POSTER AWARD
A reward to the genius of young researchers

As part of the CAE Conference, a prize has been awarded to the top six innovative ideas in the field of simulation. Amongst the winners, the University of Padua, the Mario Negri Institute and the Polytechnic of Milan

LAZISE - October 23rd - An award to distinguish the genius, the commitment and the resourcefulness of young people, researchers and businesses; amongst the winning posters: an innovative motorcycle helmet, a project that simulates the restructuring of the Arena of Verona; a method for the treatment of heart disease, new solutions in the automotive field. This award demonstrates that simulation can be a real opportunity for young people, in their exchange of ideas with companies and institutions, to reach new frontiers in occupation and employment. The Poster Award is a project promoted and sponsored by EnginSoft, a world leader in innovation consulting, with the aim of promoting and spreading the culture of simulation and of rewarding the quality of new developments by young researchers. Six of them have been rewarded for their innovative ideas in the use of virtual simulation technology.

The competition was divided into two categories: Industry (for companies) and Academy (for universities) and saw the participation of more than 50 students and businesses from all over Italy and Europe. An initial selection of the 10 best posters in each category was made by a Scientific Committee, who later announced the three winners for the Industry and three students for the Academy section, who won a Tablet PC each.

The event, hosted by Luca Viscardi, of Radio NumerOne, was attended by Stefano Odorizzi, president and founder of EnginSoft, and Andrea Remuzzi, Director of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Institute of Pharmacological Research Mario Negri. Odorizzi said that he was pleased with the competition: "The Poster Awards were a success. Many projects were submitted, much beyond our expectations. Through this undertaking we wanted to create an opportunity for interaction between the business world and the universities."

Over 50 projects were presented, 31 of which reached the final stage. They are mostly posters created by young students from Italian universities, particularly from those of Padua, Salento, Basilicata and Ferrara, from the Milan and Turin Polytechnics, from the Universities of Bologna, Cassino and Pisa. One of the projects comes from the Mario Negri Institute, while, amongst the companies, we note Mox-Off, Pierburg Pump Technology and LyondellBasell.

Eng. Remuzzi, representing the Mario Negri Institute, stressed the important role that virtual simulation can have in the biomedical sector, "Biomedicine needs these new technologies to test new and different techniques, in order to achieve important results."

As for the students, the winners were:

Davide Bertini, from the University of Padua; he submitted a poster on the simulation of renovation of complex historical buildings, such as the Arena of Verona; Matteo Longoni of Mox-off; he has implemented a project to simulate the comfort of a motorcycle helmet while aiming at reducing time and costs associated with the design phase; Marco Stevanella, from Polytechnic of Milan; he has presented a study to detect and quantify aortic malformations, which affect about 2 percent of the European population.

Amongst the companies and the research community, the winners were:

Massimo Nutini, who submitted a poster on the characterization of plastic reinforced with glass fibre, widely used in most industrial productions. Nutini works for LyondellBasell, the third largest independent chemical company in the world; Lorenzo Botti, from the Mario Negri Institute, presented a study, on an open source software platform, concerning a system that simulates blood circulation; Giorgio Peroni of Pierburg Pump Technology presented a poster on the vacuum pump, for automotive applications.