Research within ICES empowers individuals to innovate, to harness the potential of complex engineered systems thereby greatly improving productivity and enhancing our quality of life. ICES Research is based on integrated approaches to synthesis, acquisition, storage, dissemination and manipulation of information.

Research Initiatives

The Bioengineering Technologies Laboratory brings together researchers from across disciplines at CMU to solve challenging problems in healthcare delivery. Multidisciplinary teams create bioengineered systems for a broad range of applications including tissue engineering, artificial organs, sensors, diagnostic tools, and therapy development.

Enterprise-Wide Optimization (EWO) is a new emerging area that lies at the interface of chemical engineering and operations research, and has become a major goal in the process industries due to the increasing pressures for remaining competitive in the global marketplace. EWO involves optimizing the operations of R&D, supply, manufacturing and distribution of a company to reduce costs and inventories. EWO involves optimizing the operations of R&D, supply, manufacturing and distribution of a company to reduce costs and inventories. A major focus in EWO is the optimal operation of manufacturing facilities, which often requires the use of nonlinear process models. Major operational items include planning, scheduling, real-time optimization and inventory control. One of the key features in EWO is integration of the information and decision-making among the various functions that comprise the supply chain of the company.

The Laboratory for Interactive Computer Systems (LINCS) includes the Wearable Computers Lab and Interaction Design Studio. The objectives of the laboratory are to: Provide expertise in interdisciplinary design, rapid prototyping, and user evaluation; Promote more interdisciplinary design projects; Provide methodology, measurements, and tools to teach these methods and to support design meetings; Provide a physical space and equipment to support design and fabrication; Study interdisciplinary design through practicing it; Develop a metric to compare the prototypes and show a performance increase by several orders of magnitude; and Support education.

The Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) lab is developing technologies for integration of mechanical elements, sensors, electronics, and actuators on a common silicon substrate through the use of micro-fabrication technologies. Current projects are addressing the development of design tools for MEMS (MEMS-CAD), testing of MEMS devices, MEMS-based acoustic and Inertial Measurement Units, sensors for biomedical applications, and technologies for coordinated control of large arrays of sensors and actuators.

The Center for Sensed Critical Infrastructure Research (CenSCIR) performs enabling research aimed at delivering cost-effective, sensor-based monitoring systems for a broad range of critical infrastructure applications. These monitoring systems could be used for decaying bridges, oil and gas pipelines, unstable electric power grids, leaking water distribution systems, and ensuring the security of a university campus.

The mission of CNXT (The Center for Nano-enabled Device and Energy Technologies) is to work on real-world problems that can potentially be solved with appropriate nano-enabled technologies. The current focus of the Center is on nano-enabled sensor and energy technologies. The sensor work at the Center is on chemical and biological sensors, physical sensors, and imaging sensors. In energy, the interest is on technologies for clean energy generation and storage. Specifically, there are on-going projects in the generation of hydrogen as a fuel for fuel cells. There are also projects on novel fuel cell technologies and spectrally broadband photovoltaic cells for solar energy conversion.