Earth observation During his inaugural address at TU Delft on Wednesday, 3 September, Professor Ramon Hanssen of the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering argues in favour of observation of the earth from space.
Hanssen believes that manned space travel has fewer obvious applications. Hannsen: “Reconnoitering other planets appeals to our imagination, but it can also be achieved using unmanned missions; these can conduct most tasks better, more cheaply, more safely and more efficiently. Europe would do well to focus on this and not imitate the work other countries are already doing and will continue to do. There is another argument. Our knowledge of how our own planet behaves is paltry, and space travel could play a role here. It would be sensible for Europe to stop manned space travel and to concentrate on those areas in which it leads the way, such as observation of the earth.”
Customer day
The Delft Centre for Computational Science and Engineering (DCSE) will hold a customer day on 19 September. Over the course of the day, which begins at 9:00 in the auditorium, points of scientific interest and technological innovations from the DCSE will be presented to large engineering institutes, industry, and small to medium-sized companies. Industry will also get the chance to put their scientific questions to the DCSE community. The DCSE hopes this day will strengthen links between the university and industry.
TopTalent
Kavli-PhD researcher Reinier Heeres has been awarded a NWO TopTalent grant. Heeres is one of 48 doctoral students who have received a NOW-grant. The grants are given to ‘current researchers who are applying their creative ideas to doctoral research’. Heeres’ doctoral research is being supervised by Professor Leo Kouwenhoven of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience. Heeres will receive a grant worth a maximum of 180,000 euro for pursuing his research
Good vibrations
Researchers at TU Delft’s Kavli Institute of Nanoscience and colleagues at the NTT Basic Research Laboratories in Japan have used a new method to successfully measure vibrations smaller than an atom’s nucleus. This result is important to the development of ultra-small sensors. Their findings have been published in the Nature Physics journal. An airbag sensor is one of the many examples of what are known as micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS). These systems react to electrical and mechanical stimuli such as making a super-small beam – known as the resonator (R) – oscillate. Researchers around the world are working on developing even smaller systems: nano-electromechanical systems (NEMS). Their tiny dimensions mean that NEMS can, for instance, easily be integrated into chips. The researchers have succeeded in observing a movement by the resonator of less than 10 femtometer (a femtometer is a millionth of a nanometer). The measured movement is smaller than the size of an atom nucleus.
Street race
The Germans won in Zoetermeer. The student members of the successful DUT racing team held a demonstration race in the parking lot in Zoetermeer on August 30. twenty teams competed in the 22 kilometer endurance race, in front of a crowd of thousands. The team for TU Darmstadt won this first DUTch Open. TU Delft’s team captain Henk Wapstra blamed the TU team’s failure to win on the fact that the team was more concerned with successfully organizing the race than with competing.
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