IEEE Madison Section - 2014 Meeting Archive

Technical Workshop: "Hands-On Drones for Electrical Engineers"

Co-hosted by the IEEE-UW-Madison Student Branch

Saturday, December 6, 2014, 8:30 AM - 4:30 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:30 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Workshop

Participants will learn about required components of Drones and work in small groups to build them, using hand tools for mechanical assembly, wiring, and soldering.  The drones will be controlled with OpenPilot Atom and Revolution Flight Controllers, programmed with Open Source software through a groundstation.  Participants will learn how to install, configure, and operate personal computer software used to program, configure, and tune the flight systems.  By the end of the day, workshop participants will be able to fly their creations.   The Drones built in the Workshop  (or more technically, Unmanned Aeronautical Systems or UAVs) will be donated to the UW-Madison Student IEEE Branch for student projects. Advanced systems with cameras, GPS, on-board Linux microcontrollers will also be demonstrated.  For more information on the OpenPilot Controllers, visit OpenPilot.org  and for an overview of building drones in a student setting see this recorded video presentation at WN@TL recorded talk.

Section Meeting: "HeliAcc Particle Accelerator"

Co-hosted by the IEEE-Madison Chapter of  Engineers in Medicine and Biology

Thursday, November 20, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:30 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Talk

Dennis will talk about his company (HelionX, LLC) and the table top sized nuclear fusion reactor they are developing.  The HeliAcc accelerator produces short high energy pulses of deuterons that are accelerated to a target producing a copious supply of pulsed neutrons.  The HeliAcc accelerator can be used as one component of a neutron camera. Security screenings are done using neutron cameras since neutron beams will pass through container walls and highlight the materials inside such as drugs, plastic explosives, and nuclear material.  Industry could use the camera to inspect critical items such as turbine blades and mortar shells. The pulses can be triggered on command allowing a neutron camera to take “pictures” even if the object is in motion, thus allowing for more rapid scanning and a higher throughput on production line operations.
Current neutron generators use either radioactive materials or continuous flux accelerators for neutron production. The use of radioactive materials requires specially trained and licensed technicians.  Continuous flux accelerators are always producing neutrons when in use thus consuming large amounts of electrical power.  The HeliAcc accelerator only generates significant energy when the pulses are produced. The design of our generator is such that it is inexpensive to manufacture and is light weight so that truly portable neutron source can be built. No radioactive material is used in the process and minimal nuclear waste is generated. When the unit is not producing neutrons it is not radioactive and is safe to handle. The unit is small (a few meters long), light weight (less than 250kg), and can be easily transported.

eLearning Course:  "Power Quality"

Wednesday, November 12, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:10 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Format

This is a seminar provided in recorded format by the IEEE eLearning system and is available for 1 PDH (0.1 CEU) credit(s). IEEE members may register their credits for free. Non-Members will have a $10 registration fee. Be sure to include your IEEE Membership number (or none if not a member) and email address when you register. Your certificate will be sent to you via email. This seminar is aimed at Continuing Education for the Professional Engineer and is designed to keep you informed of current technical issues. 

Many thanks to ACS, Inc. for hosting this seminar.

Abstract

This eLearning pre-recorded Seminar  gives an overview of power quality with an emphasis on IEEE and IEC standards. Technical areas that are briefly covered include: voltage sags, grounding, harmonics, voltage flicker, and transients. Further details on the eLearning Course "Power Quality" may be found at this link.

Biography

Dr. S. Mark Halpin has been a driving force in the development of uniform power systems and power quality standards that promote worldwide reliability and safety. He has worked tirelessly to create international standards that advance the state of the art of power systems engineering. His work in both the IEEE Power Engineering and IEEE Industry Applications Societies resulted in the creation of nearly 40 IEEE power standards. Besides authoring or contributing to the IEEE Color Book series of power standard, he also initiated a major reorganization of the series, thus enhancing its usefulness to practicing engineers and engineering students. Dr. Halpin, who is the Alabama Power Company Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, has made many other related contributions. These include pioneering methods for both power quality measurement and techniques to identify areas of bulk power transmission systems subject to voltage and angular stability problems. An IEEE Fellow, Dr. Halpin received the 1998 IEEE IAS Outstanding Young Member Award and an IEEE Third Millennium Medal. 

