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NATIONAL ACADEMY PRESS 2101 Constitution Ave., N.W. Washington, D.C. 20418
NOTICE: This publication has been reviewed according to procedures approved by a National Academy of Engineering report review process. Publication of signed work signifies that it is judged a competent and useful contribution worthy of public consideration, but it does not imply endorsement of conclusions or recommendations by the NAE. The interpretations and conclusions in such publications are those of the authors and do not purport to represent the views of the council, officers, or staff of the National Academy of Engineering.
Funding for the activity that led to this publication was provided by Cummins Engine Company, DaimlerChrysler Corporation Fund, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Department of Defense Research and Engineering, Hewlett-Packard Company, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Lucent Technologies, Microsoft Corporation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Parsons Brinckerhoff, Inc., Pratt & Whitney, Sandia National Laboratories, Science Applications International Corporation, Xerox Foundation, Xerox Research and Technology, and the National Academy of Engineering Fund.
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Copyright © 2001 by the National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
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THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES
National Academy of Sciences
National Academy of Engineering
Institute of Medicine
National Research Council
The National Academy of Sciences is a private, nonprofit, self-perpetuating society of distinguished scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research, dedicated to the furtherance of science and technology and to their use for the general welfare. Upon the authority of the charter granted to it by the Congress in 1863, the Academy has a mandate that requires it to advise the federal government on scientific and technical matters. Dr. Bruce M. Alberts is president of the National Academy of Sciences.
The National Academy of Engineering was established in 1964, under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences, as a parallel organization of outstanding engineers. It is autonomous in its administration and in the selection of its members, sharing with the National Academy of Sciences the responsibility for advising the federal government. The National Academy of Engineering also sponsors engineering programs aimed at meeting national needs, encourages education and research, and recognizes the superior achievements of engineers. Dr. William A. Wulf is president of the National Academy of Engineering.
The Institute of Medicine was established in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences to secure the services of eminent members of appropriate professions in the examination of policy matters pertaining to the health of the public. The Institute acts under the responsibility given to the National Academy of Sciences by its congressional charter to be an adviser to the federal government and, upon its own initiative, to identify issues of medical care, research, and education. Dr. Kenneth I. Shine is president of the Institute of Medicine.
The National Research Council was organized by the National Academy of Sciences in 1916 to associate the broad community of science and technology with the Academy's purposes of furthering knowledge and advising the federal government. Functioning in accordance with general policies determined by the Academy, the Council has become the principal operating agency of both the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering in providing services to the government, the public, and the scientific and engineering communities. The Council is administered jointly by both Academies and the Institute of Medicine. Dr. Bruce M. Alberts and Dr. William A. Wulf are chairman and vice chairman, respectively, of the National Research Council.
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ORGANIZING COMMITTEE
MICHAEL L. CORRADINI (Chair), Associate Dean, Academic Affairs; Professor, Nuclear Engineering and Engineering Physics, University of Wisconsin
BRENDA M. BOHLKE, Vice President, Parsons Brinckerhoff Inc.
CARLA E. BRODLEY, Associate Professor, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University
PETER T. CUMMINGS, Distinguished Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
CHANG-BEOM EOM, Professor, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Wisconsin
PATRICK HANRAHAN, Canon USA Professor, Computer Science and Electrical Engineering Departments, Stanford University
DEIRDRE R. MELDRUM, Associate Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Washington
RICHARD M. RATLIFF, Senior Vice President and Chief Architect, Strategic Architecture Team, Sabre Inc.
PATRICK M. SHANAHAN, Vice President and General Manager, 757 Programs, Commercial Airplane Group, The Boeing Company
GANESH SKANDAN, Vice President, Research and Development, Nanopowder Enterprises, Inc.
JOHN YIN, Associate Professor and Cargill Faculty Fellow, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Wisconsin
Staff
JANET R. HUNZIKER, Program Officer
MARY W. L. KUTRUFF, Administrative Assistant
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Preface
In 1995 the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) initiated the Frontiers of Engineering Symposium program, which every year brings together 100 of the nation's future engineering leaders to learn about cutting-edge research and technical work in different engineering fields. On September 14-16, 2000, the National Academy of Engineering held its sixth Frontiers of Engineering Symposium at the Academies' Beckman Center in Irvine, California. Symposium speakers were asked to prepare extended summaries of their presentations, and it is those papers that are contained here. The intent of this book, and of the five that precede it in the series, is to describe the content and underpinning philosophy of this unique meeting and to highlight some of the exciting developments in engineering today.
GOALS OF FRONTIERS OF ENGINEERING
The practice of engineering is changing. Not only must engineers be able to thrive in an environment of rapid technological change and globalization, but engineering is becoming more interdisciplinary. The frontiers of engineering are frequently occurring at the intersections of engineering disciplines, which compels researchers and practitioners alike to be aware of developments and challenges in areas other than their own.
