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Bringing the green revolution to electronics

From biomemory to implants, researchers are looking for ways to make more eco-friendly electronic components. Researchers are investigating how to make electronic components from eco-friendly, biodegradable materials to help address a growing public health and environmental problem: around 50 million tonnes of electronic waste are produced every year. Less than 20% of the e-waste we produce is formally recycled. Much of the rest ends up in landfills, contaminating soil and groundwater, or is informally recycled, exposing workers to hazardous substances like mercury, lead and cadmium. Improper e-waste management also leads to a significant loss of scarce and valuable raw materials, like gold, platinum and cobalt. According to a UN report, there is 100 times more gold in a tonne of e-waste than in a tonne of gold ore. While natural biomaterials are flexible, cheap and biocompatible, they do not conduct an electric current very well. Researchers are exploring combinations with other materials to form viable biocomposite electronics, explain Ye Zhou of China’s Shenzhen University and colleagues in the journal Science and Technology of Advanced Materials. The scientists expect that including biocomposite materials in the design of electronic devices could lead to vast cost saving, open the door for new types of electronics due to the unique material properties, and find applications in implantable electronics due to their biodegradability. For example, there is widespread interest in developing organic field effect transistors (FET), which use an electric field to control the flow of electric current and could be used in sensors and flexible flat-panel displays. Flash memory devices and biosensor components made with biocomposites are also being studied. For example, one FET biosensor incorporated a calmodulin-modified nanowire transistor. Calmodulin is an acidic protein that can bind to different molecules, so the biosensor could be used for detecting calcium ions. Researchers are especially […]

Funding boost for UC research on airborne microplastics

Could microplastics in the atmosphere play a role in climate change UC atmospheric chemist Dr Laura Revell is leading an investigation into this important question, with the support of a $300,000 Fast-Start grant from the 2019 Marsden Fund Te Pūtea Rangahau. In July 2019, a new report by the Royal Society Te Apārangi highlighted the issue of waste plastics in Aotearoa, noting that the amount of plastic produced each year has doubled over the last 20 years and is still growing rapidly. Less than 20 per cent of the waste plastic generated each year is recycled worldwide. Much of this plastic waste piles up in landfills or the natural environment and, as it breaks down, produces microplastics that contaminate waterways, oceans and land. Some also becomes airborne, with microplastics having recently been discovered over several of the world’s megacities as well as in several remote environments throughout the northern hemisphere. Dr Revell, a lecturer in environmental physics, is leading a team looking into what role these airborne microplastics could be playing in climate change. The endeavour has attracted a Marsden Fund Fast-Start grant, awarded to select world-class standard projects by emerging researchers. Joining Dr Revell on the collaborative project are associate investigators Associate Professor Sally Gaw (UC), Professor Eric Le Ru (Victoria University of Wellington) and Dr Andrea Stenke (ETH Zürich). The project’s mentor is UC chemistry researcher Dr Deborah Crittenden. The discovery of atmospheric microplastics is still so recent that it is not known whether they significantly influence Earth’s climate or not. “However, given that they are now being discovered in the atmosphere around the world and that their abundance is expected to increase in future, it is important to understand the role of microplastics in a changing climate,” Dr Revell says. By combining observational work, laboratory investigations and […]

Remember the Buzzy Bee?

This toy is a fine example of the quality of New Zealand manufacturing. A product well known around the world and a favourite with children over the years and made very well. We have many high-quality products on local and world markets which continue to celebrate the skill and creativity of our people. And now we are in a period where we need to support local businesses and buy from them first. To buy their products. We still have trade routes open and our products on world markets. Even though demand may be down. Internally is where we need to act in a positive way. No one knows how long the virus is going to affect us personally and in business, but we need to meet this challenge as best we can. We will get through this. We will adapt, diversify and find new opportunities that may not have been apparent before. You are welcome to share your company’s challenges with NZ Manufacturer. Write in, other readers doing the same add to the picture and share the journey.– Doug Green, Publisher

Ingenious: The Unintended Consequences of Human Innovation

By Sir Peter Gluckman and Mark Hanson As humans evolved, we developed technologies to modify our environment, yet these innovations are increasingly affecting our behaviour, biology, and society. Now we must figure out how to function in the world we’ve created. Over thousands of years, humans have invented ingenious ways to gain mastery over our environment. The ability to communicate, accumulate knowledge collectively, and build on previous innovations has enabled us to change nature. Innovation has allowed us to thrive. The trouble with innovation is that we can seldom go back and undo it. We invent, embrace, and exploit new technologies to modify our environment. Then we modify those technologies to cope with the resulting impacts. Gluckman and Hanson explore what happens when we innovate in a way that leads nature to bite back. To provide nourishment for a growing population, humans developed methods to process and preserve food; but easy access to these energy-dense foods results in obesity. To protect ourselves from dangerous pathogens we embraced cleanliness and invented antibiotics, which has led to rising rates of autoimmune diseases and antibiotic-resistant bacteria. More recently, our growing dependence on the internet and social media has been linked to mental health concerns and declining social cohesion. And we are only at the beginning of the digital transformation that will influence every part of our existence. Our ingenuity has not only changed our world–it has changed us. Focusing on immediate benefits, we rarely pause to consider the longer-term costs of innovation. Yet we are now starting to see how our choices affect the way our brains develop and our bodies function. The implications are profound. Ingenious opens our eyes to the dangers we face and offers solutions we cannot ignore.