October ECN Meeting: "Bluetooth Product Development"

Thursday, October 2, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Talk

Bob Baddeley is a member of Sector67 and has been the primary product developer for the DigiTally bluetooth-connected portable electronic scoreboard. Bob will give a brief talk on the product development and then be available to discuss some of the trials and tribulations of wireless product development. The high-tech product changes how recreational sports are played and is perhaps a harbinger of things to come. Have you done any bluetooth product development? Bring your devices and ideas to share with other entrepreneurs and consultants.

Section Meeting: "Magnetic Materials in Medicine"

Wednesday, October 1, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Topic

Scientists working in the field of magnetic materials are increasingly focusing their attention on new applications of magnetic detection and magnetic transduction techniques in the biomedical sciences. Iron is a key functional element in the human body and surpasses all other naturally occurring elements in the body in terms of both the variety and magnitudes of its magnetic states. In many diseases, the quantity and the magnetic state of iron are altered by the disease. Hence, detecting and measuring the magnetic properties of the iron in vivo or in samples of body fluids can give insights into the state of health of a human subject. Example applications include assessing the risk of organ damage in hereditary hemochromatosis, determining the dose of iron chelator drugs required for patients with thalassemia, and identifying infectious forms of the malarial parasite in finger-prick blood samples. Scientists are also working on the development of synthetic magnetic particles that can be injected into the human body for the diagnosis and treatment of disease. The particles used are generally in the size range of 10 to 100 nm. They can be used to enhance the contrast in magnetic resonance images to help identify tumors in tissue, to act as local heat sources to treat cancer, and to carry, concentrate, and release drugs more specifically than drugs without a magnetic carrier. In this presentation, the physical and chemical principles behind these biomedical applications and their impact on medicine will presented at a level suitable for a generalist audience.

Biography

Professor Tim St Pierre heads the BioMagnetics Research Group in the School of Physics at The University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia. He trained at the University of Liverpool, UK, gaining a BSc with Honours in 1983 and a PhD in 1986. Following postdoctoral positions at Murdoch University in Western Australia, he was appointed to the faculty at The University of Western Australia in 1995. Professor St Pierre’s main scientific interests are in the application of physics to medicine and biotechnology. His research focuses on applications of magnetic measurement and characterization techniques for the non-invasive characterization of iron in biological systems. He and his team developed the non-invasive liver iron measurement technology, FerriScan®, which has been commercialised and used in over 20,000 patient measurements in hospitals around the world. He is currently working on magnetic methods for detection of parasites in human blood and fecal matter. He has published over 150 peer reviewed papers in the fields of iron and magnetism in biology, biotechnology, and medicine in journals such as Blood, Circulation, Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, Gastroenterology, and Magnetic Resonance Imaging. In 2010 he won a Clunies Ross Award from the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering for his work on non-invasive measurement of tissue iron deposits.

Section Meeting: "Markov Models for Metabolic Modeling"

September 18, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Abstract

The last decade has seen impressive advances in biology, driven by the acquisition of petabytes of genomic information. Among the many long-standing mysteries that have been solved through the application of mathematical theory and engineering tools to biological information systems has been “the great plate anomaly:” many bacteria can be seen under a microscope but not grown under standard conditions. The application of hidden markov models and graph theory to genomic data solved this century-old puzzle. Genes can be found and annotated for enzymatic function using hidden markov models. Metabolic models of the network of enzymatic functions in the genome can then be represented by a graph where edges represent enzymes and the nodes represent products. A case study will show how a globally important “unculturable” marine bacterium known as SAR11 was brought into culture, shedding light on “the great plate anomaly.” It will conclude with a discussion of extensions of this method from single organisms to entire communities of interacting organisms in any environment, from the human body to underwater volcanoes.

