Energy, and how best to utilize it, is
the focus of a couple of new innovative research initiatives at the
University of Michigan.
A
National Science Foundation-funded
team of scientists at the university is working on ways to make the new
hybrid-electric vehicles more self sufficient. That not only includes
creating cars that consume less energy, but vehicles that can generate
their own. The idea is that if vehicles can harness wind and solar
energy either while running or stationary, they will consume less
electricity from
the traditional grid.
The concept is called vehicle-to-grid
(V2G) integration. Jeff Stein, a mechanical engineering professor at
the University of Michigan, and his colleagues envision a world where
the electric cars become "distributed" storage, doubling as mobile
holding tanks for electricity and ready to serve in their down time.
U-M
researchers are also developing an artificial foot that recycles energy
otherwise wasted in between steps. The idea is to harness this energy
that could potentially help amputees walk with greater ease.
The
human walking gait naturally wastes energy between steps. Since
prosthetics don't produce the same reaction, amputees spend 23 percent
more energy to walk. U-M's energy-recycling foot captures the wasted
energy and channels it to help an ankle to push off. A microcontroller
tells the foot to return the energy to the system at precisely the
right time.
The foot was developed by Art Kuo, professor in
the University of Michigan departments of Biomedical Engineering and
Mechanical Engineering, and Steve Collins, a former U-M graduate
student. Watch a video demonstration of it here.
Source: University of Michigan
Writer: Jon Zemke
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