Our IEEE Day Meeting

IEEE Day 2012 will be celebrated on October 2, 2012.  It is the third time in history when all engineers worldwide are going to celebrate the IEEE Day.  It is on the anniversary of the first time IEEE members gathered to share their technical ideas in 1884.  While the world benefits from what’s new, IEEE is focused on what’s next. Thus, this year the theme of the IEEE Day will be “Engineering the Future and Beyond”.

 

We usually hold a dinner meeting the first Monday of each month. That makes our next meeting on Monday, October 1, 2012. Our dinner meeting will be at the usual place and time, 5:30PM at Zippy's, 59 North Vineyard Boulevard Honolulu, HI 96817. Map: http://zippys.com/live/locations/vineyard/. This meeting will include a short EXCOM meeting followed by a Communication Chapter technical talk entitled "What's New in Communications?" presented by Eran Agmon. It will hail the start of IEEE Day this year.

 

In order to create a deeper cohesion among the members, IEEE Day website will be running the following networking events:

• Photo wall of the year: every member will be invited to share a picture showing himself/herself in real action (at laboratory, desk, classroom, with an oscilloscope, posing next to a wind turbine and a transformer, …) or in an IEEE event.
• Let’s wear IEEE Day T-shirt: members can find the link on the IEEE Day website where they can order their t-shirts. (They can also download and print the logo locally)
• Upload your IEEE Facebook profile picture: Taken during the IEEE Day. You can find more information in this page.

September EXCOM Meeting

John W. Camery, presiding
Attendees:
John Borland
Al Toda
Yi Zhu, Assist. Prof. of CompSci, Hawaii Pacific University
Patrick Finneran
(David Morse called to say he would be delayed)

Minutes:

Al Toda volunteered to help find a speaker for a ComSoc/SigProc Chapter Meeting. Yi Zhu expressed an interest in becoming involved in the local Computer Society Chapter activities and in getting his students involved. He wants to discus possible activities further with Dave Morse. We will hold another technical meeting the first Monday of next month  We want to make sure that the ComSoc/SigProc Chapter gets two technical meetings reported for this year. We will look into holding another Business Card Exchange Meeting with the student branch most likely in November again this year. 

Labor Day Section Technical Meeting

                                             The E-CAT

Last year we had an October technical meeting in which the E-Cat was discussed.  This year we discussed the progress on the E-Cat since then. Official information on the E-Cat is at www.ecat.com.

Changes since Last Year’s Talk

1. Size Change. The 1MW E-Cat from a year ago was the size of a shipping container. The new design on the drawing boards is a drum of measuring 1.2 x 0.4 meters.  There are 100 reactors inside, each of one having about 1,200 sq. cm of surface area.
2. Temperature.  The output temperature of the unit last year was only enough to make dry steam. The new prototype reactor has operated up to 1200° C which is close to limit possible with nickel.

The E-Cat’s Design

1. The nuclear catalytic powder.   Micron sized particles of nickel enriched with the heavier isotopes, viz., Ni-62 and Ni-64 are used.  They are heated to a high enough temperature to sinter and become denser forming tubules.   A pseudo magnetic field is generated in the tubules.   The Debye Temperature is 179° C for nickel.  The catalyst interface works even above the Fermi temperature of nickel where ferromagnetism disappears.
2. Containment vessel.  A containment vessel is constructed from stainless steel with lead and boron shielding.  Inside is a heating element. The powder must be heated to at least 125° C to activate it. A dilute hydrogen atomic dipole quantum gas is diffused through the tubules.  The pseudo magnetic field polarizes the gas. The dipoles are regenerated at a certain frequency.  This frequency is used to control the temperature in self sustaining mode.  Above 125 degrees, the electrical resistance of the powder decreases with increasing temperature and energy is produced.  The lead and boron provide shielding against possible bursts of gamma rays when the device is activated and deactivated.
3. Mesoscopic Catalysts.  Mono metals with oxide surface layers, such as, ZnO, MgO, and zirconium dioxide helps to keep the Rydberg gas from ionizing before it enters the tubules.
4. Secret Catalyst. A secret catalyst may be involved, such as, graphane/graphene hydrogen delamination.

Exercise: Solve the Hubbard Hamiltonian for short-lived Rydberg hydrogen atoms with long range dipole interaction ~ R^(-3.5).  

Hint: Since the Rydberg state is short-lived, interaction is not really long range.  Taking into account the propagation time of the interaction, one ignores the interaction with points more than a specific distance away on the lattice.  Convert to spherical coordinates. Use a basis which is adiabatically connected to the zero field.  The Wannier function overlaps can be used to yield the Hubbard parameters.