Biography

Dr. Tripp is currently a bioinformaticist at the Department of Energy’s Joint Genome Institute in Walnut Creek, CA. His research interests are microbial metabolism, microbial ecology, molecular evolution, and improvement of data quality in public databases housing genomic information. Prior to that, he was the Bioinformaticist for a joint venture between the University of California at Santa Cruz and the Monterrey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, with responsibility for bioinformatics applications running on a 48-cpu cluster. At Oregon State University he built a prototype genome annotation and data mining system for his own research, which was then ported to the Web for use by other researchers. He has shared his research results at Wood’s Hole Oceanographic Institute, Stanford University, the University of Southern California, the Red Sea Research Center in Saudi Arabia and the Korean Oceanographic Research and Development Institute. Prior to his work in genomics and metagenomics, Dr. Tripp was a computer systems consultant to the health care industry for 20 years. In that capacity he oversaw the design, development, and implementation of financial systems and data warehouses for the States of Texas, Virginia, and Connecticut, as well as Blue Cross and Blue Shield organizations in Washington DC, San Francisco, and Philadelphia. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Cornell University and a PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Oregon State University.

eLearning Course:  "Fundamentals of LTE"

Thursday, September 11, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:15 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Format

This is a seminar provided in recorded format by the IEEE eLearning system and is available for 1 PDH (0.1 CEU) credit(s). IEEE members may register their credits for free. Non-Members will have a $10 registration fee. Be sure to include your IEEE Membership number (or none if not a member) and email address when you register. Your certificate will be sent to you via email. This seminar is aimed at Continuing Education for the Professional Engineer and is designed to keep you informed of current technical issues. 

Many thanks to ACS, Inc. for hosting this seminar.

Content

In this seminar, you will learn about LTE air-interface standards and technologies. After completing it, you should have obtained a high level understanding of LTE, knowing its technical features, key advanced technologies, frame structure and resource grid. Both downlink and uplink transmissions will be addressed. For downlink, we will discuss OFDMA modulation, the physical channels and their general processing, the physical signals and MBSFN. We will also highlight the MIMO technologies in downlink, which includes SIMO, transmit diversity, spatial multiplexing and multiuser MIMO.

eLearning Course:  "Introduction to IEEE 802"

Thursday, August 14, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:15 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Format

This is a seminar provided in recorded format by the IEEE eLearning system and is available for 1 PDH (0.1 CEU) credit(s). IEEE members may register their credits for free. Non-Members will have a $10 registration fee. Be sure to include your IEEE Membership number (or none if not a member) and email address when you register. Your certificate will be sent to you via email. This seminar is aimed at Continuing Education for the Professional Engineer and is designed to keep you informed of current technical issues. 

Many thanks to ACS, Inc. for hosting this seminar.

Content

This tutorial will provide an overview of the Smart Grid. The tutorial begins by explaining what is the smart grid and what are the basic concepts behind it. Next, it discusses smart grid components and develops an understanding of the elements that you need to think about to get a fuller picture of the smart grid. Then the tutorial examines how the smart grid can be realized, and provides some examples of smart grids as they are deployed.

Talk and Demo of Model RC Helicopters

Thursday, August 7, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Topic

Modern RC Helicopters are sophisticated electro-mechanical systems that combine compact brushless motors, motor controllers, servomechanisms, RF transmitters, RF receivers, sensors, lightweight batteries and video equipment in a vehicle. John Lombardo will talk about the electrical and mechanical components used to implement these complex systems and what you need to know to buy or build and fly one. He will also share his experience with programming the transmitters, electronic speed controllers (ESCs) and developing battery charger/discharge systems for the aircraft. Are you an RC Helicopter pilot? Bring your aircraft for show and tell.

Biography

John Lombardo, MSEE (UW-Madison) is an IEEE member and Electrical Engineer with an active interest in flying model RC Helicopters. His firm, designCraft Electronics offers electronic engineering services for custom projects including product design and prototyping. He has developed products for clients throughout the Midwest including electronic distribution efficiency aids, radio controlled industrial installations, remote data collection devices, prototype design and fabrication, and LED lighting control.

eLearning Course:  "Smart Grid: From Concept to Reality"

Thursday, July 17, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Format

This is a seminar provided in recorded format by the IEEE eLearning system and is available for 1 PDH (0.1 CEU) credit(s). IEEE members may register their credits for free. Non-Members will have a $20 registration fee. Be sure to include your IEEE Membership number (or none if not a member) and email address when you register. Your certificate will be sent to you via email. This seminar is aimed at Continuing Education for the Professional Engineer and is designed to keep you informed of current technical issues. 

Many thanks to ACS, Inc. for hosting this seminar.

