Bonfiglioli was a respected researcher in Technion’s history, and authored the book: Engineering Descriptive Geometry.
Strasbourg, France – The International Space University (ISU) is proud to announce that the 29th annual Space Studies Program (SSP) session will be hosted by the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa from 04 July – 02 September 2016. The dates are to be confirmed.
“ISU has a long-standing relationship with Israel in general and Technion in particular. Many participants of Israel were able, thanks in part to the Ilan Ramon Fund, to attend ISU programs previously. It is therefore a genuine pleasure for ISU to further enhance this relationship and convene the SSP16 session in Haifa. It is evident that there will be considerable interest from other countries to discover more closely the amazing hi-tech achievements and cultural richness of the host site” declared Prof. Walter Peeters, President of ISU.
Technion President, Prof. Peretz Lavie stated: “The Technion is proud to host the 29th annual Space Studies Program (SSP) in Haifa. The Technion is one of the first universities to launch a satellite and has an active space program. We will ensure that the 29th program will be an exciting event that will allow the participants to experience first-hand Technion scientific achievements, and the beauty and culture of Israel”.
The SSP is an intense nine-week program which offers the participants a unique and comprehensive professional development experience covering all aspects of space programs and enterprises. Disciplines highlighted include space physical sciences; space engineering; space policy, economics and law; space management and business; space and the humanities; space applications; and human performance in space. This program targets young and seasoned professionals from all disciplines as well as post-graduate university students. The team projects allow participants to refine the topic as a team, and also produce professional quality reports and final presentations, all in the span of a few weeks. Every summer, the SSP takes place in a different location around the world. Recent sessions have convened in Graz, the NASA Ames Research Center, Beijing and Melbourne (Florida). This year the SSP will take place in Montréal, Quebec, Canada in collaboration with ETS and HEC.
“We are delighted to be taking the SSP16 to Israel for our first session to be offered in the Middle East. Technion features world-class facilities and a beautiful campus. Haifa is an excellent location to deliver our signature Interdisciplinary, International, and Intercultural Space Studies Program” added Dr. Angie Bukley, dean of ISU.
Further information about the Space Studies Program can be found under:
http://www.isunet.edu/programs/space-studies-program
The International Space University, founded in 1987 in Massachusetts, US and now headquartered in Strasbourg, France, is the world’s premier international space education institution. It is supported by major space agencies and aerospace organizations from around
the world. The graduate level programs offered by ISU are dedicated to promoting international, interdisciplinary and intercultural cooperation in space activities. ISU offers the Master of Science in Space Studies and Master of Science in Space Management programs at its Central Campus
in Strasbourg. Since the summer of 1988, ISU also conducts the highly acclaimed nine-week Space Studies Program at different host institutions in locations spanning the globe.
ISU programs are delivered by over 100 ISU faculty members in concert with invited industry
and agency experts from institutions around the world. Since its funding, 25 years ago, more than 3700 students from over 100 countries graduated from ISU.
Technion scientists discovered a way to significantly improve shaving process, following friction tests of surfaces mimicking the textures evolved on frog, cricket and salamander feet.
The research group led by Assistant Professor Michael Varenberg, the Head of the Tribology Laboratories at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, examined how the frog, salamander and cricket, the creatures that live in a wet environment, do not slip on wet surfaces. The surfaces mimicking biological textures were tested using a one of its kind device that was built by Prof. Varenberg’s research group. This device is capable of measuring the forces that develop between the contact surfaces, such as friction and adhesion, while working within a scanning electron microscope. This allows simultaneous high-resolution visualization of the behavior of surfaces in contact. “We use nature’s solutions as inspiration for the development of new surface engineering technologies,” explains Prof. Varenberg. “We do this in collaboration with biologists who provide us with information on the functions and structure of complex biological systems that we are trying to simplify and implement using technical means. This allows us to understand how things work in nature and also promote engineering.”
