_RENEW INNOVATION LECTURE SERIES PRESENTS:_PROF. RUDRA PRATAP
LECTURE TITLE: BIO-INSPIRED MICRO AND NANO SCALE ENGINEERING: THE
REALM OF ENDLESS INNOVATIONS
Our ability to probe biological systems at multiple length scales and
learn about their incredibly intelligent designs, coupled with the
recent technological advances in making and manipulating things at
extremely small length scales, has opened a new world of endless
possibilities in engineering. The study of biological systems is now
moving rapidly from fact-finding and “how-does-it-work” quest to
system science and design-principle discoveries. What was once only a
functional inspiration (e.g., flying by watching birds) is now turning
into a quest for nature inspired design principles, synthesis of new
materials, and optimization of multifunctional components. Nature’s
designs are neither random nor bespoke. There are extremely
intelligent design templates that allow plenty of second order
variations to produce seemingly different systems. It is this design
principle that is of central interest to engineering today. As our
quest for intelligent systems grows, we realize that we need to
integrate numerous small-scale sensors and actuators into our systems
just the way Nature does. This need calls for radical changes in the
design of sensors and actuators. I will illustrate this idea in this
talk by presenting our studies on field-crickets for understanding
bioacoustic transducers and a study of insect halters as navigational
sensors. I will show how these systems and their designs are radically
different from their human engineered counterparts. I will also
present how we have been able to use our understanding of the
unusually loud sound producing mechanism of field crickets and its
cleaver design that imparts distinctive song frequencies to different
species of crickets for a very innovative design of MEMS speakers. I
will also share our quest for innovation in transducer design inspired
by our study of some Nature’s sensors used by such insects.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER:
Dr Rudra Pratap is a Professor at the Centre for Nano Science and
Engineering (CeNSE), and an associate faculty of the Department of
Mechanical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.
Dr Rudra Pratap specializes in MEMS and NEMS design. Apart from MEMS
and NEMS, his research interests include mechanobiology, sensor
technology, and computational mechanics. Dr. Rudra Pratap holds a
Ph.D. degree from Cornell University, USA and a B. Tech. from the
Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India. He is a Fellow of
the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of
Science.
WHEN: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 26TH, FROM 10:30AM - 11:30AM
WHERE: CAPEN 10 (BUFFALO ROOM)
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27/09/2018 Last update
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