Around the Quad

Inspired by Apollo, Engineers Week eyes the future of space travel.

Engineers Week 2020 will resound with space-race fervor and pride Feb. 15-21, as the Case School of Engineering partners with the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo moon landing. President Kennedy famously challenged the nation in 1961 to land on the moon before decade’s end. Ohio-native Neil Armstrong took the small step for man, giant leap for mankind July 20, 1969.

This year, the JFK Library is recalling the Apollo missions in partnership with select research universities, including Case, which played pioneering roles in the nation’s space program.

In 1958, President Dwight D. Eisenhower picked T. Keith Glennan, president of Case Institute of Technology, to organize the National Aeronautics Space Administration. Glennan proposed a manned trip to the moon.

In the ensuing years, Case graduates took leading roles as scientists and engineers at the NASA Glenn Research Center (then Lewis Field), which specialized in fuel and propulsion systems for the Apollo rockets.

Case also produced astronauts like Don Thomas ’77, PhD, a veteran of four Space Shuttle missions. Thomas is scheduled to address the Engineers Week Reception Monday, Feb. 17, and a Tuesday, Feb. 18, symposium exploring the future of space travel.

Here is a tentative list of E-week events of special interest to alumni. Find details at casealumni.org/e-week/ • E-week Reception, 5 to 7:30 p.m.

Feb. 17, Thwing Ballroom • Moonshot Symposium with JFK

Library, Feb. 18 • Moon Rover Challenge, 5 to 7 p.m.

Feb. 20, Tinkham Veale ballrooms • SWE Luncheon, 12:45 p.m. Feb. 21,

Nord 356

• KSL/think[box] Design Competition, 1 to 3 pm Feb. 20, at Sears think[box]

With an alumni boost, data science gains department status.

As the skills required of electrical engineers and computer scientists mounted and diverged, many had seen a need to split the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science — allowing for a keener focus on emerging fields.

The change came this year, with the quiet creation of the Computer and Data Sciences Department, which was spun off from a renamed Department of Electrical, Computer and Systems Engineering. In December, the university amped up the volume, announcing that a Case alumnus made the new department possible with a $5 million gift.

Kevin J. Kranzusch ’90, a California software executive and gaming pioneer, said the industry had changed much since he earned his computer engineering degree nearly 30 years ago, and that he wants to help Case take advantage of the opportunities.

“I’m so excited to be a part of this effort,” he told The Daily, the university’s online news source. “Computer sciences, especially AI and machine learning, are the future, and I hope this can play a part in helping our students to excel in those areas.”

His vision meshes with the Case School of Engineering and Dean Venkataramanan “Ragu” Balakrishnan. “These days, computing and data pervades everything that we do,” the dean told the board of the Case Alumni Association last year. “That means there’s huge potential for impact on the research side of things.” Plans for splitting EECS began under the interim deanship of James McGuffin-Cawley, PhD ’84, who said he weighed advice from alumni, including members of the Silicon Valley Task Force. The new department is Case’s response to a spike in computer science enrollment and rising opportunities in data science, artificial intelligence, machine learning and supercomputing.

“It’s really to align us with the future, and provide the right opportunities for today’s and tomorrow’s students,” McGuffin-Cawley said.

With Professor Jing Li, PhD, serving as interim chair, the school is conducting a national search for the inaugural chair of the new Computer & Data Sciences Department.

What do you think of the creation of the new department? Let us know via casealum@casealum.org.

The School of Engineering helps CWRU rise in a key ranking.

Case Western Reserve climbed 20 places — to No. 47 — in Reuter’s 2019 ranking of The World’s Most Innovative Universities, and engineering researchers deserve much of the credit.

The list identifies the 100 universities around the world doing the most to advance science and invent new technologies, as evidenced by patent production and innovative research.

As an example of Case innovation, evaluators highlighted the work of Xiong “Bill” Yu, PhD, a professor of civil engineering, who has developed roof shingles that change color in reaction to natural light.

Yu and his team took standard asphalt shingles and coated them with special plastic films. Their “chameleon roof shingles” allow a home to absorb more heat in the winter and reflect it in the summer. Computer modeling shows the thermochromatic shingles could lead to a 5 percent reduction in energy demand in the winter and a 13 percent reduction in summer.

“In a world of climate change, you have areas experiencing wilder swings in temperature,” Yu told The Daily this past summer, “so having a roof that reacts to both heat and cold could be beneficial no matter the time of year.” Evaluators also singled out two of the research hubs on Case Quad: The Center for Layered Polymeric Systems (CLiPS) in the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, and the Great Lakes Energy Institute, “which researches the production and harvesting of clean energy.”