The scientists found that creatures living in wet environments improve their grip by draining the fluid out of contact using special channels that exist on the contact surfaces in their feet. So it happens that similar problem exists in modern safety razors. The rubber strip ahead of the blades is used to improve shaving by increasing friction needed for stretching the skin before the blades slide over it. The presence of the shaving lubricant on the skin reduces friction and therefore interferes with the skin stretching. To examine real safety razors, the researchers removed the blades and replaced the original strip of rubber, which is covered today by a series of small fins (fig. 1), with a rubber strip bearing a biomimetic hexagonal surface texture that they built based on an extensive examination of frog, cricket and salamander feet. “The surface we produced in the lab is twice more effective at increasing friction on the skin covered by shaving foam than the surfaces used in commercial razors,” explains Prof. Varenberg, who co-filed a patent on this discovery together with his graduate student Alexey Tsipenyuk. “Our surface also felt much more pleasant in touch,” adds Alexey, who performed friction measurements on the skin of his forearm (fig. 2). Alexey’s poster was recently chosen as one of the 3 top posters on the competition at the Russell Berrie Nanotechnology Institute (RBNI).
The paper describing this work is published by the Royal Society journal Interface. It can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2014.0113
The friction-providing material used for stretching the skin while shaving constitutes an important component of modern safety razor design. This invention proposes the use of bio-inspired textured surfaces (mimicking those which crickets employ to enhance friction) to increase skin stretching in disposable safety razor assemblies. Borrowing from nature’s millennia of evolutionary development, it is expected to offer better shave results than current razor designs.
The Technion campus in Tel Aviv will be named the “Technion-Azrieli Sarona Campus – Tel Aviv;”
The Technion’s Division of Continuing Education and External Studies has been operating in the Tel Aviv area since 1958. Last July, the Division moved into its new offices at the newly restored Sarona campus.
David Azrieli: “Our cooperation with the Technion, over many decades, underscores the importance of supporting higher education and all levels of education in Israel. The opening of the Technion Sarona Campus in Tel Aviv will facilitate growth and strengthen education in entrepreneurship and innovation, and highlight our commitment to the advancement of the next generation, who will impact the future of the State of Israel.”
The Azrieli Foundation is announcing today a contribution of 21 million NIS for the development and expansion of the Technion’s Division of Continuing Education and External Studies at the Sarona campus in Tel Aviv. The Division will be renamed “The Azrieli Continuing Education and External Studies Division. The gift will also go towards designing a new Technion MBA program focusing on innovation and entrepreneurship, to be named, “The Azrieli MBA Program in Entrepreneurship and Innovation.”
Technion’s Division of Continuing Education has been operating in the Tel Aviv area since 1958. Last July, the Division moved into its new offices to the newly-restored Sarona complex, a project of the Tel Aviv municipality to preserve and renovate the German Templar settlement in Tel Aviv, which was founded in 1871 and abandoned in 1945. The Technion satellite campus in Sarona includes three buildings in a 1,800 sq. meter area, with a total of 16 modern classrooms. Some 500 students in engineering and exact sciences began their studies in the Technion Sarona campus last autumn.
Over the years the Azrieli Foundation has contributed generously to the Technion, particularly the institute’s Faculty of Architecture & Town Planning. The Azrieli Foundation has been instrumental in providing support for research, and to programs for the advancement of outstanding students and young researchers. David Azrieli, who received an Honorary Doctorate from the Technion and is a member of its Board of Governors, has served in a series of leadership roles in the Canadian Technion Society, including Honorary President.
David Azrieli: “Our cooperation with the Technion, over many decades, underscores the importance of supporting higher education and all levels of education in Israel. The opening of the Technion Sarona Campus in Tel Aviv will facilitate growth and strengthen education in entrepreneurship and innovation, and highlight our commitment to the advancement of the next generation, who will impact the future of the State of Israel.”
Technion President, Professor Peretz Lavie, emphasized that the Technion’s Azrieli Division of Continuing Education and External Studies in Tel Aviv enables academics and engineers from the center of Israel and Tel Aviv region to benefit from Technion graduate studies, close to their homes. “In September 1942 David Azrieli came to Israel and in September 1943 he was accepted to the Technion,” related Professor Lavie. “Since then he has had a close connection with the Technion. The contributions David Azrieli has made to the State of Israel in general, and to the Technion in particular, are enormous. Thousands of engineers and architects are work and contribute in this country today thanks to his support and vision. It is hard to imagine Israel’s modern economy without David Azrieli’s enormous efforts and vast activities.”
