Our History
In 1974, a small, informal group of Carnegie Mellon faculty members -
inspired by Herbert Simon’s The Sciences of the Artificial (MIT Press,
1969) - formed the Design Research Center (DRC). Members of DRC
explored cross-disciplinary design research and education using
computational techniques. DRC faculty received a three-year, external
grant in 1980 that transformed the DRC from an informal group into an
organization with a small staff. This provided the means to address
certain industrial design problems. Work conducted in DRC seeded the
idea and provided the structure for the successful National Science
Foundation (NSF) Engineering Research Center (ERC) proposal to study
engineering design methodologies and practices. This successful
proposal effort created the Engineering Design Research Center (EDRC),
which began operations on May 1, 1986.
EDRC generated a long-term research and educational vision
that matched Carnegie Mellon’s research strengths with fundamental
technological advances necessary for improved economic competitiveness.
Moreover, EDRC established a significant intellectual and physical
infrastructure that greatly influenced the departments of chemical,
civil and environmental, electrical and computer and mechanical
engineering.
The accomplishments of EDRC were impressive. The center
revolutionized the rapid use of information technology and networking
between geographically distributed teams. This “ubiquitous networking”
spawned electronic commerce environments where design, prototyping and
manufacturing resources were remotely available. EDRC also
revolutionized the use of computer models for rapid physical
prototyping, progressing beyond mere geometric displays and
visualization to increasingly realistic physical simulation. EDRC had a
strong commitment to multi-disciplinary education and created the
engineering design minor. The center developed revolutionary design
strategies and methodologies and extended these concepts to
organizations and organizational behavior.
After 11 years of significant contributions, EDRC graduated
from NSF funding. But, the need for an EDRC-like infrastructure to
sustain interdisciplinary research efforts was recognized.
On February 1997, the Dean of the College of Engineering
announced the creation of ICES from the infrastructure of EDRC. ICES
initially had three thrust areas. These areas included: (1) Design and
Manufacturing; (2) Embedded and Reliable Information Systems and (3)
Tissue Engineering. Design and Manufacturing and Embedded and Reliable
Information Systems thrusts were direct outgrowths of EDRC research.
The Tissue Engineering thrust leveraged expertise in Solid Freeform
Fabrication and a growing interest within the College of Engineering in
bioengineering.
In 1999 ICES reorganized its research structure into nine
focus laboratories with the goals of: continuing the consolidation and
steady growth of ICES; enabling the development of leadership depth,
and providing ownership to the Lab Directors for their initiatives and
accomplishment. During this period, the Wearable Computers Laboratory
was combined with the Interaction Design Studio to form the Laboratory
for Interactive Computing Systems (LINCS). The other eight focus
laboratories included: the Advanced Infrastructure Systems laboratory
(AIS); Computational Analysis of Social and Organizational Systems
(CASOS) laboratory; Education laboratory; Engineering Design Research
Center (ERDC); Embedded and Reliable Information Systems (ERIS)
laboratory; Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS) laboratory; Thermal
Management and Electronics Packaging laboratory; and the Tissue
Engineering and Artificial Organs laboratory.
In 2001, ICES began a strategic planning process for
self-assessment and to determine the future direction of research,
education and the changing priorities of the College of Engineering and
the university. The planning process identified the need to revisit the
intellectual theme and the evolution of the laboratory structure. Of
the nine laboratories, three mature areas became core competencies.
Leaders of ICES core competencies now have greater flexibility
concerning their interactions and responsibilities. For example, core
competency leaders participate in the Directors Advisory Board, but do
not necessarily host regular meetings. Researchers working in core
competency areas work collaboratively between laboratories, thereby
creating new ideas that could evolve into new research thrusts. And
these changes have spurred new thinking in areas of education,
nanotechnology, advanced sensing and fuel cell research.