Content

This tutorial will provide an overview of the Smart Grid. The tutorial begins by explaining what is the smart grid and what are the basic concepts behind it. Next, it discusses smart grid components and develops an understanding of the elements that you need to think about to get a fuller picture of the smart grid. Then the tutorial examines how the smart grid can be realized, and provides some examples of smart grids as they are deployed.

Engineering and Ethics Workshop

Thursday, July 10, 2014, 10:30AM to 01:30PM (3.00 hours)

Attendees will be eligible for CEU/PDHs. 

Abstract

Ethics are more than just an administrative obligation. Ethics are critical to not only your individual career but also the entire profession of engineering. In engineering terms, ethical standards define the stable operating region for the entire business system. From that viewpoint, broken or out of tolerance interactions are immediately recognized as dangerous. Your PE license renewal requires ethics training, why not learn the rules in the familiar context of engineering?

Biography

Mr. Iliff has over 30 years experience with developmental projects ranging from a few thousand to over a billion dollars, and has participated in all phases of project execution from proposal to close out. He is a seasoned large-project PM, and has managed a wide variety of developmental efforts in aerospace and purely commercial settings. That experience, as well as individual research, has resulted in unique insight on how to effectively run commercial sector developmental projects. Mr. Iliff is currently Vice President at bb7, and Director of Strategy, Methods and Learning.

He holds a BS in Engineering / Industrial Design from Michigan State University, an MS in Systems Management, Research and Development from the University of Southern California, and received Honorary Fellow appointment at the University of Wisconsin when he served as the Systems Engineering Manager for the ICECUBE project. Mr. Iliff is a charter member of the International Council On Systems Engineering (INCOSE), founder / prior Chairman of the INCOSE Commercial Practices Working Group, and a member of the Project Management Institute (PMI) and IEEE.

A frequent speaker, Mr. Iliff has developed and conducted thousands of hours of training covering all aspects of product development, particularly systems engineering and project management excellence. He is the developer, subject matter expert and master instructor for several PMI accredited courses conducted by Motorola. He has spoken before groups as large as 1,200 people and is a frequent presenter at conferences and professional meetings.

eLearning Course:  "Cyber Security of Industrial Control Systems"

Thursday, June 19, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Format

This is a seminar provided in recorded format by the IEEE eLearning system and is available for 1 PDH (0.1 CEU) credit(s). IEEE members may register their credits for free. Non-Members will have a $20 registration fee. Be sure to include your IEEE Membership number (or none if not a member) and email address when you register. Your certificate will be sent to you via email. This seminar is aimed at Continuing Education for the Professional Engineer and is designed to keep you informed of current technical issues. 

Many thanks to ACS, Inc. for hosting this seminar.

Content

This course will begin with an introduction to industrial control systems (SCADA, DCS, PLC, RTU, IED, field devices, meters, etc) and will explain what makes control systems different than business IT. Potential mitigation approaches including policies and technologies will be discussed. Example control system cyber events and their ramifications will be presented. Finally, current industry and government activities to secure ICS will be discussed.

Talk and Demo of 3D Printing Technology

Thursday, June 5th, 2014, 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM

Content

Chris Meyer is a local expert on 3D printing and all things related to Hacker Spaces.  He will give a brief presentation on the Sector67 3D printing technology and demonstrate how it is done.   If you are not familiar with Sector67, check out their web site here.   You will be amazed at the things that are happening at Sector67. 

Engineering microenvironments to regulate forces, form, and multicellular function

Monday, May 5, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Closing the Gap – The Evolution of C-Motive’s Capacitive Technology Platform™

Thursday, April 17, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Abstract

C-Motive Technologies Inc. is a Madison, WI-based startup developing electrostatic machines and devices using its proprietary Capacitive Technology Platform™, which brings electrostatics into competition with the electromagnetic devices pioneered by the likes of Tesla and Edison. Rather than use magnetic fields, C-Motive’s machines and devices leverage electric fields - no copper windings, no expensive, heavy steel electromagnets. C-Motive instead uses electric voltage across closely stacked stationary and rotating aluminum plates. C-Motive’s innovations prove for the first time that electric charges, rather than currents, can produce practical motion on an industrial scale. The secret rests within C-Motive’s patented Hydroflex Plate Stacking System™, which delivers more electrical capacitance than ever demonstrated on a macro scale. This presentation will walk through the development of these technologies and discuss some of their applications.

