Baseball may have finally ended and the NFL is in full swing. Real sports fan know the good stuff is just getting started though. Good stuff? College basketball of course. I'm pleased to say that in the AP pre-season polls the University of Louisville men are ranked #3 while the University of Louisville women are ranked #10.
It's wonderful that the University of Louisville does things like get
$11.6 million in grants to establish a "center of excellence in diabetes and obesity research" it's also wonderful that UofL knows how to bring it on the basketball court.
The New York Times riffs on the notions of innovation and creativity this week with a feature called
"Inspiration Can Be Found in Many Places, but You Need to Be Looking."
The Louisville connection in the piece is
IdeaFestival.
IdeaFest
participants and founder Kris Kimel have some interesting quotes and
ideas in the piece. Here's some background and quotes about IdeaFestival from Kimel:
And so, in 2000, he helped create the IdeaFestival, which brings
together creative thinkers from different disciplines to connect ideas
in science, the arts, design, business, film, technology and education.
The
goal, according to the festival's promotion, is to promote
"out-of-the-box thinking and cross-fertilization as a means toward the
development of innovative ideas, products and creative endeavors."
It is not your typical "business day," said Mr. Kimel, who works with small businesses. And that can be frustrating.
Whether
it is a festival, a concert, a speech, a convention or a book, creative
thinkers say, you have to actively look for inspiration, and that takes
time.
Carving out time to find inspiration may seem unrealistic
to a small-business owner working 90 hours a week. But Mr. Kimel said
it must be done to find and keep a competitive edge.
Why yes, I am a crazy dog person. Why do you ask? Is it because I'm beyond pleased that a bioengineer at the
University of Louisville studied the inadequacies in dog wheelchairs? Or is it because I'm just all warm and fuzzy that she not only
developed a better dog wheelchair but is also putting the instructions for building it on the internet for free because this is "not about making money. It's about improving the quality of life for injured dogs and their owners." Warm and fuzzy people, I feel warm and fuzzy and full of love for the University of Louisville and the innovation it inspires.
When a family dog's hind legs are paralyzed from injuries, nerve
problems or disease, its owners face a tough decision. They can take on
the demanding job of caring for a pet which no longer can walk, or they
can have the animal euthanized.
University of Louisville bioengineer Gina Bertocci was deeply
troubled by the problem, so this past year, she and mechanical
engineering graduate student Eddie Fowler designed and developed an
adjustable wheelchair for paraplegic dogs that anyone can build with
items commonly found at a hardware store.
She's not pursuing a patent on their invention. Instead, she plans
to post free instructions on the Internet for people who want to build
the wheelchair themselves.
"This isn't about making money," said Bertocci, an endowed chair of
biomechanics at Speed School of Engineering with a joint appointment in
pediatrics. "It's about improving the quality of life for injured dogs
and their owners."
You're such a rockstar Gina Bertocci.
Bertocci will be presenting a paper on how she and her students developed the wheelchair this weekend at the Fifth International Symposium on Rehabilitation and Physical Therapy in Veterinary Medicine.
