M. Alba Pérez Gracia

May, 2007

School of Engineering

Idaho State University

833 South 8^th Avenue

Pocatello, ID 83209

(208) 282 5655

perealba@isu.edu

http://www.coe.isu.edu/~perealba

Education

3/99 – 9/03 Ph. D. Mechanical Engineering, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA.

9/97 – 3/99 Masters of Science, Mechanical Engineering, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Univ. of California, Irvine, CA, USA.

9/86 – 6/92 Bachelor of Science, Industrial Engineering (BSIE 1996), specialized in Mechanical Engineering, ETSEIB, UPC (Technical University of Catalonia), Barcelona, Spain.

Experience

07/04 – present Assistant Professor -- Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

11/03 – 07/04 Postgraduate Researcher -- Robotics and Automation Laboratory, UCI: applied research in kinematic synthesis. Professor J. M. McCarthy.

3/99 – 9/03 Research and Teaching Assistant --- Robotics and Automation Laboratory, UCI: Design of spatial mechanisms and robotic systems. Teaching assistantship: MAE 145, Theory of Machines and Mechanisms (S 2000, S 2001); MAE 30, Applied Mechanics: Statics (F 1999); MAE 183, Computer-Aided Mechanism Design (S 1999). Ph.D. advisor: Prof. J. M. McCarthy.

3/97 – 8/97 Design Engineer -- MAI, United Technologies Automotive. Design of housings for electrical automotive components. Contact address: Ctra. Igualada, km 1,5 Pol. Industrial - P.O. Box 106, 43800 Valls (Spain) Phone: 00.34. 977. 614 033.

12/96 – 3/97 Design Engineer -- Bitron Industrie España, S.A. Design of temperature and pressure sensors for appliances and automotive industry. Contact address: Bitron Industrie España, C/ Ifni, 24 30, 08930 Sant Adria del Besos, Barcelona (Spain). Phone: 00.34.93.4620014

1/94 – 6/96 Planning engineer -- Waste Agency, Departament de Medi Ambient, Catalonia, Spain. Supervisor: Mr. Carles Viñolas, head of the Planning Department. Development of the regional planning for the minimization, recycling and disposal of the industrial waste. Contact address: C/ Doctor Roux, 80, 08017 Barcelona (Spain). Phone: 00.34.93.5673300.

Publications

Refereed Journal Articles

1. Lai, J.C.K., Schoen, M.P., Perez-Gracia, A., Naidu, D.S., and Leung, S.W., “Prosthetic Devices: Challenges and Implications of Robotic Implants and Biological Interfaces”, Proc. of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Vol. 221, Part H: Journal of Engineering in Medicine, Special Issue on Micro and Nano Technologies in Medicine, 210:173-183. London, UK, 2007.
2. Sato, C., Martinez, R.G., Shields, M.S., Perez-Gracia, A., and Schoen, M.P., “Characterization of Bacterial Growth in Single-Chamber Microbial Fuel Cell”, Int. Journal of Environment and Waste Management, 2006 (in press).
3. Perez Gracia, A. and McCarthy, J.M., ”The Kinematic Synthesis of Spatial Serial Chains Using Clifford Algebra Exponentials”, Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part C, Journal of Mechanical Engineering Science, 220(7): 953-968, 2006.
4. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Clifford Algebra Exponentials and Planar Linkage Synthesis Equations”, ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, 127(5): 931-940, September 2005.
5. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Geometric Design of RRP, RPR and PRR Serial Chains”, Mechanism and Machine Theory, 40(11):1294-1311, November 2005.
6. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dual Quaternion Synthesis of Constrained Robotic Systems”, ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, 126(3): 425-435, 2004.
7. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dimensional Synthesis of Bennett Linkages,” ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, 125(1): 98-104, March 2003.
8. Collins, C.L., McCarthy, J.M., Perez, A. and Su, H., “The Structure of an Extensible Java Applet for Spatial Linkage Synthesis,” ASME Journal of Computing and Information Science and Engineering, 2(1): 45-49, 2002.
9. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Bennett’s Linkage and the Cylindroid,” Mechanism and Machine Theory, 37(11): 1245-1260, November 2002.

Refereed Conference Proceedings:

10. Knight, B.M., Schoen, M.P., and Perez Gracia, A., “Distributed Actuation and Shape Control of Ionic Polymer Metal Composites”, Proc. of IMECE, Int. Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, Chicago, IL, November 2006.
11. Duraisamy, K., Perez Gracia, A. and Schoen, M.P., “Vison-Based Kinematic Synthesis of Hand Motion”, Proc. of IMECE, Int. Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, Chicago, IL, November 2006.
12. Villa-Uriol, M.C., Perez Gracia, A. and Kuester, F., "Humanoid Synthesis Using Clifford Algebra", 2006 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Orlando, Florida, May 15-19, 2006.
13. Duraisamy, K., Isebor, O., Perez, A., Schoen, M.P. and Naidu, D.S., "Kinematic Synthesis for Smart Hand Prosthetics", BioRob 2006: 1st IEEE/RAS Int. Conf. on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics, Pisa, Italy, February 20-22, 2006.
14. Soh, G.S., Perez Gracia, A. and McCarthy, J.M., "The Kinematic Synthesis of Mechanically Constrained Planar 3R Chains", Proc. of the EuCoMeS, 1st European Conference on Mechanism Science, Obergurgl, Austria, February 21-26, 2006.
15. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Sizing a Serial Chain to Fit a Task Trajectory Using Clifford Algebra Exponentials”, 2005 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, April 18-22, 2005, Barcelona.
16. Wolbrecht, E., Su, H.-J., Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M. "Geometric Design Of Symmetric 3-RRS Constrained Parallel Platforms," ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition , Anaheim , CA , November 13-19, 2004.
17. Perez, A., Su, H.J. and McCarthy, J.M., “Synthetica 2.0: Software for the Synthesis of Constrained Serial Chains”, 2004 ASME Design Engineering Technical Conferences, Salt Lake City, September 2004.
18. Villa-Uriol, M.C., Kuester, F., Bagherzadeh, N., Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Kinematic Synthesis of Avatar Skeletons from Visual Data”, Advances in Robot Kinematics, June 2004, J. Lenarcic and C. Galletti, eds., Kluwer Academic Publishing, 2004.
19. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dimensional Synthesis of CRR Serial Chains”, ASME Design Engineering Technical Conferences, Chicago, IL, September 2003.
20. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dimensional Synthesis of RPC Serial Robots”, International Conference on Advanced Robotics, ICAR 2003, Coimbra, Portugal, June 2003.
21. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dual Quaternion Synthesis of a Parallel 2-TPR Robot,” Proc. of the Workshop on Fundamental Issues and Future Research Directions for Parallel Mechanisms and Manipulators, October 3-4, 2002, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.
22. Perez, A., McCarthy, J.M. and Bennett, B., “Dual Quaternion Synthesis of Constrained Robots,” Advances in Robot Kinematics, (J. Lenarcic and F. Thomas,eds.), pp. 443-452, Kluwer Academic Publ.,Netherlands, 2002.
23. Perez, A., and McCarthy, J.M., “Dimensional Synthesis of Bennett Linkages,” Proceedings of the ASME Design Engineering Technical Conferences, Baltimore, MD, Sept. 10-13, 2000.
24. Perez, A. and McCarthy, J.M., “Dimensional Synthesis of Spatial RR Robots,” Advances in Robot Kinematics, (J. Lenarcic and M.M. Stanisic, eds.), pp. 93-102, Kluwer Academic Publ., Netherlands, June 2000.

Presentations and Invited Seminars:

• Tutorial, IEEE ICRA 2005 Conference: Robot Design Using Mechanism Synthesis Theory. Organizer: J.M. McCarthy. Speakers: J.M. McCarthy, Hai Jun Su, Alba Perez. April 2005.
• Tutorial, ASME DETC 2004 Conference: Robot Design Using Mechanism Synthesis Theory. Organizer: J.M. McCarthy. Speakers: J.M. McCarthy, Hai Jun Su, Alba Perez. September 2004.

Awards and Research Grants

Research Grants:

• US Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, June 2007 – October 2008: “Smart Prosthetic Hand Technology”. PI: D. Subbaram Naidu, co-PIs: Jim Lai, Solomon Leung, Marco P. Schoen and Alba Perez Gracia.

• CAES-LDRD, April 2007 – September 2008 : “Development of Microbial Fuel Cell, fueled by domestic, agricultural, and food processing wastewaters”, PI: Dr Chikashi Sato, co-PIs: Malcolm Shields, Marco Schoen, Alba Perez-Gracia

• NASA Idaho EPSCOR 2006-2007: “Tumbleweed Microrobots Using Electroactive Polymers”, PI: Marco P. Schoen, co-PI: Brian Williams, Alba Perez Gracia.

• ISU Faculty Research Committee Grant, May 2005 - May 2007, project: “Use of Robot Synthesis Theory for Characterization of Protein Kinematics”. PI: Alba Perez Gracia.

Awards:

• Balsells Fellowship, 1997-1998 and 1998-1999, to pursue graduate studies at the University of California, Irvine.

Graduate Research Directed (Master’s Theses)

• D. Alder, Multiple DOF Robotic Hand Design for Prosthetics, Master’s Thesis, to be completed August 2007.
• K. Duraisamy, Kinematic Synthesis for Smart Hand Prostheses, Master’s Thesis, December, 2006.
• R. Isaak, A Study of Overconstrained Linkage Networks, Master’s Thesis, June, 2006.

Teaching Experience

Fall 2004, 2005, 2006 Kinematics and Dynamics of Machinery: Kinematic analysis and design of cams, gears, and linkages; velocity, acceleration and force analysis; kinematic synthesis; balancing; computer-aided analysis and synthesis. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Fall 2004, 2005, 2006 Measurement Systems Laboratory: Principles of measurement, standards and accuracy, detectors and transducers, digital data acquisition, signal conditioning systems and devices, statistical concepts in measurement, experimental investigation of engineering systems. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Fall 2005 Robot Kinematics: A graduate level course which introduces the students to several mathematical tools for robot analysis and design: homogeneous matrices, Lie algebras and Clifford algebras. . College of Engineering, Idaho State University

Spring 2005, 2006, 2007 Machine Design: Design of mechanical components subject to static and fatigue loads. Design using screws, fasteners, springs, bearings, and welds. Computer-aided design using finite element methods. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Spring 2005, 2006 Mechatronics: Basic kinematics, sensors, actuators, measurements, electronics, microprocessors, programmable logic controllers, feedback control, robotics and intelligent manufacturing. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Spring 2006 Statics: Concepts of force vectors and equilibrium with emphasis on free body diagrams. Trusses, beams, frames, centroids, fluid statics, and friction. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Spring 2007 Symbolic Programming: Introduces symbolic programming language, with emphasis on algebraic, calculus, and linear algebraic manipulations and visualization, with engineering applications. College of Engineering, Idaho State University.

Professional Activities and Affiliations

• Member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).
• Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE).
• Member of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE).
• Member of the Scientific Research Society (Sigma Xi).

University Service Activities

• University Library Committee, 2004-2005.
• Campus Planning Council, 2005-2007.
• Research Coordinating Council, 2006-2007.