Drill Hole Diagram

Hey guys,

Here is a diagram of the drill holes we have so far in the vertical and horizontal axes. I'll update it as we continue to drill.

Phil

Estimated Battery Life

- Elliot

Lamp Update 11/15

Hey guys,
Here's a summary of tonight's meeting and assignments between now and next week (sorry about the length, pay special attention to the "Assignments" section, it may include things I didn't mention tonight at the meeting).

Tonight Selvan came to his first M-HEAL lamp meeting and he met the team. After introducing him to everyone the engineers left for the Wilson center. Steve, Mustafa, and Naroo brought Selvan up to speed on what we've done for the lamp and what our general goals are. They then discussed the main points that need to be made when approaching Freeplay and similar organizations (demonstrated need via Selvan's experience in Uganda, $40 proven pricepoint from Abigail, advantages of a surgical light over general lighting solutions (lower power consumption due to more focused light, frees up manpower, stability)).
Selvan told us we might be able to field test the lamp in Kumi, Uganda from which he recently returned. One of the problems for the hospital in Kumi is that the generator generates more electricity than is needed and therefore wastes fuel. Due to fuel prices the generator is underutilized and the hospital is frequently without power. The hospital has 350 beds but averages 500 patients at any given time (and up to 750 during malaria season).

Carl, Phil, Mike, and Ling went to the Wilson center and worked on the base. We now have a cage in the Wilson center to put our stuff in. Currently there is still some SF3L stuff in there that allegedly will be removed. Until it is gone please tag anything you put in there with a piece of tape with "M-HEAL" written on it, so it doesn't get thrown away.

Next week the engineers will meet at the Wilson center at 7:30 and the MBAs plus Mustafa will meet at 8:15 in the LBME project room.

Assignments:
Mustafa: Work on NCIIA grant; send me a summary of things we need for the NCIIA grant
Naroo: Work on penta-chart and blurb for clearlyso.com and lightingafrica.com; find out if a MAP project is going to Uganda and contact info for that group
Selvan: Work on penta-chart and blurb for clearlyso.com and lightingafrica.com; contact people in Kumi about testing there
Anita: Talk to Mustafa to see how you can help him on the NCIIA grant

Carl: Continue working on stability calculations with the assistance of Ling ; go to the hardware store with Mike
Ling: Work on stability calculations with Carl
Mike: Write down a drill list for everything except for the up-and-down joint (including the rotation). You'll probably need some sketches and you might have to drop by the Wilson center sometime this week to check what's done (unless you remember it all); go to the hardware store with Carl
Phil: Write down a drill list for the up-and-down joint . Include a sketch to show where the holes are. You might have to drop by the Wilson center sometime this week to check what's done (unless you remember it all). The current sketch you have up looks pretty good except you forgot the "noodle" to change the direction of the cable as it enters the tube.

Elliot: Start preliminary electrical calculations. Look in the lockers in the project room for the packaging for the flashlights we're using. The packaging should tell you the voltage and power consumption. Figure out how long our lamp head should last when connected to a typical motorcycle battery and a typical car battery. Look up general info on handcrank generators and estimate the relationship between crank time and light time.

Please post the results of your assignments to the blog.

If you have any questions or run into any problems, don't hesitate to email me, I'm here to help you.

Steve

Peg Design Sketches

Here is the peg design we came up with at last week's meeting. This drawing doesn't really show how the steel cable connects to the peg, or how the spring connects to the stopper and beam. There are still a few open options for these things.

Phil

Tonight we had a really productive meeting. Here's a summary:

Design Changes:
Main Joint - We fleshed out the idea from last week and are now planning to remove the hinge and instead move the pin in and out directly perpendicular to the hole. We'll try to get as much of the mechanism inside the horizontal pole as possible. We'll be using primarily parts we already have. Phil will post some sketches of the design soon; please look it over and make sure that it matches your mental picture of how things work.

Base - We'll be getting new steel L-brackets to keep the vertical pole steady and we'll replace the brackets underneath the junction with a square plate. This allows the vertical pole to rest on a flat surface instead of on bolt heads. It also simplifies the connections since the square plate can be connected using the same holes as the L-brackets.

