering, quantum mechanics overlap. who led the research. “An aerial’s size is The researchers found that by subjecting determined by the wavelength associated with the piezoelectric thin films to an asymmetric the transmission frequency of the application, excitation, the symmetry of the system is A team of researchers from the University of and in most cases it’s a matter of finding a similarly broken, resulting in a corresponding Cambridge have unravelled one of the mysteries compromise between aerial size and the symmetry breaking of the electric field, and the of electromagnetism, which could enable characteristics required for that application.” generation of electromagnetic radiation. the design of antennas small enough to be Working with researchers from the The electromagnetic radiation emitted integrated into an electronic chip. These ultra- National Physical Laboratory and Cambridge- from dielectric materials is due to accelerating small antennas – the so-called ‘last frontier’ of based dielectric antenna company Antenova electrons on the metallic electrodes attached to semiconductor design – would be a massive Ltd, the Cambridge team used thin films them coupled with explicit symmetry breaking leap forward for wireless communications. of piezoelectric materials, a type of insulator of the electric field. In new results published in the journal which is deformed or vibrated when voltage “If you want to use these materials to Physical Review Letters, the researchers have is applied. They found that at a certain transmit energy, you have to break the proposed that electromagnetic waves are frequency, these materials become not only symmetry as well as have accelerating electrons generated not only from the acceleration of efficient resonators, but efficient radiators as – this is the missing piece of the puzzle of electrons, but also from a phenomenon known well, meaning that they can be used as aerials. electromagnetic theory,” said Amaratunga. as symmetry breaking. In addition to the The researchers determined that the reason The future applications for this discovery are implications for wireless communications, the for this phenomenon is due to symmetry important, not just for the mobile technology discovery could help identify the points where breaking of the electric field associated with we use every day, but will also aid in the theories of classical electromagnetism and the electron acceleration. In physics, symmetry development and implementation of the quantum mechanics overlap. is an indication of a constant feature of a Internet of Things: ubiquitous computing The phenomenon of radiation due to particular aspect in a given system. When where almost everything in our homes and electron acceleration, first identified more than electronic charges are not in motion, there is offices is connected to the internet. For these a century ago, has no counterpart in quantum symmetry of the electric field. applications, billions of devices are required, mechanics, where electrons are assumed to Symmetry breaking can also apply in cases and the ability to fit an ultra-small aerial on an jump from higher to lower energy states. These such as a pair of parallel wires in which electrons electronic chip would be a massive leap forward. new observations of radiation resulting from can be accelerated by applying an oscillating “It’s actually a very simple thing, when you broken symmetry of the electric field may electric field. “In aerials, the symmetry of the boil it down,” said Sinha. “We’ve achieved a real provide some link between the two fields. electric field is broken ‘explicitly’ which leads to a application breakthrough, having gained an The purpose of any antenna, whether in pattern of electric field lines radiating out from a understanding of how these devices work.” a communications tower or a mobile phone, transmitter, such as a two wire system in which is to launch energy into free space in the form the parallel geometry is ‘broken’,” said Dr Dhiraj R of electromagnetic or radio waves, and to Sinha, the paper’s lead author. www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/gaja1

14 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 ALUMNI UPDATE From Tripos to TripAdvisor

Since leaving the Department of Engineering, Alumna Lily Cheng has had a whirlwind career that now

Credit: Peter Shanks (Flickr) Peter Credit: boasts President, Asia-Pacific, at TripAdvisor.

