Visions

The Super Bowl will bring a lot of cash into the Miami economy this weekend. But even more important, according to S&T economist Michael Davis, is the positive economic impact the competing teams have brought to their home cities of Indianapolis and New Orleans.

Winning NFL teams can bring a big economic benefit to their home cities, Davis told CNN Money for a story about Sunday's Super Bowl clash between the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts.

"Winning throughout the season is very important. We found the advantage peaked around 11 wins. Once you get beyond that, you're most likely in the playoffs anyway," says Davis, an associate professor of economics at Missouri S&T.

As Davis and former S&T psychology research Christian End reported in a 2008 study published in Economic Inquiry, a winning team can grow a region's per capita income by as much as $100 per year.

The Wii gaming console has been a huge success in the gaming world, and has revolutionized the way developers conceptualize game design. Could it be a game-changer for manufacturing as well?

Ming Leu thinks so. He's using remote-control devices from the popular Wii gaming console -- the Wiimotes -- and putting them to work to improve manufacturing processes. Leu is repurposing Wiimote cameras to record an assembly process in hopes of improving the way companies train workers, shorten cycle time, reduce workplace injuries, and help manufacturers improve the way they communicate with plants all over the globe.

"The Wiimotes allow us to easily capture motion in the assembly process wirelessly," says Leu, the Keith and Pat Bailey Missouri Distinguished Professor of Integrated Product Manufacturing at Missouri S&T. "We can track that motion, analyze the processes and make improvements based on the data generated through the motion-capture."

Let's hope Leu's research will help turn work -- or training for work -- into play.

Last April, we told you about some research by S&T Professor Joel Burken and others that pointed out the flaws in the nation's biofuels policy. Now it appears that work is gaining the notice of some folks who are trying to influence energy policy.

The research by Burken and colleagues from Rice University and Clarkson University forms the basis of a white paper (PDF) issued by Rice's James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy. Rice's news release on the subject captures the essence:

The report, which includes analysis by environmental scientists, highlights the environmental threats posed by current biofuels policy. "Increases in corn-based ethanol production in the Midwest could cause an increase in detrimental regional environmental impacts," the study states, "including exacerbating damage to ecosystems and fisheries along the Mississippi River and in the Gulf of Mexico and creating water shortages in some areas experiencing significant increases in fuel crop irrigation." Moreover, the report challenges claims that ethanol use lowers greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and argues, "There is no scientific consensus on the climate-friendly nature of U.S.-produced corn-based ethanol, and it should not be credited with reducing GHGs when compared to the burning of traditional gasoline."

As Burken pointed out in our news release last April, ""Developing the crops and distribution of crop production took about 100 years to get to where it was a few years ago. Redeveloping this production with the goal of biofuel production will take time and effort of farmers and engineers."

Not your memory. Your computer's memory.

As we reported on Thursday, Jay Switzer's latest experiments with nanomaterials could lead to faster, smaller, more energy efficient forms of computing.

The research by Switzer and his team, published recently in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, hold promise for improving the fabrication of a new type of memory called resistive random access memory," or RRAM.

With RRAM, a material that is normally insulating can be made to conduct through a
filament or conduction path formed after a high enough voltage is applied.

The researchers' paper, titled Resistance Switching in Electrodeposited Magnetite Superlattices, appears on the journal's ASAP ("as soon as publishable") website and will appear in an upcoming issue.

The little green men with giant brains from Mars Attacks may have been fictitious, but an S&T microbiologist thinks life on Mars is possible. Dr. Melanie Mormile and her team found some saltwater lakes in western Australia that are highly acidic -- conditions that mimic the environment on Mars. They tested the water and found living microorganisms. Read more about Moremile's research in the Dec. 30 issue of the journal Astrobiology.

Not many creatures can survive such extreme conditions -- in fact, until recently scientists thought life was not sustainable in water with such high concentration of metals and other ions. Mormile's team found prokaryotes in the lakes. These simple organisms with no nucleus are perfectly suited for salty acidic water.

Mormile hopes to return to the lakes to study the bacteria a little more closely and see if she can find any new species. From there she can see how they might be used. Similar bacteria have been used in cleaning products and bioremediation projects.

Although Mormile has proved that there is the POTENTIAL for life on Mars, there probably aren't any little green men running around on the red planet. Keep your Slim Whitman albums handy, though, just in case.

Only 121 days until 2010 St. Pat's Best Ever!

We thought some of you alumni out there would want to know about a new iPhone app (iTunes link) that lets you keep track of how many days -- um, excuse me, "daze" -- there are until the next Best Ever St. Pat's Celebration. Some of our creative entrepreneurial students created this to help get the word out about their company, IDC. We just posted the news about this app, so you're getting the scoop.

