Seminar Series Summary

For recent years, a concern over infectious diseases and biochemical threats which may endanger a nation’s security has been spreading rapidly in the United States. No matter what those treats are natural or unnatural, the concern has become a big issue in the nation since the treats are sometimes unknown and propagate quickly. Emergencies over Swine Flu and the infiltration into a U.K.’s biomedical lab will be exemplars of the threats. To cope out this serious concern, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has invested astronomical amounts of money into many research institutes. The Texas A&M Center for Innovation in Advanced Development and Manufacturing (CIADM) is one of those research institutes. The CIADM in Texas A&M started with abundant supports from the U.S. government and this partnership remains well until recently.

The main mission of CIADM is to improve the nation’s emergency preparedness against any risk from diseases, influenzas, bio-chemical attacks, and also from nuclear threats. And there are four sub objectives to accomplish the mission.   The first objective is to secure a sufficient supply of vaccines within a short time specified by the government. Next, the second objective is that the CIADM will provide an aid to entire fields for developing advanced bio-manufacturing processes. Third, the CIADM will be in charge of facilitating developments of medical products. And lastly, the CIADM will play an important role in cultivating professionals for the future.
In the viewpoint of Industrial Engineering, managing the manufacturing process, controlling the risk for the facilities and supply chain will become our main interests. To be specific, automation and system integration are considered to improve the efficiency of the manufacturing process. And also, optimization techniques can be applied to several areas such as improving the waste collection system, reducing the cost of product packaging, and Quality control. In particular,...