TripAdvisor is one of the world’s largest travel websites. Lily leads the company’s growth in the Asia-Pacific region with a focus on China, India and Japan. Since joining the corporation in 2010 as senior director of strategy and business development in the APAC region, Lily has been instrumental in establishing TripAdvisor’s offices in Singapore and Beijing. Raised in Hong Kong, Lily became interested in computers and technology at a young age. She found herself in the back streets of the city, collecting various electronic components and assembling them into small gadgets. “It was like an entire street with all the parts you would find in an RS or Farnell catalog laid out in little plastic bins,” she said. “It was my version of a candy store.” Becoming an engineering student was a natural progression for Lily. “I really love the feeling of being able to make something. I wanted to be an inventor.” She considered industrial design but in the end decided on a more technical track. “It was considered a ‘safe bet’ in Chinese society, which was an influencing factor.” During her time at Cambridge, Lily was exposed to a wide variety of disciplines, including mechanics, electronics, thermodynamics and structures. In the end, she pursued the Manufacturing Engineering “Regardless of whether you are in a Tripos (MET). “I was particularly interested in start-up or in a global internet company like the intersection of engineering and business,” TripAdvisor, being able to bridge comfortably Lily said. “The program exposed us not between technology and business is only to engineering skills but skills that are important when you are trying to secure very important in the business world, like financial resources for your ideas,” Lily said. accounting and public speaking.” “Graduates from Cambridge Engineering are Studying under Department of often able to pull things out of the bag that Engineering lecturers such as Dr Hugh Hunt, breaks conventional stereotypes of what Professor Sir Mike Gregory and Professor engineers can do. Cam Middleton, Lily honed skills that are “In my current role at TripAdvisor, I am highly sought in the internet economy. very fortunate to have the opportunity to “An engineering mindset, combined with be involved in many different disciplines of usability study watching users from different analytical and data manipulation ability, the organisation. One day, I might have a countries trying to search for information on combined with outward-facing skills to conversation with our engineering leaders our app to understand the areas of friction.” pitch ideas in a business context and secure about how we can optimise the architecture TripAdvisor’s founder and CEO Stephen resources are all very key,” Lily said. “Graduates of our code base. The next day, I might meet Kaufer, Lily noted, is an engineer and from the MET program develop a unique with political leaders in different countries to approaches work through a hypothesis and combination of these skills and the ability to explore how TripAdvisor can be a platform to data-driven approach. “The logic and analytical traverse the intersection of these disciplines in grow their economies through the promotion skills that an engineering foundation develops a way that’s very valuable to business.” of tourism. The next day, I might sit in a is critical to our everyday work.”

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 15 What makes an intelligent infrastructure asset?

What would it take to enable a piece of infrastructure to take care of itself, asks Duncan McFarlane of the Cambridge Centre for Smart Infrastructure? What might asset intelligence mean in an infrastructure context? That was the question I was recently asked to provide a view on at a meeting on Infrastructure Asset Management at the Institution of Civil Engineering. Particular regard was to be given to the increasing numbers of sensors under development and the reduced budgets available for maintaining key assets. With ever-greater numbers of infrastructure assets, the uncertainty about their lifespan and the conditions they might face, and the declining availability of funds for maintenance and upkeep, future asset management will need to: • Involve low-cost, easy-to-maintain sensing, data gathering and management • Prioritise all assets within a single integrated portfolio n Intelligent asset drawing by

Professor Duncan McFarlane © Duncan McFarlane • Examine value of the use of the asset in conjunction with cost of maintenance • Be robust to future ownership 5. Language – an ability to interpret ways of managing and visualising asset data, and usage changes and communicate information relating to methods for computing asset value over its to rules life to future-proofing strategies for ensuring Today’s centralised co-ordination of assets forthcoming needs and environment changes 6. Decision (support) – an ability to influence by asset owners or third party facility managers are accounted for in the asset management plan. decisions that are made with regard to the makes future asset management particularly More to the point, these research initiatives assets or collection of the assets challenging. What would it take to empower an directly underpin the development of a smarter, asset to ‘take care of itself’? Work with Boeing in 7. Value system – a means of evaluating cost more self-sustaining infrastructure environment the 2000s, developing software environments and benefit in terms of service provided by both in the construction phase and during the to enable aircraft parts to schedule their own the asset and services received asset’s operating life. This might just make the repair and replacement, extended the notion of theory of infrastructure asset management In simple terms this means that any a self-aware asset to propose a definition and set become one that can be practically deployed. information associated with an asset is tightly of characteristics for an intelligent infrastructure Duncan McFarlane is a Co-Investigator at ‘bound’ to the asset it represents and not to asset: a self-contained infrastructure element CSIC at the University of Cambridge where he is the owner/user/operator. linked to its own monitoring, diagnostic and Professor of Industrial Information Engineering. Directly – and automatically – associating maintenance strategy and with the ability This article was produced in conjunction with the actions with the asset itself reduces the risk to guide, influence or direct its own use, CSIC colleagues Professor Kenichi Soga and that facilities management operators might maintenance and support. In order to do this, the Dr Ajith Parlikad and originally appeared in miss key indicators or that maintenance tasks intelligent infrastructure asset needs: Infrastructure Intelligence. might be neglected due to altered priorities or 1. Constructed/fabricated properties reduced budgets. and unique identity Within the Centre for Smart Infrastructure 2. State awareness – an awareness through and Construction (CSIC) at the University sensing or inspection of its own state of Cambridge, a significant amount of (location, degradation, strain) groundwork for developing more intelligent infrastructure assets is underway. CSIC, which 3. Communication – an ability to communicate collaborates with 41 industry partners from information relating to identity and state construction and infrastructure organisations, when integrated into larger systems addresses infrastructure challenges on three Duncan McFarlane 4. Data management – an ability to collect/ levels: city level, asset level and sensor level. store/retrieve data associated with the Research focussed on assets ranges from R elements’ identity, properties and state development of new distributed, low-energy, www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/dm114 as required low-maintenance sensing systems, to better www-smartinfrastructure.eng.cam.ac.uk

