The Observer, April 8, 2005
Volume XXXVII, Issue 24
The BriefCase
Engineers develop intelligent fluid sensor
Researchers at the Case School of Engineering and their partners at Rockwell Automation have created an intelligent fluid sensor to aid in the reliability of lubrication systems for critical machinery.
Kenneth Loparo, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science whose research involves the design of fault detection and the diagnosis and prognosis for rotating machinery, commented on the importance of such a development.
"Failure of a lubrication system can result in wasted energy, noisy operation, mechanical damage, dangerous operating conditions, or even a catastrophic event," he said. "Lubrication health information may provide an early indication of problems before any mechanical damage has occurred. Continuous monitoring of fluid condition will be able to detect faults that occur between scheduled maintenance activities, and possibly avert catastrophic failures."
Trials of the sensor in industrial and aircraft fluids – including gear oil, mineral oil, bearing grease, and hydraulic fluid – have already occurred.
The multi-element lubrication health sensor, meant to monitor critical fluids in machinery during operation, was developed by a research team consisting of Loparo, C.C. Liu, Fred M. Discenzo, Dukki Chung, and researchers at Rockwell Automation's Advanced Technology Labs in Mayfield Heights.
National History Day celebrates 25 years
National History Day celebrates its 25th anniversary tomorrow, as 700,000 students from around the country and 40,000 teachers will participate in activities at History Day sites nationwide, including Case.
This year's History Day theme is "Communications in History." Participants can prepare performances to act out, show original documentaries, and present papers and exhibits to display their knowledge on this subject. Middle and high school students from around the Cleveland area will come to Case this weekend to compete for a chance to move on to the state or national levels.
History Day has significant meaning to Case, as the first History Day event in Cleveland in 1974 was sponsored and organized by the late David Van Tassel, a faculty member from the Case Department of History. The competition went statewide in 1976; by 1980 another 18 states began participating. History Day became a national event by 1981.
And student entries can produce more than just a first-place trophy. A team from Chicago created a documentary, We Are Not Afraid, about the murder of civil rights workers that later inspired the movie Mississippi Burning.
Case law students simulate counter-terrorism situation
Students at the Case School of Law recently participated in a counter-terrorism simulation held at the school. The 22 participants from professor Amos Guiora's "Legal and Policy Aspects of Counter-Terrorism" class played the roles of FBI special agents, magistrate judges, CIA case officers and interrogators, the National Security Adviser, the president of the United States, a Supreme Court justice, Department of Justice attorneys, a reporter, and a defense attorney.
Guiora and adjunct professor Jonathan Leiken devised the exercise based on "rolling scenarios" involving the need to request a search warrant based on an intelligence tip, problems with conducting a search beyond the scope of a warrant, ordering operations based on intelligence, the limits of interrogation, and the proper setting for trying American and non-American terror suspects.
The simulation involved material covered in the course, including policy and legal issues related to counter-terrorism from both an American and international perspective.
Cutler to deliver Howard T. McMyler lecture
The annual Howard T. McMyler Lecture will be given Thursday by David Cutler, professor of economics at Harvard University's Economics Department and the Kennedy School of Government.
The author of Your Money or Your Life: Strong Medicine for America's Health Care System, Cutler served on the Council of Economic Advisers and the National Economic Council during the Clinton administration and was an advisor to Bill Bradley and John Kerry in their presidential campaigns. In the past, he has worked for the National Institutes of Health and the National Academy of Sciences; Cutler currently serves as a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a member of the Institute of Medicine.
His speech here, "Your Money or Your Life," will focus on the U.S. health care system. The talk, which is free and open to the public, is co-hosted by the economics department of Case's Weatherhead School of Management and by the Center for Health Care Research and Policy. It will take place at 3:30 p.m. in the Clark Room at the Cleveland Botanical Gardens.
