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Pendulum-Launched Basketball Wins 2010 TechnoBrain Competition A pendulum-launched basketball traveled far enough to win the 2010 installment of "Dr. Bob's TechnoBrain" competition at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. The objective of the April 7th competition was to design and launch objects from a 39-ft. high, swinging pendulum. The object that rolled the furthest distance (objects used ran the gamut from bicycle tires to super balls and gears to basketballs) once released from the pendulum was the winner. This year’s winning entry belonged to Technion graduate student Alexander Lisyansky, who is studying in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering. According to Lisyansky, “The contraption provides the basketball with both linear and circular velocity. The combination of the two gives my device a great advantage over the others.”
“This competition of mechanical creativity is supported by Dr. Bob Shillman of San Diego, Calif., who immediately spotted the importance of thinking – and creating – outside of the box,” said Technion President Prof. Peretz Lavie. Dr. Bob’s TechnoBrain is held annually in memory of the late Neev-Ya Durban, the promising Technion aerospace engineering student and IDF officer who created it. Durban was murdered in Tel Aviv in March 2003. The Technion-Israel Institute of Technology is Israel's leading science and technology university. Home to the country's first winners of the Nobel Prize in science, it commands a worldwide reputation for its pioneering work in nanotechnology, computer science, biotechnology, water-resource management, materials engineering, aerospace and medicine. The majority of the founders and managers of Israel's high-tech companies are alumni. Based in New York City, the American Technion Society (ATS) is the leading American organization supporting higher education in Israel, with offices around the country. |
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