16 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 Professor Steve Young’s pioneering speech technology work recognised

Professor Steve Young is the 2015 recipient of the IEEE James L. Flanagan Speech and Audio Processing Award.

The annual prize is given to an individual or teams of up to three for “an outstanding contribution to the advancement of speech and/or audio signal processing.” Professor Young is Professor of Information Engineering in the Information Engineering Division. The award citation reads: “For pioneering contributions to the theory and practice of automatic speech recognition and statistical spoken dialogue systems.” Professor Young works in speech technology, focussing in particular on developing systems which allow a human to interact with a machine using voice. This involves machines like mobile phones recognising the user’s words, understanding what the words mean, deciding what to do and how to respond and then converting the response in textual form back into speech. David Stevenson at National Health Executive (NHE) magazine, interviewed recogniser,” he said. “The key to all of that is Professor Young. The following extracts some quite sophisticated statistical modelling are taken from this interview article which algorithms and the availability of the data.” For pioneering“ contributions originally appeared in the NHE magazine. The expert told us that it is the nature to the theory and practice Steve Young, Professor of Information of data, and its wide availability nowadays, of automatic speech Engineering at the University of Cambridge, that has changed the speech recognition recognition and statistical and a global expert in speech recognition landscape. “When you speak into your phone, spoken dialogue systems. technologies, gives his thoughts on the the signal is being routed to a server farm advances and challenges facing this ‘growing’ somewhere in North Carolina if you’re Apple or The award citation research area. He told NHE that research in South Carolina if you’re Google, and it is being this area made steady but not spectacular processed there and the result is being fed- Dictation in the medical area has been progress from the mid-1980s to the mid- back to your phone,” said Professor Young. one of the mainstays, certainly for commercial 2000s. “But over the last five to 10 years we’ve This allows two things to happen. Firstly, dictation applications, he added. seen really quite significant acceleration in it unleashes the possibility of using some very Despite dedicating 35 years to research in progress,” he said. “And that is why we are now powerful computing to recognise people’s the field of speech recognition, and with his seeing speech recognition coming into the voices. Then secondly, and more importantly, research helping to set global standards for mainstream with services like Apple Siri and the companies are capturing the data. benchmarking systems and being the basis of Google Now, and the new smart watches that “When Siri was first launched, for example, many commercial systems, Professor Young do speech recognition. it wasn’t that great,” said Professor Young, remains modest about his award, joking that Professor Young added that modern “but as more people started using it the organisations sometimes feel they have to give systems are built on the notion of building company was capturing huge amounts of them out “just because someone has been statistical models that represent the data. data. And then by using and collecting the around long enough”. “So the way you build a speech recogniser, data and upgrading the models, people found Nevertheless, he said he is “humbled” to essentially, is that you get some data, which is the recognition improved so they used the become the 2015 recipient of the IEEE James L people speaking, you transcribe the data and system more, so they gave more data. That has Flanagan Speech and Audio Processing Award. then you try to model the data and find a way happened over a wide range of fields, and it is to automatically generate the transcriptions the ‘big data’ paradigm that we are hearing a R yourself – and then you have a speech lot about.” www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/sjy11

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 17 ALUMNI UPDATE Tony Gee, designer of the Gladesville Bridge

Alumnus Tony Gee had his 15 minutes of fame towards the end of 2014 when the 50th Anniversary of the opening of the Gladesville Bridge was celebrated in Sydney, Australia. Tony tells the story of how he came to be the designer of the Gladesville Bridge below.

