I-Corps: Multi-Variate Shrinkage Sensor

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The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the elimination or reduction of metrology and post processing analysis that is currently a standard requirement of polymer part manufacturing. This process improvement that will be facilitated by sensor technology will reduce manufacturing time and cost by 20-40%, improve part quality consistency, and improve molding productivity by 100%. Each percentage point improvement in productivity corresponds to cost savings in excess of more than $1 billion per year in the United States alone while reducing the energy consumption and environmental waste related to molding, discarding, and/or recycling of defective plastic parts.This I-Corps project will enable the team to determine the ideal parameters of a multivariate shrinkage sensor for industrial polymer manufacturing. The insights gained from at least one hundred customer interviews will drive decisions on the commercial potential of a new multi-mode shrinkage monitoring sensor that will obviate the need for manual inspections and enable fully automatic production by directly measuring molded products as they are made, before the mold opens, so that defectives parts can be automatically diagnoses and recycled. Through I-Corps, the team will assess current sensor design, its relative value compared to existing sensors and inspection procedures in the polymer manufacturing industry, and facilitate identification of customer segments with a critical unmet need for in-mold shrinkage sensor capability. Further, key learning from the I-Corps process will drive refinement of sensor development with the goal of developing a more commercially relevant sensor and provide industrial connections for sensor testing in the future. This overall enhanced knowledge of the industry will additionally reduce commercialization risk should a start-up or licensing opportunity be pursued.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.