The Structures of Solution Principles and Their Role in the Betterment of Designs

这个项目是基于这样的观察，即一个想法的结构，无论该想法是以科学发现的形式还是以工程创新的形式，都会影响其长期影响。这个项目的目标是调查产品设计的解决方案原则的结构以及它们对产品改进潜力的影响。为了实现这一目标，该项目将对世界上最重要的产品之一：缝纫机进行长期和深入的研究。根据缝纫机解决方案原则的特性，随着时间的推移，关于产品改进的发现很可能是可推广的，因为项目中收集的纵向数据将涵盖150多年来社会、经济和政治变革中发生的主要设计和技术改进。了解解决方案原则影响产品改进潜力的原因将使设计工程师能够更有效地加速改进机会，更有信心地实施更改，并更快地迭代。这是一个重要的经济问题，因为美国政府和私营部门每年在使用先进技术的新产品上投资数十亿美元。该项目将设计的工程细节与产品改进联系起来，以便在工程创新中进行知情的资源分配。这项研究的更广泛影响包括与美国国家历史博物馆合作，通过缝纫机的在线和实物展品分享研究成果，这将增进公众对科学和技术的理解。这一合作还将通过公开提供在该项目期间将产生的一组物理和功能模型来增强研究基础设施。该项目的目标是调查由于设计中的解决方案原则的结构而导致的产品的内生改进潜力。该项目将理解产品的长期改进的问题概念化为设计复杂性问题。该项目将收集专利数据，并与美国国家历史博物馆合作，记录多代缝纫机的解决方案原理。使用这个数据集，项目将使用新的基于图形的度量来计算设计转换的程度，每个度量对转换的概念采取不同的观点。该项目有助于在概念和方法上取得重要进展。首先，该项目通过解释解决方案原则对改进的限制是独立的还是分层的，来改进指导设计搜索的战略设计建议。同时分析物理和功能架构以了解它们对产品改进的影响，将在设计及其改进潜力之间产生清晰的因果逻辑。这一逻辑将支持建立新的设计策略，以增加产品未来改进的潜力。了解解决方案原则的结构和解决方案原则本身如何积极地影响或阻碍改进的潜力，将使设计工程师能够选择和设计解决方案原则，以促进后续产品的改进。与美国国家历史博物馆的合作将扩大传播，通过促进博物馆收藏的美国纺织机器的实物和在线展览，加强对科学和技术的了解。在这项研究中产生的一套物理和功能模型将涵盖缝纫机在美国的发展历史。这些数据将公开可用，并成为研究创新的学者的宝贵来源，从而加强研究基础设施。尽管这项研究的重点是工程产品，但研究洞察力将适用于所有类型的系统，其变化潜力由系统的底层结构控制。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project is based on the observation that the structure of an idea, whether that idea takes the form of a scientific discovery or an engineering innovation, influences its long-term impact. The objective of this project is to investigate the structure of the solution principles for the design of a product and their effect on the product’s potential for improvement. To achieve this objective, the project will perform a long-term and in-depth study of one of world’s most important products: the sewing machine. Discoveries about product improvement over time based upon the properties of solution principles for sewing machines are likely to be generalizable, because the longitudinal data collected in the project will cover major design and technological improvements that took place across more than 150 years of social, economic, and political changes. Understanding the reasons that solution principles affect a product’s potential for improvement will enable design engineers to accelerate opportunities for improvement more effectively, implement changes with more confidence, and iterate faster. This is a matter of economic importance, because the US government and the private sector invest billions of dollars annually into new products that employ advanced technologies. This project connects the engineering details of a design to product improvement to enable informed resource allocation in engineering innovation. Broader impacts of the research include a collaboration with the National Museum of American History to share the research results through online and physical exhibits of sewing machines, which will enhance public scientific and technological understanding. This collaboration will also enhance research infrastructure by making publicly available the set of physical and functional models that will be produced during this project.The goal of this project is to investigate the endogenous improvement potential of a product due to the structure of solution principles in its design. The project conceptualizes the problem of understanding the long-term improvement of products as a problem of design complexity. The project will collect patent data and collaborate with the National Museum of American History to document the solution principles of multiple generations of sewing machines. Using this dataset, the project will compute the degree of design transformation using new graph-based metrics, each of which takes a different perspective on the concept of transformation. The project contributes important conceptual and methodological advances. First, the project improves strategic design advice in directing design search by explaining whether constraints on improvement imposed by the solution principles are independent or hierarchical. The simultaneous analysis of physical and functional architectures to understand their influence on product improvement will produce a clear causal logic between the design and its improvement potential. The logic will underpin the establishment of new design strategies to increase a product’s potential for future improvement. Understanding how the structures of solution principles and the solution principles themselves positively affect or impede the potential for betterment will enable design engineers to select and architect solution principles to facilitate improvements to a product in subsequent generations. The collaboration with the National Museum of American History will broaden dissemination to enhance scientific and technological understanding by contributing to physical and online exhibitions in the museum’s collection of American textile machines. The set of physical and functional models produced during the performance of this research will cover the history of the development of the sewing machine in the United States. The data will be publicly available and become a valuable source for scholars studying innovation, thereby enhancing infrastructure for research. Even though this study focuses on an engineered product, the research insights will apply to all kinds of systems for which the potential for change is governed by the system’s underlying structure.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.