Although not particularly well known in the UK, Gladesville Bridge was the longest concrete span in the world at the time it was built, a distinction it held for a further 7 years. The New South Wales personnel who were organising the 50th Anniversary celebrations asked Structurae, the largest database for civil and structural engineers, whether they could find any record of the designer of any other major bridge being around to celebrate its 50th Anniversary: the nearest they could come up with was Othmar Ammann, the designer of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in New York, who lived for 33 years after its opening. Needless to say, Gladesville Bridge holds a very special place in my life. The circumstances which led to a raw graduate being responsible for the detailed design of a record breaking bridge seemed unexceptional at the time and it didn’t really sink in until later just how fortunate I had been. My boss Guy Maunsell had returned from Australia with his concept for a big concrete were executed using application programmes I look forward to gazing down in 2064 on our arch and needed someone to work with him on specially written for the purpose. descendants celebrating the centenary of one the realisation of his dream. It had to be done as The people of Sydney should be extremely of the world’s great bridges. The bridge has inexpensively as possible because it was viewed proud that they live in the only city in the recently been recognised as an “International as somewhat of a long shot and the recent world where a bridge like Gladesville could Historic Engineering Landmark”. graduate recruit was the obvious choice! It was be overshadowed by – or at least have to only after the design was finished that I realised share the limelight with – two other iconic Tony founded the consulting engineering firm what an incredible opportunity it had been. structures. It was and still is by any standards of Tony Gee and Partners in 1974. He retired from I am sometimes asked how bridge design a great bridge, not only because of its record- the practice in 1988 to live and work in the United then differed from now. Two words - codes breaking span – and there have only been six States but the firm continues to thrive: it is now and computers. Design specifications were larger concrete arches built in the intervening over 400 strong and was named “Medium Size very basic; from memory, the Department 50 years – but because it featured a number Practice of the Year” by New Civil Engineer in 2013. of Main Roads bridge code ran to about 40 of design innovations which have since been At the time of his later ‘retirement’ in 1995, pages and the UK one was only slightly longer. widely adopted. It is greatly to the credit of Tony believes he was the only – and probably the The current version of the US bridge design the former Department of Main Roads that last – person to be FICE, FIStructE and FIMechE. specification contains 1,638 pages. We had to they had the courage, open-mindedness and He was a two-term Member of Council of the design almost everything from first principles generosity to accept an alternative design IStructE and a Founding Member of Council of and since several aspects of the design were which stretched the boundaries to such an the Steel Construction Institute. not addressed in any of the specifications, this extent that it gave them plenty of cause to He won an Oscar Faber Medal at the IStructE, allowed us a latitude not available today. reject it had they been so inclined. a Telford Premium at the ICE and finally, in 1992, Although a limited number of main frame It is extremely gratifying to see this 50 the Telford Gold Medal, the highest award of the computers existed, there were no commercially year anniversary receiving well-merited Institution at the ICE. available engineering programmes so we attention. It is also a sobering reminder of Although he refers to his ‘retirement’, he is still had to write our own. The potential benefits the passage of time! However, Gladesville is doing some consulting and is currently working on of computerisation outweighed the effort of so soundly constructed and in such good the design of the first commercially viable maglev learning basic programming and ultimately all condition that I see no reason why it should transportation project, having been involved in the aspects of the analysis and detailing of the arch not remain functional for another 50 years and development of the system for the past 20 years.

18 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 PhD student Camille Bilger receives Airbus Group UK TechMaster Award

Camille Bilger, a PhD student in the Department of Engineering’s Energy and Fluids group, has received the Airbus Group UK TechMaster Award. Camille’s research involves simulating jet fuel turbulence with the ultimate goal of addressing injection inside engine combustion chambers. significant scientific issues of notable challenge. She then studies the impact of these findings Camille grew up in Strasbourg, France, and for Rolls-Royce civil aircraft engines. In moved to St Andrews, UK, in 2008 to study particular, her group is interested in simulating Astrophysics at the University of St Andrews. the liquid fuel-film atomisation in fuel injector After graduating from St Andrews in June 2012 n Camille Bilger devices. Improving combustion is critical with a MSci. degree in Astrophysics (First Class Honours; SELEX Galileo 2012 prize for the best for the next generation of aircraft in order The Airbus Group UK TechMasters Awards Astrophysics Masters thesis), she moved to to lower the fuel consumption and reduce consist of six scholarships of £5,000 each per Cambridge in September 2012 to undertake pollutant emissions. A detailed understanding year, dedicated to supporting UK students a comprehensive programme of graduate of the atomisation process in two-phase flows reading for a Masters degree in aerospace- teaching and research (M.Phil. in Energy is still a missing link in effectively controlling related areas. In addition, the programme Technologies, Distinction), for which she was the process of fuel atomisation as well as fuel provides opportunities to connect with senior funded by an Airbus Group TechMasters Award ignitability and combustion under all possible management and employees across the group, scholarship. In this broad programme, students operating conditions. and gain in-depth understanding of the group have the opportunity to learn and integrate The complexity of the physics involved has and the wider aerospace industry. curbed the research growth in the field. Her multiple engineering disciplines. The curriculum research goal is to continue gaining valuable emphasised renewable energies, combustion, knowledge and experience within the fields computational fluid dynamics, turbulence and R of hydrodynamics, fluid instabilities and management in technology. www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/cb757

3D printing has left the station

On his industrial experience summer placement, a Department of Engineering student experienced the real-world applications of a 3D printer in a bustling rail manufacturing centre.