About the Test Depicted in the Photograph

First, the E-Cat tested was constructed using two steel tubes or cylinders of equal length. The tube with a smaller diameter was placed inside of the tube with a larger diameter. In the gap between the two cylinders (the outer surface of the inner cylinder and the inner surface of the outer cylinder) a resistive heating element was placed, along with the "charge" consisting of nickel powder, catalysts, and a tablet that would release hydrogen when heated. The ends of the cylinder were then covered with putty that could withstand high temperatures. As can be seen in the picture, the central "hole" was not covered.

The outer and inner surface of the module was coated with a black paint that would resist high temperatures. The black surface would make the device a more efficient black body radiator. 

Next, the device was positioned several feet above the floor on a metal framework. A thermal camera was positioned below the E-Cat module, looking upwards. This camera would be used to record the surface temperature of the bottom half of the module. By being positioned below the module instead of above, the thermal camera would not be exposed to hot rising air that could artificially inflate the temperature data acquired. Due to the air currents providing some amount of cooling to the bottom of the reactor, the camera was in the position that would allow for the lowest temperatures to be recorded. This makes the resulting measurements the most conservative possible.

Power was applied to the resistors inside of the E-Cat and the temperature of the module, as recorded by the thermal camera, increased over a period of several hours. The thermal camera was connected to a computer so all of the data could be recorded for analysis. A handheld laser thermometer was used to determine the temperature of the inner surface of the inner cylinder (the glowing hole in the image).

At the time of the photo, the average temperature of the outer surface was 801° C with local peak of 873 ° C. The inner surface temperature ranged from 1100 ° C to over 1200° C. Two parallel resistors were used for heating (the 4 wires you see). The value in parallel was 6 Ohm. The voltage of alternating current power (50 Hz) was 147v. The current was 24.25 amps. The power consumption was 3.56 kW. The power radiated by the two internal and external walls was estimated to equal to a total of 13.39 kW in excess of average ambient temperature of 35 ° C.  The internal wall was white-hot and unapproachable within a meter. The outer wall measured by thermal imager with an accuracy of 2%. The inner wall measured with a laser thermometer from 1.2 meters away.  The conservative values and the deficet  because heat removal convective motion estimated in at least 8% of the outer wall and inner wall cosine irradiation down to cause high angle of irradiation toward thermometer laser (pointing almost aligned with the inner cylinder)  The reaction was stable.

August Newsletter

Aloha! Welcome to the August issue of IEEE Hawaii Section Newsletter!

Contents:

1. Student Chapters begin the year with many activities
2. Nominations for Computer Society Officers are due by Nov 9th.
3. High School hacking - Hawaii has more teams than many Big States!
4. Committee formed for preparing Conference Bids.
5. Competition to design new Section website.
6. Monday Sept. 3rd (Labor Day) ExCom meeting - all are welcome!

* section websites:

•   https://webinabox.vtools.ieee.org/wibp_home/index/R60017
•   http://ieee-hawaii.org/ (new - in development)

* additional updates on John's blog: http://hawaii-ieee.blogspot.com

-------- Begin Articles ---------------

1. Student Chapters begin year with activities:

Our student chapters are very active. UH-Manoa Chapter has planned the
following events for September: (http://www4.eng.hawaii.edu/~ieee/)

•   Summer Internships and Coops Seminar - W 9/12 5pm-6:30pm
•   Resume Writing Workshop - W 9/19 5pm-6pm
•   Bytemarks Talk with Burt Lum - R 9/25 5pm-6pm

The newly created UH-Maui College Chapter had fourteen students
helping with the IEEE/IFIP Network Operations and Management Symposium
(NOMS 2012) at The Westin Maui Resort & Spa this past April. The
students described it as a tremendous experience and the chapter is
ready to support other events. (http://www.maui.hawaii.edu/ecet)

We're excited to be coordinating with other organizations, such as
AAUW, AARP and the Society for Women in Engineering. The AAUW Honolulu
Branch hosts Start Smart, a salary negotiation workshop designed to
teach students (women in particular) how to negotiate for fair and
equitable salaries. (rsvp. Joanna Amberger at             808-489-2813      )

•   Friday, September 28 3-5:45pm, Shidler College of Business
•   Saturday, October 13, 2012 9am-Noon, Laulima House, 1802 Ke`eaumoku Street, Honolulu, HI 96822

2. Nominations for Computer Society Officers:

Our Computer Society Chapter is putting out a call for nominations, so
we can elect new chapter officers by the end of the year. Nominations
are due by November 9th, with elections held the first week of
December. John Camery is serving as chapter chair and David Morse is
serving as vice chair for the chapter until the elections.