At the three-day Frontiers of Engineering symposium, 100 of this country's best and brightest engineers, ages 30 to 45, learn from their peers about what is happening at the leading edge of engineering. This has great value for the participants in a couple of ways. First, it broadens their knowledge of current developments in other fields of engineering, leading to insights that may be
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applicable to the furthering of their own work. Second, because the engineers come from a variety of institutions in academia, industry, and government and from many different engineering disciplines, it allows them to make contacts with and learn from individuals whom they would not ordinarily meet in their usual round of professional meetings. This networking, it is hoped, will lead to collaborative work, facilitating the transfer of new techniques and approaches across fields.
The number of participants at each meeting is kept at 100 to maximize the opportunity for interaction and exchange among the attendees, who are invited to attend after a competitive nomination and selection process. The choice of topics and speakers for each year's meeting is carried out by an organizing committee composed of engineers in the same 30- to 45-year-old cohort as the participants. Each year different topics are covered, and, with few exceptions, different individuals participate.
The speakers at the Frontiers of Engineering symposium have a unique challenge—to make the excitement of their field accessible to a technically sophisticated but nonspecialist audience. To achieve the objectives of the meeting, speakers are asked to provide a brief overview of their fields and to address such questions as: What are the frontiers in your field? What experiments, prototypes, and design studies are completed and in progress? What new tools and methodologies are being used? What are the current limitations on advances? What are the controversies? What is the theoretical, commercial, societal, and long-term significance of the work? Many elements of these topics are captured in the papers as well.
CONTENT OF THE 2000 SYMPOSIUM
The four broad areas that provided the framework for the 2000 meeting were systems engineering, visual simulation and analysis, engineering challenges and opportunities in the genomic era, and nanoscale science and technology. In the Systems Engineering session, the International Space Station, battlefield management, and software development provided the context for the discussion. Here the theme was “managing complexity,” in particular, delivering well-engineered and tested products in an era of rapidly shrinking time to market. The three environments described provided some interesting contrasts and similarities. Visual simulation, the second area covered, is the application of ideas from physics, mathematics, and computer science to the production of rich imagery by computer. Applications of visual simulation include entertainment, training, virtual prototyping, industrial design, art, and scientific and information visualization. The speakers in that session amply demonstrated through talks on physically-based animation, data mining and visualization, and multi-resolution methods for modeling, simulation, and visualization that visual simulation is more than just pretty pictures. The four speakers in the Genomics session
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described the challenges and opportunities brought about by the sequencing of the human genome. Talks covered an overview of the Human Genome Project and the subject of genomics, the characterization of proteins in a small model genome, a bioengineering approach to understanding developments in molecular biology and genomics, and ethical questions generated by advances in genomics. The last talk set the stage for small group discussions on the merits and perils resulting from the development and application of genomic technologies. The symposium concluded with a session on the topic of nanotechnology, which is the science and engineering of making materials, functional structures, and devices on the order of a nanometer scale (1 nanometer = 10−9m). The talks here provided an introduction to the field with presentations on the synthesis, processing, and application of functional nanostructured inorganic particles; carbon-based nanotubes; and nanoscale semiconductor devices. (See Appendixes for complete program.)
As has been done in previous years, a distinguished engineer was invited to address the Frontiers of Engineering participants at dinner on the first evening of the symposium. At the 2000 meeting, Robert Lucky, corporate vice president for applied research at Telcordia Technologies, Inc., spoke about the future of information technology and raised some provocative questions about information technology's limits, intellectual property, and the impact of networking. Dr. Lucky's remarks are contained in this volume.
As part of an ongoing process to make these meetings even more useful to participants, the attendees were asked to evaluate the Frontiers symposium. This feedback once again confirmed the value of the event. Attendees found that being informed about engineering areas with which they were not as familiar was very useful and had the potential to affect their research and technical work. Others noted that the opportunity to interact with engineers from other sectors and disciplines was broadening and inspiring. Many noted that with engineering becoming more interdisciplinary, this meeting filled a unique and much-needed niche in the profession.
The National Academy of Engineering is deeply grateful to the following organizations for their support of the Sixth Annual Symposium on Frontiers of Engineering: Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Department of Defense – DDR&E-Research, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, DaimlerChrysler Corporation Fund, Hewlett-Packard Company, Microsoft Corporation, Science Applications International Corporation, Cummins Engine Company, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Lucent Technologies, Parsons Brinckerhoff, Inc., Pratt & Whitney, Sandia National Laboratories, Xerox Foundation, and Xerox Research and Technology. NAE would also like to thank the members of the Symposium Organizing Committee (see p. iv), particularly its chair, Michael Corradini, for their work in planning and organizing the event.
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Contents
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