During the summer break, Aiden Chan, a construct these, several separate pieces were second-year engineering student, had the printed and later assembled. chance to work at Progress Rail Services – one In addition to the printer, a 3D scanner was of the largest suppliers of railroad and transit introduced at Progress Rail to facilitate on-site products including switches, crossings, buffer rail inspections. Aiden likewise learned this stops and transition rails – at its Sandiacre site. system and also produced a user guide that Aiden was assigned to help integrate a documented the entire process from scanning 3D printer into the company’s operations. an object to 3D printing a scale model. He participated in the device’s testing and “I have learned a lot in my time at Progress Credit: Aiden Chan Credit: calibration and ensured the printer was Rail,” Aiden says. “My confidence in [computer- n Stretcher bar casing alongside a 3D printed scale model capable of producing templates that met assisted drawing] has seen a large boost, and Progress Rail’s demanding specifications. the range of transferable skills offered by the interested in doing practical projects that deliver After familiarising himself with the printer’s 3D printer has been enormous.” real value. Student placements provide a win- machine code, optimising the setup process Aiden is no stranger to working with 3D win opportunity for students and companies and customising the printer’s web interface in models – in his spare time, he constructs alike. If you are a large or small company, HTML, Aiden wrote up a comprehensive user intricate LEGO sculptures in the form of and you think you can find some useful work guide to assist future employees and others dinosaurs, swordfish and robots. or a project for one of our undergraduate unfamiliar with the system. He also looked All the Department’s students are students, please contact our Industrial into how the printer’s applications could be encouraged to seek opportunities to broaden Placements Team: details at the link below. expanded through the company. their engineering experience and to build their One immediate use for the 3D printer skills. At the same time, the students provide R was to create scale models of products to companies with an enthusiastic and motivated www.eng.cam.ac.uk/collaboration/student- be shown to clients and employees alike. To group of extremely bright young engineers, placements

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 19 ALUMNI UPDATE Blindingly fast computers within reach

Alumni of the Department of Engineering have gone on to found Optalysys, a company with the goal of making computer processors that use light instead of electricity.

The company’s latest achievement is a Nicholas, who earned his PhD at “If you want to push the boundaries of what we functioning prototype of a scaleable, lens-less Cambridge in Optical Pattern Recognition, are doing as engineers and scientists, you need optical processor able to perform mathematical founded the company on the back of research to trust your education. Cambridge did that.” calculations. The design, codenamed Project he performed for his degree. “It was clear from Hailing from the United States, Ananta GALILEO, represents a breakthrough in the start that optical electronics held huge chose Cambridge for the research taking scaleable, practical optical processing that potential to be applied to big data processing place at the Centre of Molecular Materials for calculates at the speed of light and in parallel. tasks,” he said. “The challenge to work on Photonics and Electronics (CMMPE). There Applications for this research are in weather something truly groundbreaking was very he examined photonics in the area of Fourier forecasting, vehicle aerodynamics and big data attractive.” Nicholas studied under Professor optics and helped advance optical microscope analysis for genomics and financial analysis. Tim Wilkinson of the Photonics Group (who technology that can observe extremely small Two new projects are on the horizon. One holds an advisory role at Optalysys). objects such as viruses. The self-directed style is in gene sequencing and analysis with the Also on the team are Drs Andy Lowe and of the PhD prepared him immensely for his establishment of the Genome Analysis Centre. Ananta Palani. Andy’s role on the team is to career and at Optalysys. “I learned through “We are also a partner in a major European examine how large computational tasks are hard-work how to iteratively research a given project led by the European Centre for Mid undertaken and how optical computing can area and how to collaborate with others,” Range Weather Forecasting,” said Dr Nicholas reduce the energy computation uses. He came Ananta said. He hopes the technologies he New, Optalysys founder and Cambridge to Cambridge to study Computational Fluid works on today will “increase the currently alumnus. “This is laying the foundations for Mechanics under Professor Peter Davidson achievable speed and capability of researchers exascale computing in weather forecasting.” and was attracted to the diverse range of high- and hopefully improve life for humanity.” Also, Optalysys is talking with a major Formula quality research. His education here created 1 team as well as financial institutions about “a solid foundation for the challenges we face future projects. building state-of-the-art technology,” Andy said.

Nicholas New

Andy Lowe

Ananta Palani

R

Credit: Jeff Ferzoco via FlickrFerzoco via Jeff Credit: www.optalysys.com

20 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 w Credit: Bob MicalCredit: (Flickr)

Let’s get statted n Data center

With more information than ever at our fingertips, statisticians are vital to innumerable fields and industries. Welcome to the world of the datarati, where humans and machines team up to crunch the numbers.

“I keep saying that the sexy job in the next 10 as genetics, astronomy and particle physics, but Professor Ghahramani and his team are years will be statisticians, and I’m not kidding,” it also has more familiar applications, such as now refining the system to cope with the Hal Varian, Chief Economist at Google famously transport data from Oyster cards, supermarket messy, incomplete nature of real-world data, observed in 2009. It seems a difficult assertion transactions, social media posts and ‘lifelogging’ and also plan to develop its base of knowledge to take seriously, but six years on, there is little through fitness apps. and to offer interactive reports. In the longer question that their skills are at a premium. This information, as Professor Ghahramani term, they hope that the Automatic Statistician Indeed, we may need statisticians now more points out, is no use on its own: “It fills hard will learn from its own work: “The idea is that it than at any time in our history. Even compared drives, but to extract value from it, we need will look at a new dataset and say, ‘Ah, I’ve seen with a decade ago, we can now gather, produce methods that learn patterns in the data and this kind of thing before, so maybe I should and consume unimaginably large quantities allow us to make predictions and intelligent check the model I used last time’,” he explains. of information. As Varian predicted, statisticians decisions.” This is what statisticians, computer who can crunch these numbers are all the rage. scientists and machine learning specialists bring A new discipline, ‘Data Science’, which fuses to the party – they build algorithms, which are statistics and computational work, has emerged. coded as computer software, to see patterns. It fills hard “drives, but to extract “People are awash in data,” reflects At root, the datarati are interpreters. value from it, we need methods Zoubin Ghahramani, Professor of Information Despite their ‘sexy’ new image, however, that learn patterns in the data Engineering in the Computational and Biological not enough data scientists exist to meet this and allow us to make predictions Learning Laboratory. “This is occurring across rocketing demand. Could some aspects of the and intelligent decisions. industry, it’s changing society as we become interpretation be automated using artificial more digitally connected, and it’s true of the intelligence instead, Professor Ghahramani Professor Zoubin Ghahramani sciences as well, where fields like biology and wondered? And so, in 2014 and with funding astronomy generate vast amounts of data.” from Google, the first incarnation of The Over the past few years, Richard Samworth, Automatic Statistician was launched online. Professor of Statistics at Cambridge, has watched Despite minimal publicity, 3,000 users uploaded the datarati step out from the shadows. “It’s datasets to it within a few months. probably fair to say that statistics didn’t have the Once fed a dataset, the Automatic world’s best PR for quite a long time,” he says. Statistician assesses it against various statistical “Since this explosion in the amount of data that models, interprets the data and – uniquely Professor Zoubin Ghahramani, left, and Professor we can collect and store, opportunities have – translates this interpretation into a short Richard Samworth arisen to answer questions we previously had no report of readable English. It does this without hope of being able to address. These demand human intervention, drawing on an open- This article originally appeared on the University of Cambridge website. an awful lot of new statistical techniques.” ended ‘grammar’ of statistical models. It is ‘Big data’ is most obviously relevant to the also deliberately conservative, only basing its sciences, where large volumes of information assessments on sound statistical methodology, R are gathered to answer questions in fields such and even critiquing its own approach. www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/zg201

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 21 Professor Sir John Horlock 1928–2015

Professor Sir John Horlock, highly influential figure in turbomachinery aerodynamics and power generation, former Professor in the Department of Engineering and founder of the Whittle Laboratory, has died, aged 87.

