EDISON AWARDS / Issue #13
July 16, 2015
20 Leagues Under the Sea
Edison Awards Nominee WHOI is getting deep in shallow waters

ThWoods Hole Oceanographic Institution, home of the famed Alvin crewed submersible, maintains its own fleet. WHOI gussied Alvin up with a slew of upgrades last year, but like the folks at Monterey Bay, its focus has been shifting toward AUVs. Its vision for the drone-y future is different than Monterey Bay's, though-Woods Hole researchers are focused on using drones in often dangerous shallow water expeditions, not so much sending them into the open ocean. "We started out saying, 'Look, we don't want to go to the deep ocean, which is where these other vehicles go,'" says Hanumant Singh, a roboticist at Woods Hole. "We want to work on things like archaeology. We want to work on things like fisheries, coral reef ecology. So shallower water." More

Scratch the Surf(ace)

Edison Award Winner Liquid Robotics is going green with new research

Buy Coastal
Move to deeper waters with new innovation from Edison Awards winner Oru Kayak

A company that brought you the world's first origami-inspired folding kayak is back again with a new model - the 16-foot Coast (and Coast+), which is a longer, expedition-style kayak designed for multi-day trips and choppier waters. The Coast offers some neat improvements over Oru's original 12-foot folding kayak, but retains the remarkably simple fold-out design that makes it easy to pack and carry, as well as fun to paddle. More


 

Making Waves
Northwest Energy Innovations is harvesting wave power

For the first time ever, some Americans are turning on the lights with energy from the ocean's waves.

A pilot project in Hawaii is now grid-connected at a naval test site off the island of Oahu. The device, known as Azura, is being tested by the University of Hawaii.


 

"As the first grid connected wave energy device in the U.S. that will be tested and validated by an independent party, this deployment marks a major milestone for our team and the marine renewable energy industry," Northwest Energy Innovations founder and CEO Steve Kopf said in a statement.

The 45-ton Azura absorbs wave energy - from both up-and-down and side-to-side motion - and converts it to electricity. It is the first design of its kind - other projects haven't incorporated this 360-degree motion, according to the company. More 


 

Captain Planet
How Edison Awards speaker Jonathan Trent is fueling the energy conversation

Jonathan Trent works at NASA's nanotechnology department, where he builds microscopic devices out of proteins from extremophiles -- bacteria that live in the world's harshest environments. It isn't the logical place to start a biofuel project. But in 2008, after watching enzymes chomp through plant cells, Trent started thinking about biofuels. And, because he has a background in marine biology, he started thinking about algae and the oceans. More 

2015 Edison Awards Event Photos & Videos

 

 

  

Steering Committee Spotlight

 

Simon Fung


 

Senior Product Development Specialist, 3M Corporation

  

 


 

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