Rocket Lab to use Siemens software to explore new frontiers of space

Peter Beck, Rocket Lab CEO, and Samantha Murray, Managing Director of Siemens Digital Industries Software in Australia Rocket Lab will start using Siemens software to scale up production and continue its growth trajectory. To date, the company has launched 40 satellites to space and is expanding services. Rocket Lab plans to implement Siemens hi-tech industrial software to help digitally manage the lifecycle needs of the business. The software is from the Xcelerator portfolio, which is from Siemens Digital Industries Software and includes Teamcenter digital lifecycle management software, and NX software for computer-aided design (CAD) and manufacturing. This announcement comes as Rocket Lab prepares to integrate all its design, engineering and production systems to establish an end-to-end digital thread that enables increased transparency and efficiency across various offices. Speaking on the decision, Rocket Lab’s Vice President of Global Operations, Shaun O’Donnell, said: “As we’ve grown, so has our production capacity and the platforms associated with various products and processes. Using Teamcenter, we’ll be able to combine various aspects of data related to the same part, assembly and system to maintain a single source of truth across the life cycle of the product. Also, as we grow, NX will give our designers increased performance and stability to cope with larger assemblies.” “Investing in the right digital platforms that allow us to easily scale with growth is critical to the sustainability of our business. With offices around the world, we rely heavily on the access of relevant information that impacts the efficiencies of our production processes,” said Mr. O’Donnell. Rocket Lab will use the same software that the top 20 global aerospace manufacturing companies have implemented to drive digital transformation across all phases of operations. With Xcelerator, Siemens offers the most complete digitalisation value chain to aerospace manufacturers – from the initial […]

Marsden Fund grant supports UC study on ‘killer robots’ debate

First there was gunpowder, then nuclear weapons. Now another revolution in warfighting is underway with the rise of algorithmic warfare using robots and precision targeting technology. Their use is highly controversial but to date there has been no systematic attempt made to map the debate unfolding in academic, intergovernmental, corporate and social media domains. Internationally, the use of lethal autonomous weapons (LAWS) or so-called ‘killer robots’ is being debated at the highest levels. A new University of Canterbury (UC) study, which has recently received a generous grant from the 2019 Marsden Fund/Te Pūtea Rangahau a Marsden, aims to map and analyse this fast-evolving debate. Its findings could help shape the development of effective and ethical regulation of these sophisticated weapons. Dr Jeremy Moses and Associate Professor Amy Fletcher, from the Department of Political Science and International Relations at UC, and Dr Geoff Ford, a political scientist with the UC Arts Digital Lab, aim to delve deeply into this issue in a three-year project starting this year. Their research has attracted a prestigious 2019 Marsden Fund grant of $842,000. Around 12 countries are known to be developing LAWS, among them the United States, China, Russia and Israel. While the perception in those nations is that LAWS are needed to maintain geopolitical balance, groups such as the Campaign to Ban Killer Robots and other international bodies are seeking a global ban on their use. “Proponents argue that autonomous weapons could decrease civilian casualties through enhanced targeting precision and reduce the risks for human soldiers,” Associate Professor Fletcher says. “Opponents fear a world of ‘algorithmic warfare’ in which robots can make decisions to kill in the absence of human oversight and in which the speed and complexity of war accelerates to the point that international rules of conduct are rendered irrelevant.” This project […]

Manufacturing talent: what can you do to bridge the gap?

From 3D printing to blockchain, automation to predictive analytics, the fourth industrial revolution is changing how the manufacturing industry is operating. However, with this rapid transformation comes manufacturing talent challenges, exacerbated by an industry that has struggled to recruit the right people. 29 per cent of manufacturing vacancies are hard to fill and with a rapidly ageing workforce, it becomes increasingly hard for leaders in manufacturing to know where to start when it comes to talent planning. Engineering businesses have always required a unique combination of technical and soft leadership skills, and it remains in short supply. The fourth industrial revolution is affecting all aspects of business because process is no longer about machines and people, but now about data. It is crucial that employees have the imagination and creativity to realise the full potential of digitilisation and end-to-end integration. Finding the right balance between the skills new technology requires and upskilling existing talent pools is the key challenge. Gap in the middle when it comes to manufacturing talent Siemens went through a period of structural reorganisation in 2014 to prepare it for the challenges facing the manufacturing industry, with industrial digitalisation being a key component of its Vision 2020 strategy. Commenting on the reasoning behind the changes in 2018, Siemens president and chief executive Joe Kaeser called digitilisation “the greatest transformation in the history of industry”. Brian Holliday, managing director of Siemens’ Digital Factory, the German manufacturer’s data integration wing, says: “From a talent perspective, many new roles are emerging in app development, connectivity and software engineering. Technology won’t replace people in future factories, but it will augment human effort through artificial intelligence and ‘co-bots’ [robots that work alongside people on the shop floor], so finding the right balance will be crucial to our survival. We won’t build factories in the future without full digital simulation and […]

Retrofitting legacy equipment

Updating legacy machinery to add smart capabilities After her mother took away her devices, a teen girl went viral after allegedly tweeting from her fridge. The reason this was so entertaining is because it’s unexpected — you don’t typically associate fridges with communication, just as you don’t with legacy equipment. Here John Young, APAC director at automation equipment supplier EU Automation, discusses the issues and solutions surrounding retrofitting legacy equipment with smart technology. Legacy equipment was not designed to communicate, but it can be given a new lease of life by retrofitting smart technology — even if it is 20 years old. Retrofitting avoids replacing an entire system by instead adding the required capabilities to equipment that is already installed. Issues with legacy equipment Functional legacy equipment, such as drives, sensors and PLCs, are often the backbone of a factory. As technology progresses, these machines may need to be integrated with newer machines, which come equipped with data collection and communication capabilities. This can cause issues for manufacturers in connectivity and interoperability. New machinery is being produced and saturating the market at an accelerated rate, despite the lifespan of older models not being complete. As technology advances, we don’t want legacy machinery to be left behind — replacing the backbone of the facility would be costly and time-consuming. However, manufacturers don’t want to be held back from collecting data on their processes and equipment that could hold valuable insights. So, asides from ripping entire systems out and replacing it all with new versions, what can we do? Finding a solution Design engineers should aim to implement a roadmap of the factory’s existing digital capabilities and focus on aims, targets and prioritising actions that will effectively increase business value. Some machinery may need replacing with new technology, however, retrofitting viable legacy […]

How viable is additive manufacturing?

The manufacturing and legal issues surrounding additive manufacturing. In 1984, Charles Hull invented the first 3D printer, which used stereolithography to build up a plastic product layer by layer. Over 35 years later, additive manufacturing (AM) is drastically altering a range of industries, from manufacturing to the medical sector. But what are the limitations of the technology? H In some applications, component manufacturing is shifting away from traditional subtractive machining methods and towards additive manufacturing techniques. The broadening of the applications of AM is causing manufacturers to assess the viability of using it in their own facilities. To do this, there are a few considerations to make before turning to 3D technology. Quality not quantity When moving from one manufacturing method to another, quality is a huge factor, particularly in highly regulated industries like aerospace and medical devices. In fact, quality has been one of the major hurdles to the widespread adoption of AM. One critical consideration is that quality and consistency must be the same machine to machine, regardless of location. Powder bed fusion is one of the most frequently used additive manufacturing methods and there is a possibility that it may introduce defects. However, if the process has a constant thermal gradient, it can prevent warping of the product, avoiding the introduction of defects due to incorrect temperatures. Another concern is that unsintered powder will degrade as a result of heat exposure and that this could impact quality, although regular changing of the powder can prevent this from becoming an issue. When investing in an AM system, manufacturers can overcome quality concerns by working with an experienced partner, who provides training and support on best practice. Those looking to invest in AM parts produced elsewhere should be mindful of their supplier’s approach to quality, to ensure that what […]

Connection Technologies Limited – looking forward to the next 20 years

The founder of Connection Technologies, Lewis Woodward, started the business in December 1999. The aim then and still now is to work with the customer and assist them in achieving their goal. “I knew that without a successful customer, I was going nowhere”. 20 years ago, business conditions were different to what they are today. Business then relied on personal contact and who you knew. Then there was no internet and business was largely done with New Zealand based companies. Technical input and having people who knew your business was important. Today “faceless” internet websites located outside NZ shores compete with each other for business. In the “old” days the customer did not need to know the part number of the item they needed, just a description. Today, you must have the part number to order on the web and so often you are drowned with the range of products available “Our aim was to be the best pro-active supplier with a finite range of product focusing on connectors and supporting tooling as might be required for the industrial, military and aviation market”. This was further narrowed down on the basis that Lewis recognised the OEM PCB market in any volume was dying in NZ. The data reticulation industry he had previously been part of was being. fought after at minimal margins, much of the coax market had moved to the data industrial markets. Getting the right staff in any business is always a challenge. Lewis said he was fortunate that an ex-employee from the same industry wanted to move back to Wellington and “this was exactly what we needed. “Hiring knowledgeable staff with industry background has always been a challenge. We needed people who saw sales different from the normal perspective of selling “nuts and bolts” and making their […]

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