Rotation at the Main Joint - We'll follow through with the suggestion that Mike made a bit ago and use a slotted tube on top and a tube on bottom.

Arm Length - We decided to shorten the lamp arm length to 3 ft to make it less ungainly. This will allow us to shorten the counterweight arm considerably.

---------------------

I talked to the MBA students who won the Net Impact case competition. They are planning to work with us and are at least some of them are coming to next week's meeting.

---------------------

Assignments:
Carl: Eqns for the counterweight and base
Phil: Draw up the base and main joint changes from today's meeting and post it on the blog
Elliot and Mike: Buy parts before Sunday
Ling: Weigh the lamp head
Steve: Write meeting summary, get us 24 hr access to Wilson, find out where our shelves are at Wilson

---------------------

Shopping List:
Steel L-brackets, 4"x4"
Square Piece, 8"x8", 1/8"-1/4" thick (check Wilson scrap first)
Various Bolts, 3/4"-1.5"
Eyelets for keeping the noodle in place?
Ferrule

Steve

10/25/09 Lamp Meeting

Today's meeting was a discussion meeting, to remind ourselves where the design team stands right now and where we're heading to.

Here's the list of topics we discussed:

1) Lamp critique/design
2) Goals
3) Net Impact postmortem
3) Freeplay
4) Timeline
6) Who we need

First off, major problems regarding the design were addressed. We started out with the base, which isn’t too stable right now. We decided to strengthen the current design by incorporating a cage-like structure (square tube) around the vertical tube at the base. For the main joint, we identified the problem to be the wobbly hinge that introduces a big range of motion before the peg stabilizes the horizontal tube. To solve this problem, we decided to alter the current design a little bit, by replacing the hinge with block with a hole that can fit the peg and spring in it. The bike cable will be attached directly to the peg through the spring so that it moves in and out of the shower drain (joint) along a straight line. With this design we will be able to make the holes in the shower drain fit more tightly with the peg. We also decided to shorten the horizontal tube and maybe the base. This will be based on Carl’s calculations. We are hoping these new design elements will eliminate any wobbliness seen in the lamp currently. Here’s Steve’s quick sketch of the revised joint along with some pictures of the joint:







Next, we talked about our general and long-term goals:
- Business creation in developing countries: to help distributing the lamp around the region more easily.
- Local partner: someone who will be in charge of the business
- Introduce motivation to build the lamp for locals
- Improve surgical lighting
- Develop a working product
- Hospital contact
- Train locals: train selected people (mechanics?) to build the lamp so that they can do it by themselves. Biannual check-ups.
- Help in redesign: stay in contact with the people and help them out with any issues they have with the design.

We also thought we should start out with one region at first and one group (~20 people) per region. We felt that meeting the trainees in person at least once was necessary to ensure quality of the lamp is up to our expectations.

Next we talked about Net Impact and Freeplay. We generally agreed working with Freeplay will benefit us and decided to contact Freeplay relatively soon to see if they were interested at all. In the meantime, we decided to concentrate on finishing up the current prototype and market analysis. We also decided that we may need a public health (for specs) and EECS person (for circuit design) to help us out with the project.

Here is our preliminary timeline for the rest of the semester:

October: Calculations
November: Market research, get specs (how bright, how long should the battery last, etc)
December: Have mechanical part of the prototype done, first contact with Freeplay, come up with preliminary circuit design to incorporate hand-cranked power source, etc.
January: CAD design of the lamp

What we've been up to for the past several months...

For new people coming to this blog, I'm sorry about the lack of updates. In the weeks following the last post we had to dedicate a large portion of our time to finishing the prototype in time to be shipped to Uganda and therefore didn't have much time to write in this blog.

Towards the end of April the lamp was sent to Mountains of the Moon University in Fort Portal, Uganda with our collaborator Abigail Mechtenberg. Unfortunately our prototype wasn't in good enough shape for clinical trials (the joint connecting the vertical and horizontal beams was too weak), but the students at the university there redesigned our lamp and built it with locally available parts for only $40, including a hand crank power system. They told us that our general concept was sound (except for that faulty joint) and that the lamp produced more than enough light.

