New research from the University of Salerno provides methods on how to detect and protect connected vehicles from cyberattacks.

<var>What if your car was as vulnerable to hack into as your laptop? The reality is cars today are basically a computer on wheels. According to Car and Driver, 40 percent of a new car&rsquo;s cost is driven by electronic components. The New York Times reported that a modern vehicle could contain more than 3,000 computer chips. Electronics are such an essential part of a car&rsquo;s design that the shortage of semiconductors due to supply chain disruption from the pandemic has impacted auto assembly lines worldwide, creating a lack of new vehicles on the market.</var> 
 
By introducing computer systems into vehicles, hackers have found ways to exploit their vulnerabilities. In 2015, Black Hat security researchers Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek hacked a Jeep Cherokee via its infotainment system. Miller and Valasek exploited how the vehicle autogenerated its Wi-Fi password based on the time when the car&rsquo;s multimedia system would turn on. Through the infotainment system, the hackers could manipulate the air conditioner, the radio, the windshield wipers, and even the transmission. On a road test with Wired magazine, the hackers cut the transmission as the vehicle was driving 70 mph on the highway. This past February, German teenager David Colombo identified a vulnerability in the TeslaMate, a third-party application used by Tesla owners to analyze car performance. By hacking the app, Colombo was able to unlock doors, turn on and off the headlights, and control the radio. He was even able to track in real-time the location of the car.

Advancing Cybersecurity in Connected Vehicles

Explore how adverse weather conditions can impact autonomous vehicles&rsquo; lidar cameras.

<var>Lidar, or light detection and ranging, is a popular remote sensing method used for measuring the exact distance to an object. These imaging systems are increasingly used in the development of autonomous vehicles (AVs). However, final technology implementation cannot yet be achieved because major AV manufacturers are only now starting to select providers for data collection units that can be introduced in commercial vehicles.</var> 
One of the biggest unknowns in the development of AVs is how adverse weather conditions challenge the development of safe and reliable advanced autonomous systems for sensing and perception. How does the diffraction of light through rain, fog, and snow limit lidar performance?

How Self-Driving Cars See in Extreme Weather

Interview with Luca Capriotti

Luca Capriotti, former president of the International Youth Nuclear Congress, shares his passion for nuclear energy and beliefs that it can become a viable, safe power source to be used globally and responsibly in the future.

The Future of Power is Nuclear

Infographic: Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor

<var>Most nuclear reactors in operation today use water as a coolant, but one promising alternative looks to replace water with liquid sodium. Sodium can be heated to high temperatures before boiling, which means that a sodium-cooled reactor can operate at atmospheric pressure and can use a thinner reactor vessel. These reactors also will produce less radioactive waste. Explore the diagram of a sodium-cooled fast reactor below.</var>

Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor

July-September 2022

<var>Using 3D scanning, 3D simulation, and CAD, engineers at the Queensland University of Technology have created a patient-specific contoured mattress that successively supports patients in the operating room.</var>
Paige Little is an expert on using state-of-the-art imaging technology to understand ideal body position and support for enhancing the quality of sleep. It&rsquo;s the kind of research used to improve beds for the home. But in 2018, Little was contacted by a consultant who asked for something more serious. Could she design a customized, patient-specific surgical mattress for a 10-year-old about to undergo spinal surgery?

The patient had Morquio syndrome, a disorder that causes skeletal abnormalities and neuromuscular scoliosis. She would need to lie safely on her stomach and the front of her body for the duration of the surgery.

&ldquo;Intraoperative patient position is always a critical factor in spinal surgery, particularly in the case of prone patient positioning, where the anatomy and physiology of the torso is such that additional pressure may have adverse effects on the cardiopulmonary system as well as causing skin and muscle necrosis,&rdquo; Little said. &ldquo;Optimal patient positioning for spine surgery is vital for surgical success and the minimization of complications intra and postoperatively.&rdquo;

