Case Study: Level Crossing

Darrell Mann

Humans can be pretty dumb sometimes. Everything the automotive industry does to make cars safer, we all compensate for by driving worse. There’s a similar phenomenon in the rail industry: the safer the level-crossing systems the rail industry … Read More

Biology – Arctic Ground Squirrel (Spermophilus parryii or Urocitellus parryii)

Darrell Mann

Every September arctic ground squirrels in Alaska, Canada and Siberia retreat into burrows more than a meter beneath the tundra, curl up in nests built from grass, lichen and caribou hair, and begin to hibernate. As their lungs … Read More

Generational Cycles – 12 Rules For (Millennial) Life

Darrell Mann

Could the plight of today’s 20-something white American male be cured with a self-help book? For tens of thousands, the answer appears to be a surprising yes.

The author, Jordan Peterson, is a clinical psychologist and college professor … Read More

Patent of the Month – Reducing Ice Crystal Formation

Darrell Mann

Our patent of the month this month is US9,986,733, granted to Bay Area start-up, X-Therma (x-therma.com, ‘biomimetic nanotech’) on the 5th of June. Here’s what the company has to say about the problem being solved in their invention:

… Read More

The 10th International Conference on Systematic Innovation (ICSI) & the 9th Global Competition on Systematic Innovation (GCSI)

ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Date: July 08-11, 2019, Liverpool, UK Web: http://www.i-sim.org/icsi2019 E-mail: icsi2019@i-sim.org

Co-Organizers

• International Society of Innovation Methods (I-SIM)
• The Society of Systematic Innovation (SSI)
• The University of Liverpool Management School (Local Host)

… Read More

Case Studies: Magic?

Darrell Mann

Back in 1987, Michael Jackson amazed the world with his biomechanically impossible dance moves in his music video Smooth Criminal. In the routine, Michael leans from the ankle at a 45-degree angle, while keeping his body straight as … Read More

Biology – Sea Slug (Elysia chlorotica)

Darrell Mann

In an amazing achievement akin to adding solar panels to your body, a Northeast sea slug sucks raw materials from algae to provide its lifetime supply of solar-powered energy, according to a study recently published by scientists at … Read More

DSRP vs LoSC

Darrell Mann

A good friend told me I had to take a look at Derek & Laura Cabrera’s book, ‘Systems Thinking Made Simple’ (Reference 1) a few weeks ago. My intrigue was brought to a critical level when I saw … Read More

Generational Cycles – Spot The Year?

Darrell Mann

Let’s keep things simple this month. Here’s a poster from the Whitney Museum.

Can you guess the year?

Answer:

And here’s the point….

Related posts:

1. Welcome to the August 2008 Issue of The TRIZ Journal!

… Read More

TRIZmeta the triz game that breaks all the rules.

Kobus Cilliers

Strategy games have always been popular and essential. They prepare us for life and help us to try out risky options in a fictional situation. Now we can take the strategy game a step further.

TRIZmeta is a … Read More

Playing TRIZ

Christian Thurnes, Claudia Hentschel and Frank Zeihsel

Playing TRIZ (Volume 1) Games and Cases for Learning and Teaching Inventiveness

Learning and teaching inventiveness often hands us situations in which we fear completely unjustified leaps just as much as … Read More

Patent of the Month – Graduated Auxetic Foam

Darrell Mann

Our patent of the month this month sticks to the world of ‘keep-it-simple’, and also manages to stay local. My old haunt, Rolls-Royce in Bristol to be precise, and a pair of inventors who had US9,956,729 granted … Read More

Patient Compliance Big Picture

Darrell Mann

We first wrote about patient compliance via a very specific case study some time ago (Reference 1). Reading Jordan Peterson’s book, ‘12 Rules For Life’ (Reference 2), recently triggered thoughts about the bigger compliance issue. Specifically, his second … Read More

Patent of the Month – Microfluidic Desalination

Darrell Mann

Patent of the month this month takes us to a trio of inventors at the University of Texas. US9,932,251 was granted on April 3. The wonderfully succinct background description describes the motivation for the invention as follows:

Read More

Biology – Sleeping Chironomid (Polypedilum vanderplanki)

Darrell Mann

Polypedilum vanderplanki or the sleeping chironomid, is a dipteran in the family Chironomidae (non-biting midges). It occurs in the semi-arid regions of the African continent (e.g. northern Nigeria and Uganda). Its larvae are found in small tubular nests … Read More

Paradoxical Thinking & Breakthrough Oxymorons

Darrell Mann

Here’s my new favourite delegate exercise in team-building workshops. The inspiration comes from a twenty-year old book, Paradoxical Thinking, that I found in a junk shop last year (Reference 1). Ultimately it’s yet another book in the category … Read More

Campaign to destroy Patent Trolls and break the patent stranglehold

The patent system was created to support entrepreneurs and encourage innovation – now it does the opposite stifling both innovators and new ideas. Now patent trolls are using the system to rip off manufacturing companies and large corporations are registering … Read More

Generational Cycles – Anthems

Darrell Mann

When Roger Daltrey sang, ‘I hope I die before I get old’, he sounded what was to become the clarion cry of the rising Baby-Boom teenager. The Who’s song ‘My Generation’ quickly established itself as the anthem for … Read More

A TRIZ approach for bitter cassava root detoxification

Doua P., Kapseu C.

Abstract

The objective of this study was to find how to eliminate all the cyanogenic glucosides from bitter cassava roots to make them palatable for humans and animals. Prior to the elimination of those substances, cassava … Read More

Case Study: Effectuation

Darrell Mann

According to the business theory of good and bad capital, good money is money from investors who are willing to wait for growth in the size of the enterprise, but who are hungry for profit in the short-term. … Read More