University of Washington

The Boeing Company

Santosh Devasia

Samuel Francis Pedigo

Shuonan Dong

Lucky Singh

Silas Lawton Studley

Nathan Alphonse Secinaro

Lukas Wavrin

James Hutchinson

Nini Hong

Devin Ide

Connor Burch

Kevin Hsu

Joseph L Garbini

Jerry Deming Chungbin

Kieseok Oh

Kyong Hoon Lee

James J Riley

Jiradech Kongthon

Qingze Zou

Dhanakorn Iamratanakul

Benjamin Yat-Chun Wong

Kyle William Schultz

Héctor Ramiro Pérez Rodriguez

Wade Marquette

Derek Keith Loy

Anuj Tiwari

John W Fuller

Jae Chung

There is provided a mechanical avatar assembly for use in a confined space in a structure. The mechanical avatar assembly includes a rail assembly for attachment to an access opening to the confined space. The rail assembly includes two or more rail segments coupled together to form an elongated base having a rail and a gear rack extending along a length of the elongated base. The rail assembly further includes a carriage portion coupled to the rail, and movable relative to the rail, and a drive assembly coupled to the carriage portion and to the gear rack, to move the carriage portion along the rail. The mechanical avatar assembly further includes an articulating avatar arm coupled to, and movable via, the carriage portion. The mechanical avatar assembly further includes an image capturing device.

Mechanical avatar assembly and system for use in a confined space in a structure and method of using the same

A method of manufacturing a backed cross-ply prepreg comprises cutting, using a cutting machine, a first continuous length of a unidirectional prepreg into first prepreg segments, each having an opposing pair of segment cut edges that are non-parallel to a lengthwise direction of the unidirectional prepreg. The method also includes picking up, using a pick-and-place system, the first prepreg segments off of the cutting machine, and placing the first prepreg segments in end-to-end relation onto a conveyor belt of an adhesion machine, and in an orientation such that the segment cut edges are generally parallel to a lengthwise direction of the conveyor belt. The method also includes feeding, using the conveyor belt, the first prepreg segments to an adhesion station of the adhesion machine, and adhering, using the adhesion station, the first prepreg segments to a continuous length of a backing material.

System and method for manufacturing cross-ply pre-impregnated material

A manufacturing system includes a cutting machine, an adhesion machine, and a pick-and-place system. The cutting machine sequentially cuts a continuous length of a unidirectional prepreg into prepreg segments. Each prepreg segment has an opposing pair of segment cut edges that are non-parallel to a lengthwise direction of the unidirectional prepreg. The adhesion machine has a conveyor belt and an adhesion station. The pick-and-place system sequentially picks up the prepreg segments from the cutting machine, and places the prepreg segments in end-to-end relation on the conveyor belt, and in an orientation such that the segment cut edges are generally parallel to a lengthwise direction of the conveyor belt. The conveyor belt feeds the prepreg segments to the adhesion station. The adhesion station adheres the prepreg segments to a continuous length of a backing material, thereby resulting in a continuous length of a backed cross-ply prepreg.

The behavior of automated agents, such as autonomous vehicles, drones, and the like, can be improved by control systems and methods that implement a combination of neighbor following behavior, or neighbor-averaged information transfer, with delayed self-reinforcement by utilizing time-delayed movement data to modify course corrections of each automated agent. Disclosed herein are systems and methods by which a follower agent, or a multiple follower agents in formation with a plurality of automated agents, can be controlled by generating course correction data for each follower agent based on the movement of neighboring agents in formation, and augmenting the course correction data based on time-delayed movement data of the follower agent. The delayed self-reinforcement behavior can (i) increase the information-transfer rate between autonomous agents without requiring an increased, individual update-rate; and (ii) cause superfluid-like information transfer between the autonomous agents, resulting in improvements in formation-keeping performance of the autonomous agents.

Method for controlling autonomous agents using self-reinforcement

A device comprises: one or more cantilevered biomimetic cilia, and a liquid disposed among the one or more biomimetic cilia, wherein individual biomimetic cilia are at least partially submerged in the liquid, and wherein the biomimetic cilia are arranged for excitation into resonance, such as for mixing and pumping via the resonant behavior of the excited cilia.

Devices, apparatus, and methods employing biomimetic cilia for microfluidic manipulation

A method useful to change a system's output from one value to another within a prescribed time-interval in an optimal manner using optimization criteria such as minimal time (e.g., to increase throughput) or minimal energy (e.g., to reduce heat dissipation and reduce induced vibrations). Optimal design of maneuvers (such as fast seek and scanning) that rapidly change the output from one value to another, arise in flexible structure applications, including rapidly positioning the end-point of large-scale space manipulators, positioning of read/write heads of disk-drive servo systems, which are relatively medium-scale flexible structures, and nano-scale positioning and manipulation using relatively small-scale piezo actuators. Maintaining a position of an element constant outside of the transition time-interval is critical in many applications. For example, in disk-drive applications, read and write operations cannot be performed (before and after the output transition) if the output position is not precisely maintained at a desired track.

Fast positioning of disk drives and other physical systems

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Seattle, WA, United States of America

Santosh Devasia