Little, an associate professor at the school of mechanical, medical, and process engineering at Queensland University of Technology, is up to the challenge. Using an innovative digital workflow involving 3D surface scanning, 3D simulation and computer-aided design (CAD), she successfully created a customized theater mattress with the patient&rsquo;s specific body-contour requirements. The operation was a success, and the surgical team praised the mattress and its positive impact on patient outcome.
<img alt="" src="~/getmedia/3cd9331a-8fc6-47de-8bf9-c54a38524afa/patient-img1.jpg" /> <var>Dr Paige Little at Research Centre Qld Children&rsquo;s Hospital.</var>

<h5>Patient-specific design</h5>

Little&rsquo;s goal was to create a customized mattress to hold the patient safely and reduce possible skin damage during the surgery procedure. By using digital simulation tools and CAD, she was able to create a patient-specific surgical mattress that fit the contours of the patient&rsquo;s body. This made it easier for the surgeon to relieve load bearing on prominent anatomical features during the surgery because the support surface was tailored to the patient&rsquo;s anatomy for the lengthy procedure.

&ldquo;The design process is based in CAD, and for many of the mattresses I have designed, I use Solidworks to create the mattress contours,&rdquo; Little said. &ldquo;We have recently explored the use of CNC machining to create the surface contours in the polyurethane foam, and with high spindle speeds it is possible to machine this foam using standard tooling. The machining is very successful with well-defined surface contours, and relatively little post-process cleaning is needed to remove dust waste. The foams do not require freezing to machine them. They also do not release toxic fumes or particulate matter.&rdquo;

Topographic scanning of the entire patient was required to create a mattress contour. &ldquo;The contour is not a replica of the patient&rsquo;s anatomy, but rather is custom-designed using the topographic scan as a basis,&rdquo; Little said. &ldquo;The design process cannot be parameterized&mdash;the design is created for each patient using CAD methods to alleviate pressure on the skin surface over areas that are delicate, or regions of the anatomy that cannot bear load for long periods of time. For some corrective surgeries, the patient may be lying stationary for many hours.&rdquo;

Manufacture is currently a manual, just-in-time process. The process may benefit from CNC machining or robotic manufacturing, especially for mattress contours that are for large or tall individuals or have deep cutouts and/or overhangs.

Sealy of Australia then manufactured the final mattress product. Technicians used the 3D model to hand-cut and piece together multiple layers of soft hypo-allergenic foam to conform exactly to the patient&rsquo;s anatomy.

The custom mattress is effectively contoured to the patient&rsquo;s anterior anatomy during surgery. Intraoperative monitoring indicated the patient was not under undue cardiovascular strain over the course of the operation &ldquo;and she successfully remained in the prone position for the entire eight-hour operation,&rdquo; Little said. &ldquo;Immediately postoperatively, there was no evidence of excessive interface pressure between the patient and the support, suggesting the custom-fit mattress successfully distributed the patient&rsquo;s body weight, alleviating regions of excessive pressure.&rdquo;
<img alt="" src="~/getmedia/a3cf9bdb-f951-4224-a7dc-5c8ec7269b24/patient-img2.jpg" /><var>Sealy of Australia R&amp;D manager Daniel Green exams form that contours to the patient&rsquo;s torso.</var>

<h5>Moving Forward</h5>

Since the first use of the surgical mattress, Little has designed 11 other supportive mattresses for pediatric patients with unique anatomies requiring support during surgery&mdash;all with successful results.

The next step is to continue showcasing the mattresses to a broader clinical audience so other patients can benefit from the use of customized body supports during surgery. &ldquo;Their surgical teams will also gain confidence in reducing the risks of complications due to extended periods of weight-bearing in patients with unique conditions,&rdquo; Little said.

The digital workflow she used to design the mattresses can also be applied to the design and advanced manufacturing of other custom-fit devices to assist in treatment and/or rehabilitation of patients. &ldquo;These same techniques&mdash;3D topographic scanning, 3D simulation, and CAD methods&mdash;can be applied to the design of customized corrective/rehabilitation orthoses,&rdquo; Little said, &ldquo;or to the custom design of supports for radiation therapy to ensure the patient is positioned in a repeatable position between treatment appointments.&rdquo;

Using 3D scanning, 3D simulation, and CAD, engineers at the Queensland University of Technology have created a patient-specific contoured mattress that successively supports patients in the operating room.