The Azrieli Foundation was established with a goal to support educational initiatives; in the past decade it has developed and operated programs promoting excellence in education, both in higher educational institutions for academics and students, and in primary schools across the country, aimed at promoting youth education and prevention of school dropouts in junior high school.
The term “Technion Family” is typically used to describe all of Technion’s researchers, students and employees, as well alumni and friends in Israel and around the world. But for the Hiar family from the Druze town of Peki’in in northern Israel, the Technion is truly a “family affair”: four the family’s five children are studying at the Technion this year, as well as the fiancés of the two oldest siblings.
The oldest brother, 30 year-old Majed, is a fourth year student in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering. After completing his service in the Israel Defense Forces, he decided he wanted to start studying. “The field of mechanical engineering always appealed to me. I read studies in this area and it interested me. I chose to study at the Technion because of its good reputation and since it was the closest institute to my home,” he said. Majed began his studies at the Technion by enrolling in the preparatory program (mechina) run by the Technion Center for Pre-University Education, and later was accepted to the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering.
Majed’s younger brother Alaa, 25, followed in his footsteps. He began his studies following his army service in the artillery unit. “I came for a consultation,” remembers Alaa, “and the challenge at Technion excited me. My father really wanted me to study medicine, but I preferred computer science, because I love the field of programming.”
Both brothers, Majed and Alaa, are engaged to marry, and naturally their fiancés – Lubna and Lina, both from Peki’in as well – are also Technion students. Lubna (23) will complete her degree this year at the Department of Education in Science and Technology, concentrating on teaching biology and environmental studies, and Lina (20) is a second year student in the Faculty of Industrial Engineering & Management, majoring in Production and Service Systems.
“Ever since high-school I’ve wanted to study biology,” relates Lubna. “It’s a field that really interests me and I love it. I started my studies at Haifa University, but Majed persuaded me to come to the Technion. My parents are very supportive and encouraged me to study. I like working with teenagers and I want to be a teacher.” “My father is a CEO of a high-tech company in Ma’alot that manufactures electronic components, says Lina, “The field he is working in always interested me. I’m very happy to be studying at the Faculty of Industrial Engineering & Management because the atmosphere at the faculty is great and the studies are at a very high level and very interesting.”
The third Hier family sibling at the Technion is Majda,20, who, after completing her pre-university preparatory requirements, began studying at the Technion’s Department of Education in Science and Technology. “I want to be a college teacher of electricity and electronics,” she said.
Hier family #4 is the youngest sister Manar, 18, in her first year in the Faculty of Biology. She aims to get high grades so she can be accepted to the prestigious Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and become a doctor. Her brother Alaa says that he is “confident that she will fulfill her dream and become a doctor.”
Jamal, their father, is very proud of his children. He was wounded during his military service and his life circumstances forced him to give up his dream of higher education. Nonetheless, he and his wife Hedaya instilled in their children the academic dream and encouraged everyone to fulfill their potential. “Studies are in our blood,” says Jamal. “In high school, they chose to study the fields of mathematics, physics, electronics and biology. It’s not easy to financially support four students at the same time, but they are good students, they receive scholarships and they work.”
The fifth brother in the family, Baha (27) had not yet started his academic studies. He is financially supporting his siblings and next year he is planning to start studying, if it will be financially feasible.
While studying, Majed, Alaa and Lubna are mentoring new first year students at the Technion, particularly Druze students, helping them adjust to the demanding academic requirements and life at the Technion. The mentoring project was initiated by the Technion’s Beatrice Weston Unit for the Advancement of Students, and all three family members have nothing but praise and admiration for the work done by the Unit.
“My first semester at the Technion was the hardest,” says Lubna, who is mentoring a group of female Druze students. “The shock at the beginning is very hard, and I’m working with my students on efficient time management, handling exams, and resources you can turn to in need. I also went through a mentoring program when I first came to the Technion and it really helped me.” Lubna is engaged to Majed.