Professor Horlock first studied engineering as Deputy Head of Department under Sir time he published numerous papers and wrote at Cambridge at St John’s College and earned William Hawthorne. several more books. He also became treasurer his PhD in 1958. As the Independent writes, While conducting research on compressor and later Vice President of the Royal Society. “He went to St John’s to read for the Mechanical aerodynamics, Professor Horlock wrote two He was knighted in 1996 for services to science, Sciences Tripos. His supervision partner was highly influential books, Axial Flow Compressors education and engineering. Neville Kirby, who had worked on gas turbines and Axial Flow Turbines. He was also interested “Professor Horlock maintained a strong – and Horlock, too, became interested in these in promoting turbomachinery research in a interest in the personal welfare of students, new power plants. Having won the Rex Moir wider context. Having obtained the necessary young academics and not-so-young Prize, he obtained a summer scholarship at MIT. funding, Professor Horlock then founded academics,” recalled Professor John Young of the During a recess, he was shown around Princeton the Whittle Laboratory in 1973, where today Energy Group. “Many have cause to be grateful University by a professor of aeronautics; in the ground-breaking research on fluid dynamics for his kindness, generosity and support, myself common room of the Institute of Advanced and thermodynamics is conducted by top included. He once told me that he had been Studies was the quiet figure of Albert Einstein, a Engineering minds. He was elected to the personally involved in the appointment of over member of the institute. The thrill of meeting and Royal Society in 1976. 200 professors! In his life he mixed with the talking to Einstein was to remain an inspiration Professor Horlock went on to become eminent, the great and the good, but he always to Horlock.” vice-chancellor of Salford University and then retained a sympathetic understanding for the After a time working at Rolls Royce and the Open University. However, he soon found difficulties of others, whoever they were.” Liverpool University, he returned to the himself returning to Cambridge and the Whittle Professor Sir John Harold Horlock, born Department in the 1960s as Professor, serving Laboratory to continue his research work. In this 19 April 1928, died 22 May 2015.

22 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering Issue 18 Autumn 2015 Honours, awards and prizes

Undergraduate Alexander Grafton Professor John Robertson FRS (left) is Professor Royal Academy of Engineering Professor Undergraduate Alexander Grafton (centre) has of Electronic Engineering. The Royal Society of Complex Services. He is internationally been recognised for “engineering excellence.” has recognised Professor Robertson for his recognised for his work on the servitization The UK’s top engineering undergraduates sustained contribution to the production and of manufacturing, organisational performance were presented with the prestigious Sir William development of electronic devices. measurement and management. Siemens Medal at the Museum of Science and Professor Ghahramani (right) is Professor of Industry in Manchester. Information Engineering in the Computational and Biological Learning Laboratory. The Royal Society has recognised Professor Ghahramani as one of the pioneers of semi-supervised learning methods, active learning algorithms and sparse Gaussian processes.

The Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship (QInF) program has recognised Yarin Gal and Mark van der Wilk, graduate students in the Machine Learning Group. They have been selected for Andy Zhang and Anthony To were also their research proposals and awarded £10,000 nominated and were shortlisted for the award. fellowships as well as receiving mentoring from Qualcomm researchers. Dr Hugh Hunt, Reader in the Department Professor David Cardwell has been awarded of Engineering, has been awarded the 2015 an Honorary Doctor of Science (D.Sc) by the Alumnus Robert K. Perrons has been appointed Royal Academy of Engineering Rooke Award University of Warwick for producing ground- a member of the Australian Government’s Expert for outstanding contributions to the public breaking research, of making a global impact Network to accelerate the commercialisation promotion of engineering. and of sustaining a real-world relevance. of promising new energy technologies. He also The Rooke Award is given to an individual, serves as Associate Professor at the Queensland small team or organisation who has Professor Sir Mark Welland has been awarded University of Technology in Australia. contributed to the Royal Academy of an Honorary Doctor of Science (D.Sc) by the Engineering’s aims and work through University of Bristol. Sir Mark has demonstrated promoting engineering to the public. Hugh exceptional scientific leadership, not only in was recognised for his efforts over the past Britain, but throughout the world. 25 years through direct education, television and radio, inspiring thousands to engage with Professor Gopal Madabhushi of the engineering and science. Geotechnical and Environmental Group has received the Indian Geotechnical Society (IGS) and Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) biennial award for his research on the structural integrity of offshore wind turbines. Also cited were PhD student Aliasger Haiderali and Department of Engineering alumnus Professor Andy Neely has been appointed as Dr Ulas Cilingir. the new head of the University of Cambridge Institute for Manufacturing (IfM), part of the Department of Engineering, as well as Professor of Manufacturing on the retirement of Professor Sir Mike Gregory on 30 September. Professor Gregory, who has been a driving Professor Jim Woodhouse is one of thirteen force behind the IfM since its inception, inspirational academics who have been added: “I am pleased to welcome Andy Neely honoured for the outstanding quality and to his new role. He knows IfM well and is approach to their teaching. highly regarded in the wider manufacturing The annual Pilkington Prizes, which honour community. He is ideally placed to lead the excellence in teaching across the collegiate Professor John Robertson and Professor next stage of development at the IfM.” University are awarded annually to academic Zoubin Ghahramani have been elected as Professor Neely is the founding director of the staff, with candidates nominated by Schools fellows of the Royal Society. Cambridge Service Alliance and is currently within the University.

