Georgia Tech undergraduate seniors in architecture, industrial design and mechanical engineering recently captured first through fourth prizes for their humanitarian inventions in a Design Expo hosted on campus. The inventions—ranging from a water acquisition and distribution system in Nicaragua to a birthing kit for Papua New Guinea—resulted from a first-of-its-kind course taught by Jon Colton and Sabir Khan, professors in the Colleges of Engineering and Architecture, respectively.

Projects included:
- Dawn System (first prize): a water acquisition and distribution system for a Nicaraguan village. The system is driven by a solar- and biofuel-driven steam engine.

- NZEHC: a health care clinic for Tunisia. Using solar photovoltaic cells and geothermal energy, this grid-tied system generates more energy than it consumes, allowing it to sell excess energy to the grid and hence is energy and cost neutral.

- Immunization and Wellness Kit (second prize): a portable health care worker post to support immunization and well being outreach programs in tropical climates, such as Papua New Guinea. The kit consists of a banner-like structure which holds the equipment and supplies on one side and provides a chalkboard-like surface on the other for communication and education.

Other projects included a novel vaccine cool box; a birthing kit for Papua New Guinea (third prize); and a net zero energy standalone vaccine cold room for Tunisia. Full project reports and presentations are available online.

“Multi-disciplinary design teams increasingly will drive commercial and government initiatives globally,” said Khan, associate dean for undergraduate education in the College of Architecture. “Professor Colton and I challenged the students to break down knowledge barriers in order to tackle complex, large-scale problems with sound design thinking.”

Colton and Khan now are calling for ideas and mechanisms to transfer the work into practice.

“We look forward to hearing suggestions from our colleagues, alumni or business leaders for follow-up projects or for new projects,” said Colton. “We are committed to building on this success and will be teaching the course in the fall to a new group of seniors.”