We already mentioned that everything stays in the family, and Lubna is mentoring Majda, her future sister-in-law. “It’s really helpful,” says Majda. “Everyone is anxious in their first year at the Technion, and feels uncomfortable and stressed out. In our meetings with Lubna and the other first year students, you feel a lot of group support.”
“I was very lucky,” says Alaa. “My brother Majed gave me a lot of support in my first year and even helped me with math studies and in adjusting to life at the Technion. He also helped me with time management. Not everyone has an older brother at the Technion to help them and the assistance we provide these students by mentoring them in their first year is very important and noteworthy.”
Four siblings at the Technion is wonderful – on this they all agree. Each one assists the other in courses they are best at. Sometimes they have meals together, and try to go home to visit together. Rarely, when they all have some free time, they spend it together, and during stressful exam periods, when one of them goes home to the village, they return with food and other supplies for the others, who remained on campus.
“The Technion is a great place academically and socially,” Alaa concludes. “There are excellent teachers and here it is important for me to note especially the late Professor David Zilag from the Faculty of Mathematics who passed away two years ago. No lecturer at the Technion taught material as he did. He was an excellent teacher, and I think all the students at the Technion should thank him.”
At the end of the year Majed and Lubna will graduate from the Technion and return home to the village. They plan to get married and find jobs – Lubna wants to teach at a school in Peki’in and Majed will look for a position as a mechanical engineer. “We’ll miss them,” said Alaa, “But I guess we shall all go back to the village in the future, and perhaps even one day found a company together. Together we have the necessary professions needed to start a business, but first it’s very important that we all gain experience in our fields of expertise.”
In the photo (from right to left): Lina, Alaa, Manar, Majda, Jamal, Majed and Lubna.
“In light of past collisions between Earth and asteroids, we are aware of the dangers of such a calamity and must prepare for the possibility of such an occurrence accordingly – so that we don’t end up like the dinosaurs.” This is what Professor Daniel Scheeres from the University of Colorado Boulder said, who has had an asteroid named for him, Scheeres 8887, discovered in 1994. He spoke at the Technion, at the 54th Israel Annual Conference on Aerospace Sciences.”
“Asteroids are debris leftover from the formation of the Solar System, so they teach us much about the early existence of the system and its mechanics,” he explained. Asteroids are relatively small bodies – their size ranges in diameter, from a grain of sand, up to 1,000 kilometers. These bodies are constantly changing under the influence of solar radiation and interactions with other stars and bodies. “NASA is investing heavily in missions aimed at exploring asteroids; it is believed that being able to land on an asteroid may be an excellent ‘pilot’ for future landings on Mars,” said Professor Scheeres. He related his involvement in the OSIRIS-REx, the mission, to launch a spacecraft in 2016 scheduled to return in 2023, which will bring back to Earth extensive information on asteroid Bennu and about the mechanics of the formation of the Solar System.
Within the framework of the conference, a student project competition was held. Noam Neeman and Doreen Avsaid, from the Technion’s Faculty of Aerospace Engineering were awarded first place in the category of “Research/Experimental Project” for their unique project mentored by Dr. Yossi Elimelech. The pair studied how the hummingbird’s flight capabilities are affected during the molting period, when it sheds and replaces its feathers. The findings of this study may have practical implications in the small aircrafts field. “This was a research project we undertook as part of our undergraduate studies,” related Noam, who holds the title of Israeli champion in 3,000 meter steeplechase for five years in a row, “Working on it demanded more hours of my time than the rest of my degree studies.”
Doreen, his partner in the winning project, said that, “The research project was the hardest task of her degree studies. During Hanukah we sat days and nights in a darkroom, where we made our observations. We exerted a great amount of effort on this project and it was very exciting to enter this competition and win first place.”
Ms. Armona Brandl, a Technion graduate and Chief DIRCM System Engineer at Elbit Systems, Elop described at the conference the C-MUSIC™ (Commercial Multi-Spectral Infrared Countermeasure) PROGRAM, an anti-missile system developed by Elbit to protect civilian aircrafts from heat seeking ground to air missiles. The program was launched following a shooting at an Arkia plane taking off at the airport in Mombasa, Kenya, on the 28th of November, 2002. Two shoulder missiles were fired at the aircraft and both missed the target, but this event was a major turning point with regards to the threat civilian aircrafts may be under. “The program was launched in 2009. Our system, based on advanced fiber laser technology, is designed to protect aircrafts at takeoff and landing. Military defense systems against anti-aircraft missiles were available before, but the adjustment to the civilian market is very complicated due to various aspects such as budget, weight, safety and civil aviation regulations.”