Issue 18 Autumn 2015 University of Cambridge Department of Engineering 23 On the origin of (robot) species

Researchers have observed the process of evolution by natural selection at work in robots, by constructing a ‘mother’ robot that can design, build and test its own ‘children’, and then use the results to improve the performance of the next generation, without relying on computer simulation or human intervention.

Researchers led by the Department of and ‘crossover’, where a new genome is formed ‘reality gap’ – a mismatch between simulated Engineering have built a mother robot that can by merging genes from two individuals. and real-world behaviour. independently build its own children and test In order for the mother to determine While using a computer simulation to study which one does best; and then use the results which children were the fittest, each child was artificial evolution generates thousands, or to inform the design of the next generation, so tested on how far it travelled from its starting even millions, of possibilities in a short amount that preferential traits are passed down from position in a given amount of time. The most of time, the researchers found that having the one generation to the next. successful individuals in each generation robot generate its own possibilities, without any Without any human intervention or remained unchanged in the next generation computer simulation, resulted in more successful computer simulation beyond the initial in order to preserve their abilities, while children. The disadvantage is that it takes time: command to build a robot capable of mutation and crossover were introduced in each child took the robot about 10 minutes to movement, the mother created children the less successful children. design, build and test. According to Iida, in future constructed of between one and five plastic The researchers found that design they might use a computer simulation to pre- cubes with a small motor inside. variations emerged and performance improved select the most promising candidates, and use In each of five separate experiments, the over time: the fastest individuals in the last real-world models for actual testing. mother designed, built and tested generations generation moved at an average speed that Iida’s research looks at how robotics can of ten children, using the information gathered was more than twice the average speed of the be improved by taking inspiration from nature, from one generation to inform the design of the fastest individuals in the first generation. This whether that’s learning about intelligence, or next. The results, reported in the open access increase in performance was not only due to finding ways to improve robotic locomotion. journal PLOS One, found that preferential traits the fine-tuning of design parameters, but also A robot requires between ten and 100 times were passed down through generations, so because the mother was able to invent new more energy than an animal to do the same that the ‘fittest’ individuals in the last generation shapes and gait patterns for the children over thing. Iida’s lab is filled with a wide array of performed a set task twice as quickly as the fittest time, including some designs that a human hopping robots, which may take their inspiration individuals in the first generation. designer would not have been able to build. from grasshoppers, humans or even dinosaurs. “Natural selection is basically reproduction, “One of the big questions in biology is how “It’s still a long way to go before we’ll assessment, reproduction, assessment and so intelligence came about – we’re using robotics have robots that look, act and think like us,” said on,” said lead researcher Dr Fumiya Iida, Lecturer to explore this mystery,” said Iida. “We think of Iida. “But what we do have are a lot of enabling in Mechatronics at the Machine Intelligence robots as performing repetitive tasks, and they’re technologies that will help us import some Laboratory, who worked in collaboration with typically designed for mass production instead of aspects of biology to the engineering world.” researchers at ETH Zurich. “That’s essentially what mass customisation, but we want to see robots this robot is doing – we can actually watch the that are capable of innovation and creativity.” This article originally appeared on the University improvement and diversification of the species.” Evolutionary robotics is a growing field of Cambridge website. For each robot child, there is a unique which allows for the creation of autonomous ‘genome’ made up of a combination of robots without human intervention. Most work between one and five different genes. As in in this field is done using computer simulation. nature, evolution in robots takes place through Although computer simulations allow R ‘mutation’, where components of one gene are researchers to test thousands or even millions See the robots in action at: http://bit.ly/1NcByDF modified or single genes are added or deleted, of possible solutions, this often results in a www.eng.cam.ac.uk/profiles/fi224

Department of Engineering University of Cambridge Telephone: +44 (0)1223 748228 Trumpington Street Email: [email protected] Cambridge CB2 1PZ www.eng.cam.ac.uk