Umbra Applied Technologies launches improved ClearView wrist fixator to be more versatile so the approach to external bone fixation can be implemented across a wider segment of the orthopedic community.
Tampa, Florida – Umbra Applied Technologies Group Inc. announced that its next generation bone fixator, ClearView G2 is ready for release with initial pilot surgeries to be completed over the course of the next 90 days.
Five years ago, through a strategic partnership with GE, Umbra Applied Technologies created the ClearView wrist fixator. The ClearView fixator was the world's first medical grade Lexan based wrist fixator that produced clearer X-ray views of fractured bone reduction and pin placement. The paradigm shifting device further raised the bar by being radiolucent thus reducing the amount of necessary times a clinical staff and patient needed to be exposed to radiation. This device additionally revolutionized the industry by producing a fixator that was lightweight, radiolucent, eliminated the need to modify clothing when worn, fully adjustable post-operative surgery and designed with a unique ball and pin holder assembly enabling pins to be inserted and fixed within a 30-degree arc.
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Alex Umbra remarked, “Umbra Applied Technologies has successful improved its ClearView wrist fixator to be more versatile so that our unique approach to external bone fixation could be implemented across a wider segment of the orthopedic community. With the development of our ClearView G2 we now have a design that can be used on all small bones such as those found in the feet as well as the hands.”
The ClearView G2 facilitates function while shortening treatment duration by addressing trauma or limb reconstruction in a way that enhances the human body's natural healing process and works within the parameters of a patient's practical daily life. UAT's G2 fixator is the most versatile and advanced product available to be used on applications that include post traumatic and congenital limb reconstruction, limb salvage, complex arthrodesis, management of osteomyelitis and bone defects, and deformity correction. UAT's advanced research arm was able to take their already cutting-edge ClearView fixator and propel it years ahead of its competitors by addressing osteo-healing from the perspective of the human body's biology not mechanics. When pressed to describe how the G2 is better than its competitors, Mr. Umbra responded, "We have been able to enhance a method for osteogenesis that relies on a percutaneous approach with minimal trauma to the limb, closed anatomic fracture reduction, and unheard of bony stability that allows early weight bearing. We have done this with a low profile, low impact device that not only reduces the amount of X-rays a patient may need but we have done it in a way that allows for one device to be used in more than one part of the anatomy. It represents the very best of UAT design and engineering".
The ClearViewG2 is scheduled to go into production in October of this year.
Source: Umbra Applied Technologies Group
Production and slice extensions provide standardized tools for organizing and slicing models.
Wakefield, Massachusetts – The 3MF Consortium (3MF) released two specification extensions to its 3MF Core Specification 1.1 for general availability today. The 3MF Production Extension and the 3MF Slice Extension provide productivity enhancements that allow high-volume additive manufacturing facilities to better integrate and manage their 3D printing operations than previously possible. The 3MF Production and 3MF Slice Extensions are free to download immediately.
“The 3MF Production and 3MF Slice Extensions to our core specification are significant enhancements that move the industry closer to a fully integrated, high-volume additive manufacturing end-to-end 3D printing solution,” said Adrian Lannin, executive director, 3MF Consortium. “Release of specifications like these aligns with the 3MF Consortium’s mission to help improve the efficiency and productivity of additive manufacturing solutions with standardized software.”
3MF Production Extension Designed for high-volume users such as service bureaus, the 3MF Production Extension makes it more efficient for users to organize and manage print jobs with multiple parts by keeping them in separate .xml files within the 3MF package, thus dividing the parsing load for large jobs. The 3MF package manages the file hierarchy and relationships among the files, as well as keeping unique identifiers for each part instance.
3MF Slice Extension “High-volume additive manufacturing requires practical software that simplifies the 3D design and manufacturing process while fully describing a model, retaining internal information, color, and other characteristics,” said Alexander Oster, chairman, 3MF Technical Working Group and director, additive manufacturing, at Autodesk. “These extensions were developed to solve in a clear, straightforward manner two critical interoperability issues impacting efficiency and manageability in today’s additive manufacturing facilities.”