Over the summer we redesigned the lamp to simplify it and to stabilize the joint. We're nearly done with our second generation prototype where our goal is to get all the functionality we want using hardware store parts. Next we'll be building another prototype using mostly bike and car parts.

We're also making some progress on the business side as well. Net Impact is a student group run out of the business school and they are running a case competition based on M-HEAL's surgical lamp.

Now that we're back into the semester, we should be posting more often.

Email Chain about the Lamp Poles

As long as the aluminum isn't too much cheaper than steel, that sounds good.  For the base we currently have some square steel tubing that should work nicely.  We currently have casters that we can put on the base, but they don't have locks, so they might not be worth while (plus on Thursday I was looking at them and the ball bearings are exposed so I'm worried that alot of dirt/dust/grime will get in there and gunk it up).  Currently as a battery we're just going to use AAA's from the flashlights.  They should easily last through the testing phase and are easy to deal with electrically.  Since they're pretty light they'll probably be in the counter-weight.  Since you and Chris are working on the lowest piece it would make sense for you to work on the base, if another group finishes their part first they might work on it (although it's obviously pretty tied in with your joint since you interface with the vertical pole).

Let me know if you have any more questions.

-Steve

Michael H wrote:

Aluminum's a little bit more expensive than steel I think but it should be sturdy enough and it's a lot lighter.  It also doesn't rust as easily.  So I think aluminum is our best bet now?  That's good, I'll start looking for some cheep alum.

Also, what are we doing for the base?  Is the first prototype going to have wheels?  Is the battery going down there?  In some of the drawings I saw the battery as the counter weight but that might be a bit too heavy.  I don't know, I guess we need to know the weight of the head before we can do any torque calculations, but a bowl plus a couple led's aren't going to weigh too much.  I was just wondering because the subteams need to work together at the points of connection.  If no one is working on the base I suppose me and Chris could.

Anyways, just throwing things out there.  Trying to get the whole picture of this lamp.



Quoting Stephen DeWitt :

I don't think it necessarily needs to be made of stainless steel.  Won't a good coat of paint be enough to prevent rust and whatnot?  As for what to use for it, I don't think we had a specific plan, just something lightweight, sturdy, cheap, and non-porous.  We have some steel piping in the project room (I think you've seen it, but I'm not sure), but its pretty heavy.  Do you have any ideas?

Michael H wrote:

Do the tubes for the lamp frame have to be made out of stainless steel to be used in an operating room?  If not, what material were we thinking of using?

Thanks,
Mike

This past week has been really productive, so here's a recap.  Send out an email if there's anything I miss.

1. The design at present
2. Next week
3. Field testing in Uganda

1. The Design as of Now:  These parts might be hard to visualize, so I included a rough paint file to show them.

Horizontal to Vertical Joint - This joint has two degrees of freedom, one that rotates the horizontal beam up and down and one that rotates around.  A bicycle hand brake mounted on the lamp head locks and unlocks the vertical joint.  The vertical beam is capped with a U-shaped piece spanned by an axle that goes through the middle of the horizontal beam.  Connected to the axle is a dumbell spring-loaded clamp.  One end of this clamp is welded to the inside of the vertical beam, the other is connected to the bike brake wire.  When the bike break lever is pulled it squeezes the two clamp pieces together, which releases the clamp from the axle.  For the joint that swivels the horizontal beam around we're planning to make a joint by taking two tubes, one slightly bigger than the other, inserting them partway into each other, cutting slots in the larger one and putting tabs in the smaller one.  This allows the smaller and larger tubes to rotate relative to each other with the tabs keeping them together.  I'm slightly worried this will have too much friction, but I could just be paranoid.

Electrical - Since we're on a tight schedule and are a bit light on electrical expertise, I think we're best off if we just wire the LED heads together in parallel and hook them up to a battery pack made from the AAAs that came with the lamp.  We can wire them to a rocker switch on the lamp head so we can turn all of them on and off at once.  We can toss the batteries in the counterweight on the horizontal beam.

Lamp Head - We still don't have a final solution for this yet.  I suggested using a shallow tupperware bowl and cutting holes in it for the LEDs.  Mike suggested using a hubcap, which we can take a look at when we go to a junkyard to look at parts.

Head Joint - We're planning to use a car's rear view mirror joint.  After playing with the one in Elliot's car, it seemed stiff enough.  As a backup we could use a simple friction tightened hinge or a friction tightened ball and bracket (see the soldering stand in the project room for that joint).

Base - Just 4 legs on casters.  We talked about having the rotation joint here instead of at the horizontal to vertical joint, and we still may.

2. Next Week

We need to finalize our structure and then get a part list and dimensions.  Who is available on Monday to do a final design review?  After that we can break off into teams and start getting parts.  A group of us should head to a junk yard to check about getting parts there.  Did anyone go on the junk yard trips earlier in the year?

We need to get the rest of the LEDs from Home Depot.  Someone with a car will need to pick those up (I don't have a car).  They'll cost ~$200 and you will be reimbursed in about a week.  If someone is willing to drive but can't shell out money for them, let me know and I can go with you to front the bill.
We're pretty close to the point where we can start slapping things together, lets try to start building before the end of the week.

3. Field Testing in Uganda:

The plan is to get our lamp built and tested before April 7th, when we'll send our lamp with Abigail (the applied physics grad student most of you have met).  She'll be in Fort Portal, Uganda for a couple weeks and will take our lamp to some clinics and show it to people working at a local technical school.  This is a great chance for us to get feedback on our design so we can work on making the next iteration much better.

Steve

LED Hack for Surgical Lamps

http://www.instructables.com/id/Replacement-for-surgical-lamp-bulbs-using-LED-circ/

Some Duke BME students made a circuit for using LED's with a surgical lamp.
Might help us spark some ideas for our own circuit.

SF VC Trip

Last week Pratik and I went on the San Fransisco venture capital trip through the Center for Entrepeneurship.  Our goal was to improve the visibility of M-HEAL and to get feedback on our business plan for the lamp.

We talked to a person on the board of the B-School's social venture fund and someone from the social venture club.  It sounds like MBA students are looking for social venture plans to use for a business plan class (I think it's somewhat similar to our senior design) and it looked like there was some interest in using the lamp or some other M-HEAL project for that.

I also heard an interesting suggestion from another MBA student.  He suggested that we liscence our design to microlenders.  This increases the sustainability of M-HEAL since we'd be constantly bringing in revenue (assuming the lamp takes off).  An entrepeneur in a developing countries could go to a microlender looking to start a business.  The microlender could then suggest our surgical lamp, assuming the entrepeneur was in a good market for it.  We create value for the microlender because our proven design decreases the risk in his investment.  The business student also told us that many times selling a product at a minimal cost makes it more widely used because the owners have an active investment in it.

We didn't get as much useful feedback on the lamp design as we had hoped for.  Because the conference was focused around venture capital, our design didn't line up with the stated goals of the pitch competition (since we aren't fundable through VC as a student group).  Pretty much we were told that we had a good project and we should pursue startup funding via grants.  I believe they also said that if we ever wanted to spin off into a for profit company, there are some social VCs in the valley who might fund us.

-Steve

WHO statistics on target countries

Here are statistics from the World Health Organization for our target countries. I have included the US too for comparison.

Phil

2/17 Lamp Update

Hey everyone,
Here's lamp business for the week.  Sorry about the length, but make sure to read the "Tasks to be Done" section, since I included something for everyone to do over the next week and a half.

1. Tuesday's Meeting
2. Tasks to be Done
3. Spring Break
4. Meetings After Spring Break

1) Tuesday's Meeting:
Mike Harrison made his first lamp meeting this week.  After introductions Elliot showed us the joint he had looked at for the lamp head joint.  It was based off of a joint that he saw at work (the transportation research center where they test wheelchairs).  It has the same degrees of freedom as a ball and socket joint but Elliot believes it is easier to build.  I have his sketches, but I haven't had a chance to scan them in yet.  Look for them to be up on the blog sometime tomorrow.  We spent some time discussing the merits of this joint versus a ball and socket joint.  We didn't come to any solid conclusions but decided that a staying-in-place system based on friction would be find for the lamp head joint since failure would not be nearly as catastrophic as if the joint on the horizontal bar failed.