The innovative laser system by Elbit Systems is based on the identification of a missile threat and the launching of laser radiation that throws the missile off its course within minutes. The first test flight, held in July 2013, was a success.
“The Faculty of Aerospace Engineering was the first department to open its doors on Technion’s current campus (on Mount Carmel),” related Technion President, Professor Peretz Lavie, who gave the opening remarks on the second day of the conference. “At the time, the press mocked us and asked: ‘What will they fly over the Carmel – kites?’ Today there is no doubt that this was an excellent decision, for out of here came out the people who founded this field in Israel, and who made it into a source of enormous national pride.
The 54th Israel Annual Conference on Aerospace Sciences attracted some 500 engineers, scientists and experts in the field of aerospace from Israel and abroad. The paper committee chair, Professor Daniella Raveh from the Technion’s Faculty of Aerospace Engineering related that participants at the conference were exposed to new research findings, the latest technological achievements, and future developments. The conference was organized by the Technion, Tel Aviv University, Ben Gurion University, Israel Aerospace Industries, Rafael, Israel Military Industries, Elbit, Israel Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and the Israel Defense Ministry.
Pictures:
Photo taken by: Noam Neeman.
Photo taken by: Shiatzo Photography Services, Technion’s Spokesperson’s Office.
Adam Shwartz, the new Director of the Jacobs Institute and Prof. Uzi de Haan
The Joan and Irwin Jacobs Technion-Cornell Innovation Institute at Cornell Tech announced today that six postdocs are joining the campus for the first Runway Program, an innovative new model for technology entrepreneurs at the PhD level to advance their research and launch new ventures. Prof. Uzi de Haan, a global leader in tech entrepreneurship and the founder of the Technion’s Bronica Entrepreneurship Center in Israel, will lead the one-year program. Cornell and Technion professors will serve as academic mentors for the postdocs, who will also work with a team of legal, industry and venture capital advisors from outside the campus. If a postdoc has a project ready to be launched as a company, their Jacobs Institute-funded Runway Award serves as an investment in the development of the technology much like an angel investor’s cash investment might.
“The Runway Program takes its name from the fact that, unlike the now popular launchpad-like accelerator programs, which are generally focused on short-term market risk and customer development with proven technologies, new ventures based on deep technology carry different risks and need a longer time frame,” said Prof. de Haan. “Runway suggests a value-building process before taking off and is, therefore, a more appropriate analogue.”
“Uzi de Haan plays a pivotal role in entrepreneurship at the Technion, whose graduates are among the most successful in creating value through innovation. I am thrilled to welcome Uzi to the Jacobs Institute, where the Runway postdocs – and everyone on campus – will benefit from his expertise,” said Adam Shwartz, the new Director of the Jacobs Institute.
“The Jacobs Runway Program is exactly what Cornell Tech is about – tackling real-world problems with technological solutions, and giving researchers the tools and support they need to turn their ideas into realities,” said Daniel Huttenlocher, Dean of Cornell Tech. “We look forward to having the postdocs and Uzi on campus, continuing to build Cornell Tech’s entrepreneurial culture.”
“With the constant growth and evolution of technology, it’s critical that universities and researchers work together in a new way to promote cutting edge research, and transform their ideas into new ventures,” said Prof. de Haan. “The entrepreneurship center at the Technion is a hub of activity with students, faculty and alumni working together – a model that will be a perfect fit for the Jacobs Runway Program.”
De Haan is an international leader in tech entrepreneurship, with expertise in emerging ventures, strategy, and the commercialization of intellectual property at universities. He previously served as founder and CEO of Philips Electronics in Israel, where he built a $350 million company through acquisitions, venture investments and organic growth. In 2003, de Haan returned to the Technion in an academic capacity as a professor in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, with a research and teaching focus on entrepreneurship and innovation. He also serves on the boards of several start-ups.
The inaugural group of six postdocs was selected from applicants around the world based on their academic and professional track records, their proposed enterprise and their entrepreneurial passion. They will work on research and development projects in the fields of healthcare, e-commerce and urban planning, and they will have access to a support team to help advance their work, some of which may launch into start-up companies. They will be working out of Cornell Tech’s temporary campus at the Google building in Chelsea.
The Jacobs Institute is piloting a new Intellectual Property (IP) model for the Runway Program, which positions the Institute as an investor in companies that spin out of the program. Typically, universities engage in substantial negotiations to license technologies developed on campus, but the program will give the company founded by a postdoc an exclusive license to use the technology that they develop in the program, in exchange for a stake in the company comparable to its initial Runway Award.
“We expect the kind of approach to IP being piloted here to become a model at Cornell Tech broadly, and at other academic institutions around the world. It is an example of the powerful collaboration of two leading academic institutions, Cornell and Technion, to envision and create change in technology commercialization,” said Dean Huttenlocher.
Cornell Tech is up and running with world-class faculty and M. Eng and PhD students who are working with the industry and on their own start-ups. The first class of students graduated at the end of 2013. The Jacobs Institute is currently admitting students for its M.S. degree program in Connective Media, which will launch in the fall of 2014. Students in this two-year program will receive degrees from both Technion and Cornell. Also in 2014, Cornell Tech will launch an MBA program in collaboration with Cornell’s Johnson School. The program will fuse business, technology, innovation and entrepreneurship in a fast-paced, hands-on learning environment.
Cornell University, with its academic partner the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, was selected by the City of New York in 2011 to build a world-class graduate campus as a way to capitalize on the growth in the science, technology and research fields in New York City and create a more diversified and competitive economy for the future.
Construction is underway on Cornell Tech’s sustainable 12-acre Roosevelt Island campus. The first phase of the campus will open in 2017, including the first academic building, a corporate co-location building that will foster interactions and collaboration between tech companies and Cornell Tech, an innovative sustainable residential building and public open space. The completed campus will include 2 million square feet of academic, residential and corporate research and development space, and will be home to more than 2,000 graduate students and nearly 280 faculty and staff.
Through its degree programs and other academic initiatives, The Joan and Irwin Jacobs Technion-Cornell Innovation Institute at Cornell Tech embodies the academic partnership between the Technion and Cornell. At this think-tank, professors from these two globally renowned universities teach side-by-side with industry leaders, creating a new educational model that embraces experimentation to produce agile graduates poised to succeed in a fast-moving economy. The Institute departs from traditional academic departments and is organized into three interdisciplinary hubs selected for their relevance to the New York City economy: Connective Media, Healthier Life, and the Built Environment.
The Jacobs Institute was established in 2013 through an historic gift of $133 million from Dr. Irwin Mark Jacobs, Founding Chairman and CEO Emeritus of Qualcomm, and his wife Joan Klein Jacobs to Cornell and the Technion.
Autonomous cluster flight of multiple satellites, an electric passenger aircraft, drones and anti-tank missiles are projects that will be presented at the competition to be held at the Israel Annual Conference on Aerospace Sciences
A unique student design competition, of projects by undergraduates, will be held this week as part of the Israel Annual Conference on Aerospace Sciences. Ten student teams from the Technion entered the competition, along with student teams from Tel Aviv University, Ben Gurion University, and the Afeka Tel Aviv Academic College of Engineering. Among the projects to be presented on Wednesday, February 19, is a design project of a mechanical bird, a plan for a 50 passenger aircraft, a design for an anti-tank missile, the SAMSON project – Autonomous cluster flight of multiple satellites, an experimental investigation of flight in hummingbirds, and a computational and experimental investigation of the mechanical harvesting of wind energy on a vibrating structure.
The goal of the BIRDINATOR project was to understand the mechanical aspects of a bird’s flight capabilities in nature, and the construction of an artificial bird model as similar to the real bird as possible.
