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Hwang Contour Prize

April 29, 2005 —
Viterbi School post-doc Dooil Hwang received top honors in the Institute of Industrial Engineers Student Paper Competition.  
 
Hwang’s article on the Contour Crafting robotic construction process he has pioneered working with Behrokh Khoshnevis of the Viterbi School won a $1500 prize, a $1000 travel grant, and an invitation to present May 16 at the annual meeting of the IIE in Atlanta Georgia. 
 
Hwang’s article, according to the IIE, was “very interesting, highly innovative, and …very well written.”

<>Contour Crafting builds up shapes in layers by controlling the flow of liquid building materials using two movable, programmable trowel-like tools deployed around a nozzle.

 For house construction, the system will use crane- or gantry- mounted nozzles, from which building material — concrete, in the prototype now operating in Hwang’s laboratory — comes out at a constant rate. Moveable trowels surrounding the nozzle mold it into the desired shape, as the nozzle moves over the work.  Hwang has put into service a working prototype that can build full-scale walls. Khoshnevis plans to build a freestanding house within in 24 hours within the next 18 months.

 Hwang has been at Information Sciences Institute since leaving the Daniel Epstein department of industrial and systems management, the previous home of the contour crafting project Khoshnevis has been developing for more than three years.

 A native of South Korea, Hwang received a B.S. in physics at Dankook University in 1994, and advanced degrees from USC (M.S. mechanical engineering 1999, Ph.D. industrial and systems engineering 2005).