The Reuters’ innovation ranking, now in its fifth year, takes a close look at patent filings and the success rate — the percentage of filings that result in a patent. It found CWRU trending in a productive direction.

Surveyors counted 201 patents filed by CWRU between 2012 and 2017 and a success rate of 38 percent. The Daily, CWRU’s online news source, reported that between 2016 and 2019 the number of patent filings from CWRU rose by one third, while the success rate increased by a quarter.

Most of the patents awarded the university are connected to the Case School of Engineering.

At 47, CWRU is the highest ranked university in Ohio and stands in elite company; just below the Technical University of Munich and ahead of Emory, Pittsburgh and Purdue.

Read more at www.reuters.com/ innovative-universities-2019

Professor’s idea for wrapping homes in “fire blankets” sparks interest.

As wildfires raced through California, forcing thousands to flee their homes this fall, a Case researcher’s house-saving solution became a hot topic of discussion.

Fumiaki Takahashi, PhD, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, proposed protecting houses and buildings from wildfires by draping them in fireretardant materials. In October, he published the findings of 10 years of research into the potential of giant fire blankets to protect valued structures.

His idea was shared widely by news services, including Thomas Reuters, which noted new solutions are needed. California’s fires are being exacerbated by climate change, which is making the fire season longer, drying out forests and increasing the strength of winds, forest experts say.

Takahashi, a specialist in fire science and engineering, shared his research in Frontiers in Mechanical Engineering. He wrote that he and his team have tested fire blankets in the lab and in the field, once wrapping a shed in blankets of different materials before engulfing it in a controlled forest fire in New Jersey.

The protection is not foolproof, he said, but the blankets could provide a first line of defense “against a relatively short wild fire attack.” And that’s more than helpless homeowners have now.

Read more at tinyurl.com/sciencedailyfireblanket

Lubrizol commits $2 million to train more Case scientists and engineers.

Science powerhouse Lubrizol Corp. recently broadened its longstanding ties to Case Western Reserve with a $2.2 million grant that will seed new research and fund scholarships for STEM students.

The gift continues a legacy of support that dates nearly to the founding of the company by Case alumni some 90 years ago.

Kent Hale Smith ’17 and his two brothers, Vincent and Kelvin Smith ’22, joined Alex Nason ’22 to launch the Graphite Oil Products Company in 1928. The foursome grew the specialty chemicals company with talent from Case, where the Smith family roots run deep.

The Smith brothers’ father, Dow Chemical co-founder Albert W. Smith, chaired the chemistry department at the Case School of Applied Science and founded the metallurgy department.

Across the decades, support from the Smith family and from Lubrizol endowed scholarships and professorships and helped build the Kelvin Smith Library, the Kent Hale Smith Building and the Tinkham Veale University Center.

Wickliffe-based Lubrizol, which employs 8,700 worldwide, was purchased by Berkshire Hathaway in 2011, but the friendship with Case endured.

The new grant will support science, technology, engineering and math scholarships for underrepresented students, internship and co-op positions, and joint research between the company and the university.

“Lubrizol’s founders, who all had close associations with Case, believed education was critical for the growth of the individual and the business,” said Julie Edgar, Lubrizol's corporate vice president of innovation and chief of sustainability. “We are proud to continue this tradition by supporting and growing STEM talent in our local communities, especially among underrepresented scholars.”

The Case Amateur Radio Club hopes former members help raise new antenna towers.

On the roof of Glennan, nine stories above Case Quad, a trio of hi-frequency antennas cast spidery shadows over a glass-and-cinderblock bunker known as the Ham Shack. Inside the rooftop clubhouse, members of the Case Amateur Radio Club talk to ham radio operators around the world.

To keep the conversation flowing, the club needs to refurbish two of its antenna towers. A capital project looms for a student group with a modest budget.

“We haven’t done anything ‘Kickstart-y’ just yet,” but the club is considering its options, said Kristina Collins, MS ’19, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.

Collins, the club’s historian and former president, has been poring through its old logbooks, building a database of alumni ham enthusiasts. Working with the Case Alumni Association, she hopes to launch a targeted giving campaign.

Following the lead of student groups like the Humanitarian Design Corps, club members will reach out to potential supporters online — and on air — and ask them for help.

It’s a new approach for a venerable club, one founded at Case Institute of Technology in the 1940s. But amateur radio has seen a resurgence of late and alumni might like to know that student interest is strong, Collins said. Plus, crowdfunding seems to offer more than a revenue stream.

“We want to have a relationship with our alumni, whether or not they donate,” she said. “We do have a facility to maintain. So if they donate, great. But we’re communication hobbyists — we do like to talk!”

Reach her at Kristina.Collins@case.edu or KD8OXT.

To help the radio club today, go to http:// casealumni.org/campaigns/radio-club/