<var>Using 3D scanning, 3D simulation, and CAD, engineers at the Queensland University of Technology have created a patient-specific contoured mattress that successively supports patients in the operating room.</var>

Paige Little is an expert on using state-of-the-art imaging technology to understand ideal body position and support for enhancing the quality of sleep. It&rsquo;s the kind of research used to improve beds for the home. But in 2018, Little was contacted by a consultant who asked for something more serious. Could she design a customized, patient-specific surgical mattress for a 10-year-old about to undergo spinal surgery?

The patient had Morquio syndrome, a disorder that causes skeletal abnormalities and neuromuscular scoliosis. She would need to lie safely on her stomach and the front of her body for the duration of the surgery.

&ldquo;Intraoperative patient position is always a critical factor in spinal surgery, particularly in the case of prone patient positioning, where the anatomy and physiology of the torso is such that additional pressure may have adverse effects on the cardiopulmonary system as well as causing skin and muscle necrosis,&rdquo; Little said. &ldquo;Optimal patient positioning for spine surgery is vital for surgical success and the minimization of complications intra and postoperatively.&rdquo;
Little, an associate professor at the school of mechanical, medical, and process engineering at Queensland University of Technology, is up to the challenge. Using an innovative digital workflow involving 3D surface scanning, 3D simulation and computer-aided design (CAD), she successfully created a customized theater mattress with the patient&rsquo;s specific body-contour requirements. The operation was a success, and the surgical team praised the mattress and its positive impact on patient outcome.

Patient Support Via Customized Surgical Mattresses

<var>Hydrogen seems like an ideal fuel, but a feasibility analysis reveals the factors that will determine its success.</var>
Hydrogen has the highest energy density by weight of any fuel. So it only makes sense that compressed hydrogen gas is being considered as a carbon-free replacement for diesel in heavy-duty trucks. A hydrogen-fueled truck fleet would substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants from the freight industry.

Before that can happen, engineers need to work out the optimum technology to make hydrogen economical as well as clean.

​&ldquo;Hydrogen technology is currently expensive because of relatively low deployment. Once it is more common, the refueling infrastructure cost should decrease significantly. Hydrogen refueling infrastructure can be implemented immediately. It has the potential to be very economical,&rdquo; said Wahiba Yaici, a research scientist at the CanmetENERGY Research Centre, Natural Resources Canada in Ottawa, Ontario.

The cost of hydrogen itself looms as the main element in the acceptance of compressed hydrogen. It is rarely found isolated and must go through processes to extract it. Each hydrogen production method involves separating hydrogen from some compound. Common extraction processes include natural gas reforming, biomass gasification, and coal gasification. So-called green hydrogen is produced by using renewable energy such as solar and wind to power the electrolysis of water or other hydrogen-making reactions.
<img alt="A truck cab with visible hydrogen fuel tank" src="~/getmedia/c92a71b0-061d-466a-b7d5-8b3ffeabf1ff/hydrogen-img1.jpg" /><var>Generally, green hydrogen is more expensive than hydrogen produced by other methods, but it also has the advantage of producing zero carbon emissions.</var>

Storing hydrogen is another issue. Hydrogen at a fueling station can be stored either as a gas or a liquid. Storing hydrogen as a gas typically requires high-pressure tanks at 5,000 to 10,000 psi. Storage as a liquid requires cryogenic temperatures, as the boiling point of hydrogen at one atmosphere pressure is &minus;252.8 &deg;C (-423 &deg;F).

The main options for onboard hydrogen storage in vehicles are gaseous storage at 5,000 psi or at 10,000 psi in thermally insulated tanks or in materials with superior chemical properties, like metal hydrides or organic compounds,&rdquo; Yaici said.