So what are you waiting for? Get the app. It's free! And it could be the best app ever. We know it's definitely the Best Ever app.

While we're on the subject, it's only a few months before we start posting stuff on our Best Ever Blog about next year's St. Pat's Celebration. Which, by the way, is only 121 days away. (Of course, if you had this iPhone app, you'd already know that.)

S&T's prohibition era expert Kate Drowne is quoted in today's Newsday:

Even though flapper dresses were knee-length, it was still enough to raise eyebrows, said Kathleen Drowne, an associate English professor at Missouri University of Science and Technology who has written on the time period.

"This is still coming off a generation previously where if a woman showed her ankle in public, that was something to look at twice," Drowne said.

Read the full story here. 

There's been a lot of research-related activity under way on campus. Here's a rundown of some of the biggies:

• Fun in the sun. Missouri S&T's entry in this year's Solar Decathlon -- dubbed Team Missouri, since it's a joint venture with students from the University of Missouri-Columbia -- is the fourth solar-powered home built by S&T students. Our campus is one of only two universities in the world to have entered each of the four Solar Decathlons (in 2002, 2005, 2007 and this year). Right now, our team is in ninth place. Keep track of S&T's/MU's progress via the Solar Decathlon's Team Missouri page, or follow along at the Experience This! blog.

• Workin' in a coal mine. This is old news for some of us on campus, but we're glad to see more interest in David Summers' work to turn abandoned underground mines into farms for biodiesel feedstock. Summers, a Curators' Professor of mining engineering, sees a big future in growing algae in underground mines.

• Waving the white flag. While some of us are still bitter about the St. Louis Cardinals' early departure from post-season play, at least the team made it to the post-season. Many teams with no chance of making the playoffs give up their star performers in hopes of a better chance in the future. Those so-called white-flag trades are the subject of some interesting research by Samantha Schussele, a nuclear engineering major who loves baseball. She's working with Michael Davis of the S&T economics department on her statistical analysis of how white-flag trades affect attendance.

• Frontiers of engineering. Congratulations to Sahra Sedigh, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, who has been selected to participate in the National Academy of Engineering's Frontiers of Engineering Education symposium. She is one of 49 young engineering researchers and teachers who will come together "to become a major force in identifying, recognizing and promulgating advances and innovations in order to build a strong intellectual infrastructure and commitment to 21st-century engineering education," says NAE President Charles N. Vest. It's great to have a Missouri S&T faculty member involved in this important national discussion.

• Off to Estonia. Congratulations, too, to Eric Showalter, a lecturer in civil, architectural and environmental engineering, who is heading to Estonia on a Fulbright scholarship. Keep up with Eric's adventures by following his blog.

The writers of the automotive blog Car Spy Guide like to scope out the latest in car design and innovation. As they put it on their blog's about section, the writers are "snooping for the latest automotive news that the car companies don't want you to see." But apparently they're also looking elsewhere, because they recently discovered Missouri S&T's EcoCAR Team and have featured our team on their site.

S&T is one of 17 universities in the U.S. and Canada participating in the EcoCAR Challenge, a competition that requires student teams to re-engineer a GM vehicl to minimize energy consumption, emissions and greenhouse gases while maintaining utility, safety, and performance.

The car spies laud our team for "its commitment to hydrogen energy. Being the only school to use hydrogen as its source of energy shows Missouri S&T's commitment to the future of transportation without relying on gasoline."

You'll be hearing more about this team in the near future. And we promise, it won't be cloak-and-dagger stuff.

You can also check the team's blog for updates, as well as S&T's news site.

Let's be honest. No one really likes to think about where stuff goes when toilets are flushed, showers are used or dishes are washed. It's not something anyone wants to think about - unless maybe it's part of their job, like it is for one of our alums, Brandon Freeman.

But I digress. My point is this - most of us living in the U.S. are fortunate to have a system for our wastewater to be treated, whether it be through treatment plants or septic tanks. But that's not how it works at many of our forward operating bases in Iraq and Afghanistan. Daily convoys of more than 20 trucks are used to supply a base with fuel or water and dispose of wastewater and solid waste.

But Jianmin Wang, a professor of civil, architectural and environmental engineering at Missouri S&T, has an idea that could change that. His system, housed inside a shipping container, is good that it could be deployed anywhere - from small, rural communities to forward operating bases, like those in Iraq or Afghanistan. It's a pretty cool system that's low power, low maintenance and highly efficient.

Cheaper, better and faster - who knew you could get all three?