The additive manufacturing industry grew by more than $1 billion for the second consecutive year in 2015, according to Wohlers Associates, an independent consulting firm.
About the 3MF Consortium Launched in 2015, the 3MF Consortium is a Joint Development Foundation project with the goal to define a 3D printing format that will allow design applications to send full-fidelity 3D models to a mix of other applications, platforms, services and printers. The 3MF (for 3D Manufacturing Format) specification eliminates the widespread issues with currently available file formats.
Founding members of the 3MF Consortium are: 3D Systems; Autodesk, Inc.; Dassault Systèmes, SA.; FIT AG; GE Global Research; HP, Inc.; Materialise; Microsoft Corporation; Shapeways, Inc.; Siemens PLM Software; SLM Solutions Group AG; Stratasys, and Ultimaker.
Plan to attend the IMTS 2016 Conferences to learn about laser material processing.
Chicago, Illinois - For over 40 years laser material processing has been defined as: A laser source (continuous or pulsed) providing the ability to deliver large amounts of energy into a localized region of material in order to achieve a desired response such as heating, melting (welding), and or evaporation (cutting and drilling). During the laser/material interaction a number of unwanted outcomes may occur and these are classified in two categories: primary and secondary. To ensure the quality and consistency of the process it is necessary to optimize both laser and processing parameters in the hope of reducing/eliminating these primary and secondary defects.
Some of the primary defects for laser cutting, drilling and welding, include excessive dross, large kerf width, striations/gouging; excessive recast and oxide layer, cracking, taper; heat affected zone, spatter, porosity, lack of weld penetration, undercut (top and bottom weld bead), heat affected zone cracking, loss of mechanical strength. To some extent, these defects have been historically addressed by optimizing laser and processing parameters, including average and peak power, laser beam size (focusing) and the process speed. Other parameters that are known to be important are gas flow rates, type of assist and shielding gas, orientation of the laser beam to the surface, workpiece geometry, depth of focus, beam mode structure and the joint configuration. Sometimes optimizing conventional laser and processing parameters has not been enough to produce defect free component processing. In many applications, further optimization is required to produce parts which require no post processing. The combination of advanced control techniques and a better understanding of the nature of defects has resulted in an innovative series of laser processing techniques for fiber laser-based systems. These processing tools are not simply the result of the use of a fiber laser. They are based on and require advanced control of the laser output and tighter integration of the laser, motion, and process sensors to reduce and, in some cases, eliminate secondary defects.
Among the areas addressed are the excessive surface spatter caused by piercing during laser cutting and drilling, “back wall strike” or damage to a surface adjacent to an area of laser hole drilling, and the depression typically found at the end of a weld. These techniques were developed through investigation followed by advancements in integration of laser, motion, and process sensors. They are now helping to increase the productivity and quality in 3D laser material processing. The presentation will summarize defects historically associated with laser processing and the role of advanced control in reducing or eliminating these defects as a means of improving quality and productivity in precision laser processing.
About the speaker Mark Barry has spent over 32 years working at Prima Power Laserdyne and is currently Vice President of Sales and Marketing. During this period laser material processing has progressed from the era when slow flow CO2 lasers of 600 Watts were considered state of the art to today’s fast developing and broad spectrum of multi-kilowatt lasers, systems and processes. A native and current resident of the Buffalo, NY area, Mr. Barry has AS and BS degrees from what is now the State University of New York at Buffalo and has worked in manufacturing and engineering roles for 40 years. His focus has been and remains the pursuit of precision laser material processing.
Registration for the IMTS 2016 Conferences is open now!