Biography

Justin Reed is the President and CEO of C-Motive Technologies Inc., a Madison, WI-based startup developing fundamentally new types of electric machinery for industry. Reed received the M.S. in 2009 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the B.S. in 2005 from the University of Washington in Seattle, both in Electrical Engineering. He is currently finishing his Ph.D. at UW-Madison in the Wisconsin Electric Machines and Power Electronics Consortium (WEMPEC) under Prof. Giri Venkataramanan. Reed specializes in multilevel power converters and high-frequency power electronics, and has a strong background in electromechanical power conversion with 12 published research papers. He attended the Wisconsin Entrepreneurial Bootcamp and Dutch Block Program in 2009.

Restoration of Motor Skills in Patients with Disorders of the Central Nervous System

(A Presentation of the IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer Series)

Friday, March 14, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Abstract

Recent technological innovations such as functional neural stimulation (FNS) offer considerable benefits to paralyzed individuals. FNS can produce movement in paralyzed muscles by the application of electrical stimuli to the nerves innervating the muscles. The first part of this talk will describe how smooth muscle movements can be evoked using Utah slanted electrode arrays (USEAs) inserted into the motor nerves of the peripheral nervous system. The standard 4 x 4 mm USEAs contain 100 electrodes of varying lengths. Implantation of a USEA in a peripheral nerve allows highly selective electrical access to individual and small groups of axons. We will review approaches for designing asynchronously interleaved stimulation signals applied via individual electrodes in the arrays to evoke smooth, fatigue-resistant force that closely resembles normal motor function. The second part of this talk will describe efforts to decode cortical surface potentials, recorded with dense grids of microelectrodes. Decoding human intent from neural signals is a critical component of brain-computer interfaces. This information can then be used to control the muscles in tasks involving restoration of motor skills or to control a robot that performs desired tasks. We will discuss recent work on decoding neural data collected from patients implanted with microelectrode arrays. The talk will conclude with a discussion of some of the current research challenges in this area.

Biography

Dr. V. John Mathews is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Utah. His research interests are in nonlinear and adaptive signal processing and application of signal processing techniques in audio and communication systems, biomedical engineering, and structural health management. He chaired the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Utah during 1999-2003. Dr. Mathews is a Fellow of IEEE. He served as the Vice President (Finance) of the IEEE Signal Processing Society during 2003-2005 and the Vice President (Conferences) of the Society during 2009-2011. He is a past associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing, and the IEEE Signal Processing Letters and the IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Signal Processing and currently serves on the editorial board of the IEEE Signal Processing Magazine. He was a recipient of the 2008-09 Distinguished Alumnus Award from the National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, India, and the Utah Engineers Council's Engineer of the Year Award in 2011. He serves now as a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Signal Processing Society for 2013 and 2014.

Radio-frequency identification technologies in ecological studies.

Thursday, February 20, 2014, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Informal networking will begin at 11:45 AM. Presentation will begin at 12:00 PM.

Abstract

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies were first developed in the mid-to late 1930’s for specific military applications. Advances in engineering and manufacturing throughout the years have lowered the cost and size of RFID transmitters, making them available to an array of applications in a variety of industries. Today, RFID is commonly used in pharmaceutical, automobile and shopping industries, with increasing applications in environmental monitoring and ecological studies. Mr. Latimer will present a brief history of RFID and how it works, followed by a discussion about RFID use in ecological studies. Then he will present a case study of ongoing research using RFID to monitor behavior and survival of wintering birds in Wisconsin, and finally, provide some insight into future directions for RFID applications in ecological research.

Biography

Chris Latimer is a Ph.D. student in the wildlife ecology program and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research interests include: understanding how anthropogenic factors affect the behavior, energetics and survival of wildlife, and technological applications in tracking and monitoring wildlife populations. His dissertation work involves using RFID technologies to determine how the interaction between land-cover and weather influence the foraging behaviors and survival of wintering birds in Wisconsin.

Entrepreneurs & Consultants Network (IEEE-MSN-ECN)

Regular meetings are held on the first Thursdays of even-numbered months 11:45 AM - 1:00 PM