Next we looked at the LED flashlights that Carl bought.  Each one has 5 white LEDs and one red LED with a peak output of 100 lumens.  According to my calculations we need ~850 lumens.  Conveniently, without modifying the flashlights they have a 6" spot at 36" just like we want.  We went in the dark and checked to see how much light is outside of the 6" bright spot and found that alot of it goes out at wider angles.  Mike suggested that we have white cones surrounding each LED array to tighten the light distribution.

Phil brought some data on the Philippines and Uganda that he got from WHO.  It shows that the current situation in the two locations is quite different in terms of doctors per capita and treated water.

2) Tasks to be Done:
We're still planning to get a prototype ready for WMR's trip to Liberia during the third week of March.  This means that after spring break we don't have much time to mess around.  All we need is to get a rough prototype ready so the doctors can see the idea we're shooting for, even if we don't have all the functionality we want.  The main things we need are:
- the lamp head joint: Elliot has already done some good work here but we need to pick a joint and buy/make it.
- the horizontal beam join: I don't believe we have much here yet.  For now we can take emphasis away from the pedal and focus on just getting the structure.  We can add the pedal if we are ahead of schedule.
- the LED holder: we need something to hold the LED heads in the proper orientation
- electrical integration: at the very least all the LEDs need to turn on and off from a single switch.  It would be nice to have all of them hooked up to a single large battery with the option of wall power.

Everyone: Get the basic training at Wilson.  We're going to be starting to build the lamp and you need to be able to go in there.  Also, remember to post your progress up on the blog as you go.  It will help everyone keep up to date between meetings and allow people to give you a fresh perspective on your ideas.

Elliot: You've already been working on the lamp head joint so keep at it.  By the Thursday after spring break I want to have a joint in hand.  Use your best judgment on what type of joint to use and let me know before you spend money on anything (just so we stay on budget).

Mike Harrison:  Work with Elliot on the lamp head joint.

Phil:  On Tuesday you said that you will be looking into the LED holder.  Figure out the best material and structure, but don't buy anything until we have all of our LEDs, so that we can test out how everything is going to be arranged.  Also, put your data on Uganda and the Philippines up on the blog.

Mike Weist:  Work with Phil on the LED holder.

Chris:  Work on the joint that connects the two poles.  It needs up and down movement and the ability to swivel.

Seth:  I can't remember when you said you were getting back next week, but take a look at the two LED flashlights we have and start figuring out how to integrate them in the electrical system.

Carl:  On Tuesday you said you would get in touch with Home Depot to order more LEDs.  Also, check with Seth to see if he needs a hand on the electronics.

Mustafa: Familiarize yourself with the business documents on the Ctools site.  Most of them are under Resources->Social Venture Development.  Most of those documents are still pretty accurate, only we're not using car parts anymore, we're using LED flashlights.  In Resources->Lamp Project->Possible countries there is a good paper about the health system in the Phillipines and some stats on various countries.  Also keep an eye out for the data Phil will post on the blog.

3) Spring Break:
I know alot of us will be gone next week for spring break.  Who will be around?

4) After Spring Break:
After spring break we have two weeks to get our lamp built.  This means we're going to have to meet more than just Tuesdays.  We'll definitely have meetings with all of us on the two Tuesdays after break but people working together on various aspects of the lamp will probably have to meet several other times so we can finish in time.  Thursday is a good candidate for a general build session since I know most people said they were free then at the beginning of the semester.


Best of luck on the various aspects of the lamp you're working on.  Let me know if you have any questions or run into any problems.  Have a great break!

Steve

Pedal sketch

Hey guys,

Here is the sketch I brought to last week's meeting of the pedal mechanism.

Phil

2/10 Meeting Summary

Hey guys,
Here's a summary of lamp business this week:

1. Meeting Summary
2. Assigned Tasks
3. Next Meeting

1. Meeting Summary:
First we reviewed M-HEAL's IP policy.  Pretty much any ideas anyone has regarding the lamp becomes property of M-HEAL.  That said, the point is to freely distribute the plans so it shouldn't be much of an issue.  Next, Phil told us about his idea for a mechanical latch and pedal system to lock and unlock the rotation of the main joint.  We then discussed other ideas involving a pneumatic system similar to those on office chairs.  General consensus was that it was possible but no one had a specific implementation idea.  Next we discussed the reflector.  Seth pointed out that the distributed nature of the LED system might not need a reflector or defuser.  We just need to carefully place the LEDs.  I haven't ordered the LED flashlights online because I was concerned about their brightness and shipping cost almost as much as the lights themselves.  We discussed buying LED flashlights locally.  We discussed batteries, but Seth told us we need to wait until we have more information about the LEDs before we can talk about batteries.  Then we discussed the general timeline of the project.  Next week we want to have LED flashlights to play with and have a good idea of the physical structure.  Over spring break Seth (along with anyone else who is interested) will get to work on integrating the flashlights together electrically.  Before the end of spring break we should have all the parts we need.  After spring break we can begin building the physical structure.  We will work on integration and testing until the third week of March when we will send our prototype to Liberia with WMR.  If Abigail firms up on her next trip to Uganda and it fits well into our timeline, we will consider sending the lamp with her.  Let me know if I forgot anything.

2. Assigned Tasks:
As you make progress please post on our project blog.  The url is http://mheal-lamp.blogspot.com/.  You can also get to it through the main M-HEAL website by going to the activities page and scrolling down to the lamp section.  

Please sign up for the one hour Wilson training session.  The next sessions are Thursday at 2 and 3 and Monday at 10 and 11.  You can sign up here: http://www.engin.umich.edu/teamprojects/About/training.html.

Carl: Look into LED flashlights locally.
Elliot: Work on firming up the parts needed for the joints and how we can build them.
Mike: Work on methods to lock and unlock the joints using a foot pedal.
Phil: Look into the market for the surgical lamp.  Find data on target countries and rough estimates of the size of our target population and the number of clinics/hospitals that translates to.  There is already some related information on the Ctools site.
Chris: Find other surgical lamps that our somewhat similar to ours.  Try to define the niche where we fit best.

Elliot and Mike you two might need to work together since you are both working on things related to the joints.  As  always, let me know if you run into any problems.

If you couldn't attend today's meeting but still want something to work on, shoot me an email.

3. Next Meeting:
Next meeting everyone will talk about what they've found this week.  If we have LED flashlights with us we'll play around with them trying to figure out how we'll attach them and test out different arraignments.  I'll give the three minute San Fransico VC pitch to get feedback from the team before Pratik and I fly out there.

--Steve

LED Torch

The follow links provide the different (relevant) LED Torches that I found.

32 LED Torch; Stephen is planning on buying 5 of these torches for the electrical group to "play with"; $31.50 + S&H for 5 Torches:
http://www.lightinthebox.com/LED-Torch--E4U-091---Start-From-5-units-_p3121.html

100 LED Torch; $18.79 + S&H for 1 Torch:
http://www.1topstore.com/product_info.php?products_id=1718

-- Carl

2/3 Lamp Meeting Summary

Here's a summary of lamp business for this week.

1. Meeting Summary
2. Tasks
3. Updated survey
4. Project blog
5. Next week

1. Meeting Summary:
Carl brought in printouts about four different types of LED torches, although he was unable to find the exact type that are found in Uganda.  We decided to purchase 5 of the 32 LED torches.  The idea is to try to rewire the torches to run off of our large battery/the grid instead of the AAs that are designed for it.  This simplifies the design and if we can make a universal adapter, it makes the lighting element easy to replace (if somehow the LEDs failed, however unlikely).  We also discussed the reflector assembly.  To avoid having a shadow in the middle of our beam we looked at placing the LEDs off to this side and then having an angled reflector that directs the light down.  In order to have a uniform spot getting the shape of the reflector might be tricky.  Attached is a very rough sketch in paint for how I picture it in 2D. 

Carl and I looked at Meg's edits of the lamp survey and added a few more questions.  Phil talked to an OR nurse found out that the surgeon is the one who adjusts the position of the lamp and does so frequently.  He needs to be able to move it even when he has instruments in his hands.  Phil suggested that we have a pedal that unlocks the hinges so the surgeon can use his foot.  One possible problem I've thought of since yesterday's meeting is that this design forces the surgeon to be standing next to the lamp stand.  If we used a system similar to the cables for bicycle breaks we could have a few pedals set up under the table.

2: Tasks:
Due to exams and some other scheduling difficulties many of you couldn't make it to yesterday's meeting.  Therefore instead of just listing who is doing what for the week we'll do task assignment via email.  Email me (cc'ing the mheal-lamp) if you are interested in one of these tasks.  As always if you have any questions or are having a hard time finding anything useful don't hesitate to shoot me an email.

Pedal Design: Phil

Reflector Design: If you miss high school trig this might be the job for you.  Based on the specs for a minor surgical lamp (6-8" spot from 36") we need to figure out a good design for a reflector.  Multiple people can work on this either independently or together so that we have multiple minds hacking away at this.  This is the primary non-circuit part of the design that remains.

Emerging Markets Club:  The b-school has a club called the Emerging Market club that looks into starting businesses in developing countries.  Their advisor is Ted London, who gave the talk at last week's general M-HEAL meeting.  We need someone to be a liaison between the two groups to see if there is any way we can help each other.  If they are interested we might want to send a person or two to one of their meetings to talk about the lamp and see their general approach.  I can give you an email introduction if you want so that it's not just an email out of the blue for them.

Market Research:  We need to find out how large of a market there is for the lamp in terms of people and in terms of hospitals and clinics.  Alex posted some relevant information on the Ctools site.  We're targeting clinics and hospitals in developing countries that have access to unreliable electricity and those where the primary light source is currently ambient lighting or flashlights.  This might be difficult but if you're interested just send me an email and I can work with the other officers to assemble a list of places to check for info.

Competitors:  At the end of the month we're bringing our lamp design to a venture capital conference.  For that conference we need to have good information on the status quo.  I believe there are a few links of similar designs on the Ctools site but we need to make sure we have a comprehensive list.

Survey: See next item.

3.  Lamp Survey:
As mentioned previously, M-HEAL is sending out a survey with the various student organizations that go on mission trips to developing countries.  The survey team has asked us to look over and update the survey.  The current version is attached.  If you have any suggestions let me know, I'll be sending our edits to the survey team in a couple days.

4.  Project Blog:
All of you should have gotten my email from last night that our project blog is up and running.  Please post all the information you've found on that site.  I want to make sure that we can get all the important information from just looking at the blog so that someone doesn't have to read through 10 links just to find the power consumption of a typical LED.  Links should be well labeled and with a short summary of the key information found in it (following with the example from before a link containing a table of the specs for LEDs should be labeled as such and have basic facts like typical power consumption mentioned in the summary). 

5.  Next Week:
At our next meeting people will talk about the information and designs they worked on this week, we'll go over the general business plan for the lamp both in the short and long terms, we'll go over the M-HEAL IP policy, and we'll figure out tasks for the following week.  There is a general M-HEAL meeting next week at 6pm in 1303 EECS and we will be meeting directly after that at approximately 7:00.

-Steve

M-HEAL Lamp Blog

Hi everyone, this website is where the M-HEAL surgical lamp design team will be keeping track of its progress.  For members of the team please put up a post whenever you find something interesting relating to the project.  After every meeting we have I'll post a summary of what we did (similar to the weekly update emails).  

If you're not on the team but are interested in what we do this site should show our progress and hopefully provide a guide for how (or more likely how not) to run a similar project.

M-HEAL is a student organization at the University of Michigan dedicated to improving access to medical technologies in the developing world.  One way we approach this mission is through design projects.  A ultra-low cost surgical lamp with a battery backup is our first design project and is the focus of this site.  For more information about M-HEAL please visit our website: www.umich.edu/~mheal

Steve

Lamp Design Lead