Developmental
Innovations
is a proposed Fall Semester 200X arts, science, and engineering class
introducing the vast challenges faced by people in developing nations and
emerging regions and surveying the various appropriate and leapfrog
technologies under development at MIT and beyond to tackle these major
problems.
Summary
Description –
We survey developmental innovations via case examples and brainstorming with
technology experts in a dozen major categories of developmental
challenges. We cover the wide range of
scientific, technological, and design work currently being undertaken at MIT by
faculty, staff, and students throughout most schools and departments. This course builds on prior seminars SP.753 Designs
for Developing Countries, MAS.963 Development Technologies, and Design
That Matters.
Expected Student Deliverables
– We expect
students to write a final paper – on a developmental innovation theme – of high
enough quality for potential publication in a worthy medium, anything from
MIT’s Tech, MURJ, the MIT student research journal, the MIT African Technology
Forum, Technology Review, or beyond. We
further urge students to craft at least a first-iteration prototype of some
developmental technology project for further refinement throughout the Spring
Semester Design That Matters developmental projects course.
Catalyzing
the MIT 1G Developmental Technology Challenge – We challenge our students and people
generally to craft economically viable solutions for problems faced by at
least One Billion people worldwide.
We encourage students to tackle these big challenges in any of many
possible problem domains, but we hope folks will pursue the most pressing and
promising prospects with greatest vigor.
By embracing live experts from all around the Institute, we hope to survey the broad spectrum of challenges and opportunities facing developing nations and to highlight where at MIT interested student might find UROPs, RAships, theses, and more. Proposed themes include, but are not limited to:
|
Theme |
Experts |
Topics |
|
Water
& Sanitation |
Murcott,
Harleman |
Clean
Water |
|
Health |
Pentland,
Lander, Smith |
Ehealth,
Malaria, AIDS |
|
Shelter
& Cities |
Sanyal |
Urbanization,
Planning |
|
Power
Systems |
Sachs, Prestero, Wilson, Maguire |
Cheap
Solar, Human, Distributed |
|
Transportation |
Sheffi? |
Urban
congestion |
|
Communication |
Levison,
Shepard? |
Inexpensive
reliable IT |
|
Education
|
Abelson,
Resnick |
OpenCourseWare |
|
Personal
Tools |
Jacobson,
Nishi |
Digital
Paper |
|
Local
Fabrication |
Gershenfeld,
Vigoda, Griffith |
OpenSource
Hardware, Fast fab |
|
Language
Barriers |
Zue,
Roy, Kurzweil |
Universal
Translator |
|
Eyesight
& Vision |
Griffith |
Low
Cost Glasses |
|
Open
Source |
Hariharan,
Kakhani, Sawhney |
ThinkCycle,
Linux |
|
Environment |
Molina,
Ashford, Zuberi, Parekh |
Atmospheric
& oceanic |
|
Infrastructure |
Moavenzadeh? |
Technology
& Development |
|
Leveraging
Crafts |
Dhande |
Handicrafts
global |
|
Prosthetics |
Herr,
Pratt |
Trauma
recovery |
|
Remote
Imaging |
Levy |
Landmine
detection, disaster recovery |
|
Other… |
|
|
Anne
Mayes http://dmse.mit.edu/people/faculty/amayes/index.html
Better
filters http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/rd/2001/feb.html
OCW
rxn http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/tt/2001/apr11/ocwside.html