This flexible wearable sensor can be worn on the arm to detect alcohol level. Photo credit: UC San Diego
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a flexible wearable sensor that can accurately measure a person's blood alcohol level from sweat and transmit the data wirelessly to a laptop, smartphone, or other mobile device. The device can be worn on the skin and could be used by doctors and police officers for continuous, non-invasive and real-time monitoring of blood alcohol content.
The device consists of a temporary tattoo – which sticks to the skin, induces sweat and electrochemically detects the alcohol level – and a portable flexible electronic circuit board, which is connected to the tattoo by a magnet and can communicate the information to a mobile device via Bluetooth. The work, led by nanoengineering professor Joseph Wang and electrical engineering professor Patrick Mercier, both at UC San Diego, was published recently in the journal ACS Sensors.
"Lots of accidents on the road are caused by drunk driving. This technology provides an accurate, convenient and quick way to monitor alcohol consumption to help prevent people from driving while intoxicated," Wang said. The device could be integrated with a car's alcohol ignition interlocks, or friends could use it to check up on each other before handing over the car keys, he added.
"When you're out at a party or at a bar, this sensor could send alerts to your phone to let you know how much you've been drinking," said Jayoung Kim, a materials science and engineering PhD student in Wang's group and one of the paper's co-first authors.
Blood alcohol concentration is the most accurate indicator of a person's alcohol level, but measuring it requires pricking a finger. Breathalyzers, which are the most commonly used devices to indirectly estimate blood alcohol concentration, are non-invasive, but they can give false readouts. For example, the alcohol level detected in a person's breath right after taking a drink would typically appear higher than that person's actual blood alcohol concentration. A person could also fool a breathalyzer into detecting a lower alcohol level by using mouthwash.
Recent research has shown that blood alcohol concentration can also be estimated by measuring alcohol levels in what's called insensible sweat – perspiration that happens before it's perceived as moisture on the skin. But this measurement can be up to two hours behind the actual blood alcohol reading. On the other hand, the alcohol level in sensible sweat – the sweat that's typically seen – is a better real-time indicator of the blood alcohol concentration, but so far the systems that can measure this are neither portable nor fit for wearing on the body.
Now, UC San Diego researchers have developed an alcohol sensor that's wearable, portable and could accurately monitor alcohol level in sweat within 15 minutes.
"What's also innovative about this technology is that the wearer doesn't need to be exercising or sweating already. The user can put on the patch and within a few minutes get a reading that's well correlated to his or her blood alcohol concentration. Such a device hasn't been available until now," Mercier said.
How it works Wang and Mercier, the director and co-director, respectively, of the UC San Diego Center for Wearable Sensors, collaborated to develop the device. Wang's group fabricated the tattoo, equipped with screen-printed electrodes and a small hydrogel patch containing pilocarpine, a drug that passes through the skin and induces sweat.
Mercier's group developed the printed flexible electronic circuit board that powers the tattoo and can communicate wirelessly with a mobile device. His team also developed the magnetic connector that attaches the electronic circuit board to the tattoo, as well as the device's phone app.
"This device can use a Bluetooth connection, which is something a breathalyzer can't do. We've found a way to make the electronics portable and wireless, which are important for practical, real-life use," said Somayeh Imani, an electrical engineering PhD student in Mercier's lab and a co-first author on the paper.
The tattoo works first by releasing pilocarpine to induce sweat. Then, the sweat comes into contact with an electrode coated with alcohol oxidase, an enzyme that selectively reacts with alcohol to generate hydrogen peroxide, which is electrochemically detected. That information is sent to the electronic circuit board as electrical signals. The data are communicated wirelessly to a mobile device.
Putting the tattoo to the test Researchers tested the alcohol sensor on 9 healthy volunteers who wore the tattoo on their arms before and after consuming an alcoholic beverage (either a bottle of beer or glass of red wine). The readouts accurately reflected the wearers' blood alcohol concentrations.
The device also gave accurate readouts even after repeated bending and shaking. This shows that the sensor won't be affected by the wearer's movements, researchers said.
As a next step, the team is developing a device that could continuously monitor alcohol levels for 24 hours.
Full paper: "Noninvasive Alcohol Monitoring Using a Wearable Tattoo-Based Iontophoretic-Biosensing System." Authors of the paper are Jayoung Kim,* Itthipon Jeerapan,* Somayeh Imani,* Thomas N. Cho, Amay Bandodkar, Stefano Cinti, Patrick P. Mercier and Joseph Wang, all from UC San Diego.
*These authors contributed equally to this work.
This work was supported by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering of the National Institutes of Health (grant no. R21EB019698), the Defense Threat Reduction Agency Joint Science and Technology Office for Chemical and Biological Defense (grant no. HDTRA1-16-1-0013) and the UC San Diego Center for Wearable Sensors.
Major projects boost mid-year figures to a healthy level; machine tool order bookings in the German machine tool industry rose by 16%.
Frankfurt am Main, Germany – In the second quarter of 2016, order bookings in the German machine tool industry rose by 16% compared to the preceding year’s equivalent period. Domestic orders were up by 19%, while demand from abroad increased by 14%. The eurozone contributed growth of 37%, and non-eurozone nations a ten-per-cent rise in orders. In the year’s first half, order bookings increased by a substantial twelve% compared to the preceding year’s figure. While domestic order bookings rose by ten%, orders from abroad were also up, by 13%.
All in all, order bookings are developing auspiciously. “The year’s second quarter, too, signals a green light for an overall rise in orders during the current year. Our business is running significantly better than we expected at the beginning of the year. The sector can point to a sound, balanced performance over the year’s first half,” comments Dr. Wilfried Schäfer, executive director of the sectoral organization VDW (German Machine Tool Builders’ Association) in Frankfurt am Main.
The higher level of demand results primarily from good domestic business, and in particular from automotive projects in China and Mexico. Thus the substantial rise in orders is equally attributable to both domestic orders and exports. With reference to the first half of 2016, one-off effects are primarily responsible for the auspicious order situation. Abroad, machining centersand milling machines are benefiting particularly from large-scale orders. All other metal-cutting technologies, plus significant areas of forming technology, however, are performing less well in terms of orders from abroad. On the domestic scene, by contrast, the picture is somewhat different.
“Metal-cutting is two% up, and the current as-is situation gives reason to hope that a broad spectrum of technologies can benefit from this,” Schäfer says.
Turnover in the first half of 2016 ended up slightly better than break-even.
“In view of the encouraging development of orders in the year’s first six months, and the range of order backlogs, now recovered to over seven months, we are anticipating a perceptible rise in turnover for the upcoming period,” Schäfer says.
This, he added, is conditional on demand levels remaining stable in the year’s second half as well, particularly on the domestic market. Germany’s industrial sector is in good shape, and exhibits impressive pricing structures and competitive efficacy. The ifo Business Climate Index, for instance, contrary to analysts’ expectations, recovered again in July.
“Despite Brexit, the business cycle is holding up well, and showing no significant signs of deterioration,” Schäfer explains.
Employment remains at a high level. This is an indication that the German machine tool manufacturers, despite cyclical fluctuations, are keeping themselves fit to face the challenges of the future. “The sector is entering the year’s second half in improved condition, and is continuing to invest in qualified staff,” Schäfer emphasizes. In May 2016, almost 69,000 people were employed in the machine tool industry – a slight increase of around one% over the preceding year.
Background The German machine tool industry ranks among the five largest specialist groupings in the mechanical engineering sector. It provides production technology for metalworking applications in all branches of industry, and makes a crucial contribution towards innovation and enhanced productivity in the industrial sector as a whole. Due to its absolutely key role for industrial production, its development is an important indicator for the economic dynamism of the industrial sector as such. In 2015, with around 68,500 employees (annual average for 2015, firms with more than 50 staff), the sector produced machines and services worth around 15.1 billion euros.