3. High School hacking - Hawaii has more teams than many Big States!

Reviewing the teams signed up so far, Hawaii exceeds the national mean
with 15! The folks at uscyberpatriot.org have pre-packaged the entire
competition with tutorials and virtual server images for kids to
launch and configure. Local schools are looking for team Mentors -
would you like to lend a helping hand? Most of the teams (high
school and JROTC) have teachers for coaches. But often, the teacher
doesn't know the first thing about technology. That's where you come
in as a Mentor! Visit the site:
http://www.uscyberpatriot.org/HowYouFit/mentors.aspx

4. Committee formed for preparing Conference bids:

Conference Committee to assess and develop bids to host future
conferences. John noted that the IEEE-USA conf. has a Sept. submittal
deadline. Additional committee members and input welcome.
(https://webinabox.vtools.ieee.org/wibp_officers/index/R60017)

5. Competition to design new Section website:

Open to all Student members, our website development contest aims to

develop a better web presence for our Hawaii Section and chapters.

David Morse is organizing the contest. Contact him for details at

David.Morse@ieee.org, or visit our interim homepage at

www.ieee-hawaii.org for more information.

6. Monday Sept. 3rd (Labor Day) ExCom meeting - all are welcome!

The EXCOM meeting will take place on Monday, Labor Day, Sept. 3, 2012

in conjunction with a technical meeting. This dinner meeting will be

at the usual place and time, viz., 5:30PM at Zippy's, 59 North Vineyard Boulevard

Honolulu, HI 96817. Map: http://zippys.com/live/locations/vineyard/.

Last year we had a technical meeting in which the E-Cat was discussed.

We will discuss the progress on the E-Cat since then. Information on

the E-Cat is at www.ecat.com.

EXCOM Meeting Agenda

The Meeting

The EXCOM meeting will take place on Monday, Labor Day, Sept. 3, 2012 in conjunction with a technical meeting.  This dinner meeting will be at the usual place 5:30PM at Zippy's, 59 North Vineyard Boulevard Honolulu, HI 96817. Map: http://zippys.com/live/locations/vineyard/. Last year we had a technical meeting in which the E-Cat was discussed.  We will discuss the progress on the E-Cat since then. Information on the E-Cat is at www.ecat.com.

The Agenda

1. The Communication Society/Signal Processing Society Chapter (Com19/SP01) must report two technical meetings before the November meeting of the MGA Board to avoid being dissolved. I propose the section co host two technical meetings together with the chapter in the September/October time frame and count them for the chapter.  Do we have anyone willing to be a speaker?

2. Discuss efforts to schedule a meeting about STEM opportunities in Hawaii. David Morse has been exploring the possibilities.

3. Discuss support for the Student Branch. Scheduling our annual joint Business Card Exchange Meeting with them,  our web design contest and other joint meetings and support.

4. Schedule a topic for a technical meeting to be held in conjunction with the the October EXCOM meeting. Last year we had a technical meeting on renewable energy. Also, in our newsletter we publicized licensing opportunities from the national labs.  DOE has presented many webinars and videos on these opportunities. These are possible topics.

IEEE Labor Day Meeting

We usually hold a dinner meeting the first Monday of each month. That makes our next meeting on Labor Day, Sept. 3, 2012.  Our dinner meeting will be at the usual place 5:30PM at Zippy's, 59 North Vineyard Boulevard Honolulu, HI 96817. Map: http://zippys.com/live/locations/vineyard/. Last year we had a technical meeting in which the E-Cat was discussed.  We will discuss the progress on the E-Cat since then.   

Upcoming Student Branch Events

----- (UH Manoa Student Branch - Tentative Event List - Fall 2012) ----
First General Meeting - W 8/29 5pm-7pm
Summer Internships and Coops Seminar - W 9/12 5pm-6:30pm
Resume Writing Workshop - W 9/19 5pm-6pm
Bytemarks Talk with Burt Lum - R 9/25 5pm-6pm

Also a few events that don't have set dates yet:
AutoCAD Workshop
Matlab Workshop
Soldering Workshop
Technical Resume Writing Workshop
Interview Workshop
Eagle and/or PCB Design Workshop
H-Power Tour
Referentia Tour
Solar Farm Tour
Krispy Kreme Fundraiser
T-shirt Fundraiser
Game Tournament Fundraiser
Weekly Sports Day Social Event
BBQ Social Event
Movie Night Social Event
S-PAC

We also usually plan a business card exchange with the Hawaii Section.
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