“Most of the final-year projects at Technion’s Faculty of Aerospace Engineering are concerned with planning and development of aircrafts or missiles,” recounted Matan Meir, a faculty graduate. “We wanted to work on a different sort of project, one that required ‘out of the box’ thinking. This project, which is mostly a research, was mentored by Professor Gil Iosilevskii, from the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering. We wanted to understand how these birds manage to fly and how to mechanically recreate this ability. It’s important to emphasize that although there are machines that simulate the flapping of bird’s wings, it’s nothing like the complex movement of the wings by a bird in flight. The motion of a bird’s wing is very complex, much more than simple up and down movements.”
“After numerous observations of birds in nature and films, and an in-depth study of biological articles on the subject, we managed to develop a mechanism that simulates the movement of a bird’s wing making use of all its elements. After we realized how birds do it, we became the first ones to build such a complex mechanism. By Implementing aircraft design tools and mechanical adjustments we designed an artificial bird capable of flapping flight for 10 minutes, a typical rate of three meters a second, at a speed range of 10-20 meters per second in horizontal motion, carrying a load of 20 g and tolerant of wind gusts. The bird has an engine attached to its wings, and most of the maneuvering is carried out by the wings. We fly it like a model airplane. “
“Concerning its design, we rose up to the challenge by developing a 3-D model and preparing drawings for production. We performed simulations with the MATLAB software system, which shows that we successfully simulated the flapping mechanism. We planned a mechanical bird that maintains all of the requirements we set for ourselves.”
A team of ten students from the Technion’s Faculty of Aerospace Engineering participated last April in the DBF International Student Competition, held under the auspices of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) in Tucson, Arizona.
“We built a drone at a Technion laboratory from scratch, including design and fabrication, under the guidance of Mr. Shlomo Zach, former senior planner in the Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI),” relates team leader Chai Kramf, a student at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, who will present the project at the conference. “For the competition it was required to build a modern airplane capable of especially short take off (at 30 feet), with an internal and external carrying capacity of munitions, when the total weight of the aircraft should be as light as possible. At the competition you gain points for meeting the requirements and successfully pulling off the missions, and lose points for deviating from the size and weight of the plane.”
“We worked on the project for about a year. After a lot of hard work, numerous blueprints, and some crashes, we successfully built a drone, with a wingspan of two meters and a length of 1.36 m that is capable of carrying rockets the size of 40-30 cm.”
“Hundreds of students from leading universities around the world participated at the competition, spanning over three days. We succeeded on our first attempt, and within two days we completed all of the tasks. We were ranked in 12th place out of 82 teams. It was a very enriching experience, and this was one of the major things I did during my studies at the Technion. The regular studies are drier – and working on this project I gained important practical experience.”
Another group of Technion students will present a groundbreaking project at the conference, which was mentored by Mr. Shlomo Zach, former senior planner in the IAI: the design of a 50 passenger airplane with an electric engine.
“The planning of an electric aircraft is a significant challenge concerned mainly with energy,” related the leader of the team Oz Saar, who completed his studies at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering last year. “The challenge in designing such an airplane is in developing a battery that can reach a level of density like the aircraft fuel. This is a technology under development, which will most certainly be available by 2020. The development challenge is to produce a battery that can last throughout long flight durations (as long as possible) while being as light as possible. The world is going towards this direction, and electric motors already exist.”
“Our project consists of designing and producing a 3-D model of such an airplane. We may be ahead of our time, but the future will usher in the production of electric aircrafts that will be better for the environment. I am currently working as an engineer for a company that is working on such a development.”
The 54th Israel Annual Conference on Aerospace Sciences, held on Wednesday-Thursday, February 19- 20, attracted some 500 engineers, scientists and experts in the field of aerospace from Israel and abroad. During the conference, participants were presented with new research results, the latest technological achievements, and future developments. The conference was organized by the Technion, Tel Aviv University, Ben Gurion University, Israel Aerospace Industries, Rafael, Israel Military Industries, Elbit, Israel Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and the Israel Defense Ministry.
In the photos:
MAZELTOV – students who were part of the team that built the drone.
Computer drawings of the mechanical bird.
Photographed by: The Technion’s Spokesperson’s Office
