New naval engineering center attracts US Naval Academy, corporate, international partners

The Office of Naval Research (ONR) has funded a new and far-reaching naval research and engineering center to be led by Dr. Michael Bruno, director of the Davidson Laboratory at Stevens Institute of Technology. The Atlantic Center for the Innovative Design and Control of Small Ships will involve an impressive consortium of co-investigators, including personnel from the US Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md.; University College, London, England; and the Lockheed Martin Company, Baltimore.

Cooperative work among the partners began Nov. 1. The center facilities will be physically located on the Stevens campus.

Stevens has for the past seven decades played a central role in the development of small ship design technology. Stevens has been and is today an active member of the commercial small ship and boat design community. Davidson Laboratory, a world-class wave tank and towing tank complex at Stevens, has examined over 5,500 designs and has developed close relationships with a number of small ship design firms as well as small ship builders.

"With the Navy's emphasis on smaller ships and craft and on minimum manning," says Dr. Bruno, "specialized areas where Davidson Laboratory has established itself as a leader and where innovation is rapid, Stevens is best positioned to bring this community of small and mid-size ship innovators to the naval design community."

Testimony to Stevens commitment to the maritime industry is its "Center for Maritime Systems," a facility to be built by 2005 that will include the most advanced re-circulating/wave/towing tank in the world and will provide a unique environment to address the technical challenges facing the US naval architecture and ocean engineering industry and the marine transportation industry.

The US Naval Academy has been active in the towing tank analysis of hull designs, particularly over the last 25 years, and has contributed significantly to US Navy ship design. Naval Academy faculty have also been significant contributors to the advancement of ship automation and systems integration.

The University College of London has, over many years, conducted towing tank, analytical, and CFD studies into the application of novel hull designs to naval and commercial roles. Recent examples include the examination of the suitability of trimarans for use as aircraft carriers and fast sealift logistics ships.

"Stevens and its partners in the Atlantic Center understand that there is a deteriorating critical mass
surrounding classical design centers for naval architecture and marine engineering," Bruno said.

"Unless this critical mass is regenerated, it is inevitable that US Naval ships will eventually lag in both innovation and technical development.

"The causes of this phenomenon are complex," he continued, "and include the loss of career opportunities and university curricula in naval architecture. This has led to the decline of the shipbuilding infrastructure within the US."

Bruno also contends that a major challenge in US Navy ship design in the 21st century is ensuring performance and affordability with a reduced crew size while also maintaining high reliability and damage control. This challenge is particularly evident in the design of vessels to meet the Navy's new and emerging needs in the coastal regions. These needs require fast, relatively small vessels capable of operating in the range of weather and ocean conditions encountered in the coastal environment while also meeting the Navy's payload requirements.

The partners in the Atlantic Center propose to address this issue by focusing on two key areas. First is to establish an environment where engineering disciplines associated with hull design and ship automation can be brought together within the context of the total ship system architecture, thereby facilitating the creative knowledge development, educational changes, and discipline integration required for true innovation.

Second is in the utilization of this unique education and research environment in the recruiting, training and long-term career development of the best and brightest young engineers in the US. The partners in the Atlantic Center believe that many of the requisite tools, models, practices, and heuristics do not exist today, and it will be the responsibility of the consortium to identify, and the academic institutions to invent, new research areas and tools to meet the Navy's needs.

Since 1935, Stevens has been the nation's leading naval architecture research and testing center in the areas of high-speed planing craft design and small ship hydrodynamics, including seakeeping and maneuvering. This activity continues today, through a long-standing collaborative relationship with the US commercial small ship and recreational vessel design communities.

"By capitalizing on this partnership with the nation's most innovative designers," said Bruno, "and in collaboration with some of the world's leading academic and industrial naval engineering enterprises, the Atlantic Center will provide the creative, interdisciplinary environment in which to educate the next generation of naval engineers, and will open the door to exciting long-term career opportunities for graduates of the program.

"In this fashion," he concluded, "the Atlantic Center will foster and instill innovation and creativity into the future leadership of the US Navy, and will ensure the nation's ability to maintain superior naval forces."

About Stevens Institute of Technology

Founded in 1870, Stevens Institute of Technology is one of the leading technological universities in the world dedicated to learning and research. Through its broad-based curricula, nurturing of creative inventiveness, and cross disciplinary research, the Institute is at the forefront of global challenges in engineering, science, and technology management. Partnerships and collaboration between, and among, business, industry, government and other universities contribute to the enriched environment of the Institute. A new model for technology commercialization in academe, known as Technogenesis®, involves external partners in launching business enterprises to create broad opportunities and shared value.

Stevens offers baccalaureates, master’s and doctoral degrees in engineering, science, computer science and management, in addition to a baccalaureate degree in the humanities and liberal arts, and in business and technology. The university has a total enrollment of 2,150 undergraduate and 3,500 graduate students, with about 250 full-time faculty. Stevens’ graduate programs have attracted international participation from China, India, Southeast Asia, Europe and Latin America. Additional information may be obtained from its web page at www.stevens.edu.  

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