To address the hydrogen refueling scenario for big trucks, Yaici teamed with Michela Longo, an associate professor at the Politecnico di Milano in Italy, to write a paper, &ldquo;Hydrogen Gas Refueling Infrastructure for Heavy-Duty Trucks: A Feasibility Analysis,&rdquo; for the ASME Journal of Energy Resources Technology. Both authors are mechanical engineers. The pair chose to pursue hydrogen because it can be used as fuel in modified internal combustion engines (ICEs), reducing the need to purchase new vehicles. Existing diesel engines can easily be modified to burn hydrogen. This is in contrast to the fuel-cell-powered vehicles most people think of when talking hydrogen; fuel cells combine hydrogen and oxygen, yielding water, heat, and electricity used to power an electric motor that drives the vehicle.

This paper investigates the feasibility of developing a nationwide network of hydrogen refueling infrastructure to help convert the long-haul, heavy-duty (LHHD) truck fleet from diesel fuel to hydrogen. Diesel is currently the main fuel used to transport freight over the road.

The team carried out a technical analysis to estimate the number of hydrogen refueling stations needed to convert the fleet of LHHD vehicles to hydrogen. They also did an economic analysis to evaluate the final selling price of hydrogen.

According to Yaici, &ldquo;Results from the techno-economic study showed that hydrogen prices can vary significantly.&rdquo; On average, they found hydrogen to cost 239 percent more than diesel due to the diverse costs of the various production methods for hydrogen. Hydrogen also has about 2.6 times the energy density of diesel fuel by weight, which serves as an equalizer. Energy density by volume is another matter because at the operating temperature of trucks, diesel is a liquid while hydrogen is a gas, giving it a lower energy density by volume if it is not liquefied by cryogenics. Regardless of the hydrogen production method, the process can occur at a central facility or locally where it is needed.

&ldquo;A central system can increase the scope of production by producing hydrogen at large facilities that take advantage of bulk processes to reduce costs per unit,&rdquo; Yaici said. &ldquo;Nevertheless, hydrogen must be transported to its destination via pipeline or trucks. This will increase the operational fees. A distributed process, one where hydrogen is produced on demand locally, eliminates the need to deliver hydrogen over long distances.&rdquo;
<img alt="A hydrogen &quot;gas&quot; pump accompanied by a small array of solar panels" src="~/getmedia/7f96ca95-97e5-4062-9f56-5da4b3d880e5/hydrogen-img2.jpg" />
Hydrogen stations are built to refuel vehicles in similar manner to those used by diesel stations. Each refueling station will consist of a compressor, storage tanks, and at least one dispenser. Yaici pointed out the versatility of the feasibility study. &ldquo;The methodology and models proposed can be used for studying the techno-economics of hydrogen refueling stations in any country and for other types of ICE fleets or fuel cell vehicles,&rdquo; he said.

This includes refueling stations for vehicle fleets powered by renewable fuels such as renewable natural gas or biofuels. Engineering analyses such as this one will help shape the future of transportation.

Hydrogen seems like an ideal fuel, but a feasibility analysis reveals the factors that will determine its success.

<var>Hydrogen seems like an ideal fuel, but a feasibility analysis reveals the factors that will determine its success.</var>
Hydrogen has the highest energy density by weight of any fuel. So it only makes sense that compressed hydrogen gas is being considered as a carbon-free replacement for diesel in heavy-duty trucks. A hydrogen-fueled truck fleet would substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants from the freight industry.

Before that can happen, engineers need to work out the optimum technology to make hydrogen economical as well as clean.

Putting Hydrogen to the Economic Test

Interview with Moncef Krarti

Moncef Krarti, head of the Building System Program at the University of Colorado, Boulder, discusses ways to turn down the temperature on hot, overcrowded urban areas.

Cooling Cities by Combating Heat Islands

Infographic: Pneumatic Help for Grasping

<div class="infogram-embed" data-id="_/JNK9h2xLuaalwUNVZqrN" data-title="Pneumatically-Powered Help for Grasping" data-type="interactive">&nbsp;</div>
 
&nbsp;

Researchers hope this pneumatic grip glove could soon help relieve industrial workers of some pain.

Workers who must repeat forceful actions with their hands&mdash;whether operating industrial hand tools or typing on a keyboard&mdash;are often subject to carpal tunnel syndrome and other cumulative trauma disorders, which not only are painful but also diminish grip strength. Naveen Chandrashekar, a professor of mechanical and mechatronics engineering at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, and graduate student Daniel Loewen, now chief technology officer at ioAirFlow in Winnipeg, looked for a way to reduce the force needed by workers operating hand tools, which would lean to less wear and tear on the hands and wrists.

Pneumatic Help for Grasping

October-December 2022

Through a complete review of published research over the last 60 years, researchers aim to propel development of new head injury metrics forward.

<var>Through a complete review of published research over the last 60 years, researchers aim to propel development of new head injury metrics forward.</var>

Metrics that help engineers design safer helmets and vehicles to prevent fatalities went mostly unchanged for about 50 years. Now, researchers are looking for better metrics to help prevent brain injuries&mdash;from mild concussions to traumatic damage.

In &ldquo;A Review of Head Injury Metrics Used in Automotive Safety and Sports Protective Equipment,&rdquo; published in the ASME Journal of Biomedical Engineering, authors Stefan Duma and Bethany Rowson examined every major metric that has been published over the past 60 years, including some of the original work done at Wayne State University in the 1960s and 1970s that examined skull fractures and were used for early football helmet and vehicle design standards. This effort summarizes existing head injury metrics and their applications for head and brain injuries.

Duma is Harry C. Wyatt Professor of Engineering and director of the Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science (ICTAS) at Virginia Tech and Rowson is a former Virginia Tech research assistant professor. The team defined a metric as any variable or combination of variables that is &ldquo;used to assess injury severity, while a criterion is any quantitative value that is considered a threshold for injury or is assigned a predicted risk of injury.&rdquo;

The Virginia Tech team has about 30 years of history in automobile safety. About 20 years ago, they started working more in the sports and football area. Today, about 40 faculty and students at Virginia Tech work on brain-related research.

Advancing Head Injury Metrics Research

Researchers at Vanderbilt University have invented a nitrogen gas-powered thruster that is worn on the back that can correct falls as they start, restoring balance and averting potential injury.

<var>Researchers at Vanderbilt University have invented a nitrogen gas-powered thruster that is worn on the back that can correct falls as they start, restoring balance and averting potential injury.</var>

Falls can lead to severe and fatal injuries, particularly for elderly people. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, millions of people fall each year, with one in five suffering serious injury.

Michael Goldfarb, a professor of mechanical engineering at Vanderbilt University, has first-hand experience dealing with this health risk. &ldquo;As my parents grew older, both had experiences with fall risk that really limited their quality of life,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My father, in particular, had Parkinson&rsquo;s disease.&rdquo;

Goldfarb began thinking about new ways to correct occasional states of imbalance. Robotic exoskeletons can offer balance assistance, but have design challenges, such as having to coordinate a recovery response with the user. To avoid requiring a large frame or other structure (which would impede independence), he decided to focus on building a backpack-worn system that can apply forces directly to a person&rsquo;s body using a thruster.

&ldquo;This research challenge seemingly has not received much attention and therefore there were a lot of unknowns,&rdquo; Goldfarb said. &ldquo;Correcting a fall is a shared task between the person falling and the device helping to arrest the fall. What is the distribution of shared effort? How much force is appropriate to correct an impending fall? For how long is the force required? Can the magnitude of assistance required be provided by a compact cold-gas thruster?&rdquo;

Goldfarb and fellow researchers Almaskhan Baimyshev and Michael Finn-Henry then set out to create a lightweight, cold-gas thruster (CGT) jetpack that senses when a fall has been initiated and can provide a restoring force to help the person recover his or her balance.

Backpack Could Reduce the Risk of Fall

Paul P. Palies, director of the Combustion and Propulsion for Aviation Research Center at the University of Tennessee Space Institute, discusses the prospects for fueling aircraft with hydrogen.

Flying with Hydrogen

Ro-Bats, Bat-Bots, and Other Bat-like Robots

For these engineers, the allure of biologically inspired flight still remains strong.

July-September 2022

In This Issue

article

Advancing Cybersecurity in Connected Vehicles

article

How Self-Driving Cars See in Extreme Weather

Get exclusive news from the engineering world

Q & A

The Future of Power is Nuclear

infographic

Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor

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