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Title : Soft and Stretchable Transducers for Robotics and Energy
Harvesting Applications
Seminar by : Dr. Karali Patra,
Department of MME, IIT Patna
Date: 22nd of February 2017 (Wednesday). Time and venue will be announce soon.
Abstract: :
This talk begins with the basics of stretchable transducers. Dielectric elastomers
will be mainly considered for this discussion on stretchable transducers. Dielectric
elastomers consist of a soft dielectric membrane, sandwiched between compliant conductors.
The soft and compliant nature of this assembly allows dielectric elastomers to be
easily deformed, thereby functioning as a deformable capacitor under an electric
field. Electric stress from an electric field would thus be large enough to mechanically
deform the material significantly, allowing it to function as an actuator. Actuator
prototypes for soft robotics will also be discussed in this talk.
Apart from this discussion, Professor Patra will also discuss the current state
of Mechatronics and Robotics and the facility available in his lab at IIT Patna.
Students may interact with the Professor to discuss about any possibilities of project
and in internship.
Brief Biography :
Dr. Karali Patra is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering,
IIT Patna India. He is an alumni of IIT Guwahati and IIT Kharagpur at his Masters
and Doctorate level respectively. He has post doctoral experience at Robotics Research
Center of at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His current research interests
are smart materials based actuators and energy harvesting systems and modeling and
analysis of micromachining processes for difficult to machine materials and smart
materials. He has been awarded national and international research projects on micromachining
and smart materials of total project value of more than rupees one crore, so far.
He has collaborated with eminent researchers from Canada, UK, Germany, Hungary,
Russia and Singapore through various exchange programmes and joint projects. His
research has resulted in more than 70 publications and 2 patents.
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Title : Relationship between work system approach and digital innovation
Author : Prof. Steven Alter (https://www.usfca.edu/faculty/steven-alter) from University
of San Francisco
Venue : Thu (Feb 9th) 11 am to noon in LT-7
Abstract : The work system approach is a lens for understanding
systems in organizations as operational systems through which people produce product/services
for customers of the work system. This approach to understanding systems was developed
to help business people communicate more effectively with IT professionals and consultants.
It has been used for around 15 years by MBA and Executive MBA students whose task
was to do an analysis in order to recommend improvements to systems in their own
organizations that had a problem or opportunity. It has also been used in research.
Much digital innovation is about using digital means to create or improve work systems.
That is why understanding work systems is essential for understanding digital innovation
related to the operation of processes in organizations. Consulting companies frequently
talk about digital innovation and digital transformation. Implementing those ideas
in real situations requires understanding of how the innovations affect work systems.
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Title : Workarounds, compliance and non compliance
Author : Prof. Steven Alter (https://www.usfca.edu/faculty/steven-alter) from University
of San Francisco
Venue : Fri (Feb 10th) 10 am to 11 am in LT-5
Abstract : Requirements engineering typically assumes that it is
possible to specify a process that will use software, and furthermore that people
who use the software will follow the process that is specified. There are many situations
when that is only partially correct, such as situations where people work around
password schemes in order to avoid logging in and logging out repeatedly,
Research on workarounds found hundreds of examples that led to a general model of
how workarounds occur. That led to ideas related to a "workaround design system"
that might be incorporated into requirements engineering with the goal of anticipating
likely workarounds and evaluating whether those workarounds would probably be beneficial
or detrimental. The next step along that path is explicit recognition that noncompliance
to process specifications may be beneficial in some situations just as compliance
to specifications may be detrimental in some situations.