With a special shout out to Indian Mobile Initiative for winning in all three categories, this year’s winners are:

$10,000 Global Challenge Awards
—
1. KOSIM WATER KEG
2. SOLAR AUTOCLAVE
3. PRACTICAL ENERGY NETWORK – winner of the School of Engineering’s Global Villages Challenge
4. INDIAN MOBILE INITIATIVE – congratulations on your sweep in all three award categories!
5. MAA-BARA – Winner of the Mohammad Yunus Challenge to Alleviate Poverty through Improved Agricultural Processes

IDEAS Awards
—
1. BIODIESEL – $5000
2. EYECATRA – $5000
3. HYDROHARVEST – $5000
4. LOW-COST CURRICULUM FOR THE BLIND – $5000
5. SAFE WATER WORLD – $5000
6. INDIAN MOBILE INITIATIVE – $7500
7. SOLAR AUTOCLAVE – $7500
8. INNOBOX – $7500
9. LOW-COST AUTOCLAVE – $10,000
10. ASSISTIVE TECH – $10,000

$5000 Community Choice Awards
—
1. LOW-COST CURRICULUM FOR THE BLIND
2. AQUA
3. INNOBOX
4. INDIAN MOBILE INITIATIVE
5. EYECATRA

You can learn more about this year’s teams here.

CONGRATULATIONS to the 2011 IDEAS Competition and MIT Global Challenge teams! A record 45 MIT student-led teams entered their innovative public service ideas addressing underserved needs in water, sanitation, agriculture, education and much more. Many of undergraduate and graduate students have been hard at work for the last eight months to enter this year. The Salud del Sol and MIT IIH collaborative Solar-Powered Autoclave is one of the teams.

Meet all the teams at 7:00pm in the lobby. Celebrate their work. Learn which teams will win part of the up to $150,000 in awards this year. We’ll be joined by President Susan Hockfield, our keynote speaker Dr. Akhtar Badshah (MIT Alum) and other special guests.

Details here. RSVP here.

Later that same day, 46 teams of public service innovators led by MIT students entered final proposals into the 2011 IDEAS Competition and MIT Global Challenge. The Salud del Sol and MIT IIH collaborative Solar-Powered Autoclave was one of the teams. Twenty-four hours later, 84 judges from a range of disciplines began their reviews. And the Community Choice Award voting opened.

Please join us in supporting the spirit of invention as public service that has helped to define the Institute over that last 150 years. Today’s young innovators and entrepreneurs are tackling tough challenges in new ways – from low-cost medical devices that expand care to novel education programs that increase opportunity, these young solvers need your support.

Between now and April 25 you have the opportunity to cast up to 5 votes for the teams that you think demonstrate the greatest innovation, feasibility, and impact. The top five will secure $5000 implementation awards to advance their work. Here’s how you can help them succeed:
• