TECHNOLOGICAL innovations, THREE-dimensional printing, RAPID prototyping, TECHNOLOGICAL forecasting, and SUPPLY chain management

In recent years, the Forecasting Innovation Pathway approach (FIP) has shown to be a promising set of tools to capture potential developments in emerging fields through capturing indications of endogenous futures. However, the FIP approach is reliant on a clear demarcated area to study, a challenge for emerging technology fields where uncertainty and rhetoric abound. This paper presents an addition to the FIP toolbox that helps characterise and demarcate boundaries of emerging fields to allow for deeper analysis through other FIP methods. We illustrate this approach through an exercise for 3D printing technology (also known as Additive Manufacturing). We show that 3D printing can be represented by a dominant design: a tri-partite configuration of printer, material and digital design software. In the past decade we have seen significant branching from applications in rapid-prototyping to medical, fashion, aeronautics and supply chain management with a variety of elements coming together in tri-partite configurations. The paper adds to the current FTA literature an approach building on evolutionary theories of technical change to help with such situations – emerging, evolving and branching 'innovation pathways'. Moreover, we developed a methodology to construct these innovation paths. • New technology fields can be represented as paths that build momentum, fork and evolve. • Forecasting Innovation Pathways (FIP) require a further developed theory of path emergence and evolution. • 3D printing can be represented by a dominant design: a tri-partite configuration that is filled in a variety of ways. • 3D printing is a field which evolved first around prototyping applications and has branched out to new applications. • The interplay of foreseen applications and the filling of the tri-partite schema motivate branching from rapid prototyping. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ORGANIC light emitting diodes, POLYMER light emitting diodes, COMPOSITE materials, SMART materials, PIEZOELECTRIC thin films, and RAPID prototyping

Over the past years, product designers have been involved in collaborative developments of smart material composites early on in the development process, to showcase creative applications of them. In these projects, the way the material is presented to the development team and the extent to which its properties are defined affect how designers understand the potentials and boundaries of the material and envision product applications. In the context of a European project, Light.Touch.Matters, we studied the attempt of designers to understand and prototype underdeveloped composites of thin-film organic light emitting diodes and piezoelectric polymer. Arguing for a collaborative exploration of the unique experiences that such underdeveloped composites unfold, we elaborate on a challenge designers face in understanding and prototyping the experiential qualities, specifically, the dynamic and performative qualities. The paper presents our design approach and complementary tools to overcome this challenge. It further discusses the applicability and limitations of the proposed design supports in the context of collaborative materials development and outlines future research directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

RAPID prototyping, ENGINEERING systems, LITERATURE reviews, ENGINEERING design, NEW product development, and TECHNICAL literature

Given the need to develop a systems engineering framework to enable rapid prototyping and rapid fielding capability for the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) per Public Law 114-92 and the fact that historically rework has been a problem during product development, a literature survey of engineering and design rework was conducted to better understand its nature and causes. The intent of the survey is to present the current state of research in the understanding of this aspect of development and to articulate future research areas for developing a systems engineering framework during the Technology Maturation and Risk Reduction (TMRR) phase of the DOD life cycle that addresses rework concerns, accelerates iteration and enables rapid prototyping. Since much of the research on rework has been done on information exchange and organizational structure there is a need for future research in systems engineering to develop frameworks to: 1) mitigate the impact of information uncertainty and instability, 2) accelerate information evolution, and 3) reuse knowledge for engineering reasoning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

RAPID prototyping, BIOSENSORS, ARTIFICIAL neural networks, and BASES (Architecture)

The paper aims to explore the potential offered by nanotechnologies for the development of a new generation of reconfigurable and robust Nano-biosensors for the purpose of implementation in medical applications The subject proposes to make a contribution in the field of Nano-biosensors by organizing itself around several scientific objectives, multidisciplinary technologies • Demonstrate the interface with reconfigurable architectures based on FPGA/NoC to drive the Nano-biosensors • specify Platform model based on neural networks that can be adapted to Nano biosensors experimental context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prototyping is one of the core activities of product development, and understanding prototyping should therefore be of great interest to both researchers and professionals. Yet, when considering the many definitions of prototype in engineering design literature, prototyping is not fully understood. Aimed at engineering design researchers, this article compares various efforts that attempt to understand prototyping by capturing design activity. This comparison is used as a basis for discussing various methods, tools and resources available to the engineering design researcher, as well as the contexts of the studies (i.e. laboratory, intermediate and in-situ studies). From this comparison of studies on capturing prototyping in engineering design research, the authors identify that many of the studies have relatively low robustness—i.e. the ability to generalize and apply the findings to a wider engineering design context. The authors argue that the factors that contribute to the relatively low robustness of these studies are a combination of the methods, tools and resources (including participants) available to the researchers for both capturing and analyzing the data. Therefore, the authors conclude that to increase the robustness of research on prototyping in engineering design—i.e. ensure that relevant, realistic and representative data is captured—more suitable tools and methods are needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]