Frontiers of Engineering

This volume includes 16 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2005 U.S. Frontiers of Engineering (USFOE) Symposium held in September 2005. USFOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding engineers (ages 30 to 45) to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2005 symposium covered four topic areas: ID and verification technologies, engineering for developing communities, engineering complex systems, and energy resources for the future. A paper by dinner speaker Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson, president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, is also included. The papers describe leading-edge research on face and human activity recognition, challenges in implementing appropriate technology projects in developing countries, complex networks, engineering bacteria for drug production, organic-based solar cells, and current status and future challenges in fuel cells, among other topics. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and a list of meeting participants. This is the eleventh volume in the USFOE series.

Table of Contents

• Front Matter
• ID AND VERIFICATION TECHNOLOGIES: Introduction
• Ongoing Challenges in Face Recognition
• Designing Biometric Evaluations and Challenge Problems for Face-Recognition Systems
• Large-Scale Activity-Recognition Systems
• ENGINEERING FOR DEVELOPING COMMUNITIES: Introduction
• Challenges in the Implementation of Appropriate Technology Projects: The Case of the DISACARE Wheelchair Center in Zambia
• Engineering Inputs to the CDC Safe Water System Program
• Sustainable Development Through the Principles of Green Engineering
• Science and Engineering Research That Values the Planet
• ENGINEERING COMPLEX SYSTEMS: Introduction
• Complex Networks: Ubiquity, Importance, and Implications
• The Promise of Synthetic Biology
• Population Dynamics of Human Language: A Complex System
• Agent-Based Modeling as a Decision-Making Tool
• ENERGY RESOURCES FOR THE FUTURE: Introduction
• Future Energy
• Organic Semiconductors for Low-Cost Solar Cells
• Research and Development at the U.S. Department of Energy on Hydrogen Production and Storage
• Fuel Cells: Current Status and Future Challenges
• DINNER SPEECH: Engineering for a New World
• Appendix: Contributors
• Appendix: Program
• Appendix: Participants
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