ENERGY with Vicky Coy and David Poston

07/20/22 • 25 min

If we want to truly break our dependence on fossil fuels, we’re going to need to get really wild and find power in places we haven’t even thought of. That means new and novel technology, so how do we properly test and evaluate it? This week, we travel from Scotland to space to find out. First, host Derek Burrows welcomes Vicky Coy, the Head of Innovation Projects at Catapult in Glasgow, where they specialize in offshore renewables. Vicky talks about the testing of tidal power and how we can learn from the old to create the new. Then, we launch into space with David Poston, the Chief Technical Officer of Space Nuclear Power Corporation. David breaks down what it’s really like to put nuclear reactors into space, and why good testing is just as much about the doing as it is the dreaming and talking.

Learn More About:

What is tidal energy, and with something this new, how do you test it?
Vicky talks about some of the benchmarks they use in test.
Sometimes in test, it’s the things you wouldn’t expect that fail first. Vicky talks about what she and her team have learned in this arena and the ways they have adapted.
Even though the idea of drawing energy from the sea is new, the methods used to evaluate and test have been around for a long time.
David talks about why we need nuclear reactors in space.
In test, there are sometimes regulations that aren’t very well defined, but you still need to meet with the regulators and ensure everything works.
David is the Chief Reactor Designer for the NASA Kilopower Project, including the DUFF and KRUSTY reactor experiments. How can this lead to changes in the way we test all terrestrial reactors?

Resources Mentioned:

Learn More About:

What is tidal energy, and with something this new, how do you test it?
Vicky talks about some of the benchmarks they use in test.
Sometimes in test, it’s the things you wouldn’t expect that fail first. Vicky talks about what she and her team have learned in this arena and the ways they have adapted.
Even though the idea of drawing energy from the sea is new, the methods used to evaluate and test have been around for a long time.
David talks about why we need nuclear reactors in space.
In test, there are sometimes regulations that aren’t very well defined, but you still need to meet with the regulators and ensure everything works.
David is the Chief Reactor Designer for the NASA Kilopower Project, including the DUFF and KRUSTY reactor experiments. How can this lead to changes in the way we test all terrestrial reactors?

Resources Mentioned:

Previous Episode

HEALTH with Kipp Bradford and Aaron Feldstein

Our lightning-fast innovation helps patients and doctors get results and life-saving solutions at a quicker pace than ever before, but how do we make sure every piece of tech is used safely? Join host Derek Burrows this week as he explores how test is driving and safeguarding the tools that save lives, one patient at a time. First, he welcomes Kipp Bradford, who is on the faculty at the Harvard School of Engineering, a teacher at their Grad School of Design, and the founder of an air conditioner startup called Gradient. Next, Derek welcomes Aaron Feldstein, Manager of Test at Butterfly Network.

Together, these two guests discuss the explosion of innovation and how we can use test to build and test devices for our medical community, getting them into the hands of doctors and patients who need them most.

Learn More About:

How the democratization of tools has led to a broader community of people who can access life-changing medical care.
The explosion of innovation has been driven by makers and engineers who got into the medical field when they saw a need for their skill set, and also patients taking a greater interest in personalizing their own health experience.
With this new innovation, patients can work more in partnership with their doctors and use technology to track aspects of their own health and wellness.
Examples of a few tools that test has allowed us to release on the market, including hearing aids and an ultrasound device that you can run from your phone.
How do we use test and AI software to gather the data that we need to tweak and better our medical equipment?
How does regulation interfere with innovation...or does it actually help?
What elements do we need in test as we move forward toward the democratization of medicine?

Resources Mentioned:

Next Episode

SPEED with Jennifer Alvarez and Jeremy McKinney

As our need for mobile and wireless connectivity becomes more essential, the technology and testing around our phones are also developing at breakneck speed. Cameras get bigger and better screens, confirming our identity becomes more seamless, and how we can quickly collaborate matches our need for connectivity on the go. This week, host Derek Burrows talks with two experts about the testing behind innovation, who’s got a front-row seat watching the need for speed, and who’s in the race to get us our data as fast as possible. First, Jennifer Alvarez is the CEO of Aurora Insight, an IT company that uses its proprietary technology to measure the radio frequency spectrum, and Jeremy McKinney is an associate attorney with Dunlap Codding, a law firm that specializes in intellectual property. They talk about testing in a race of innovation, the future of acceleration, and how times have changed from our flip phones in the 90s.

Learn More About:

5G is not just enhanced 4g. It’s going to enable brand new applications that we can only imagine. Jennifer breaks down the different “G’s” and how we can drive innovation to solve problems.
Aurora is agnostic of the network operator and technology, making it easy to be independent and truly reflect what the network is doing.
The more data your signal can carry, the harder it is to actually transmit.
How do we connect machines and get rid of all those cables and instead, enable wireless connectivity that is super fast, low latency, very reliable, yet able to communicate high bandwidths of data?
How do we even begin to test tech that has to go through a sea change every time a new iteration drops?
A few of the pros and cons of technology where the speed of innovation is so important.
With Aurora Insight’s technology, the real innovation is its ability to vacuum up all the spectrum, not just focusing on collecting cellular or LTE from a mobile network.
As an associate attorney specializing in intellectual property, Jeremy is able to observe the speed of innovation firsthand.
What is a standard essential patent?
Aurora Insight’s approach has been to make the software do all the work, and have relatively generic hardware.

Resources Mentioned: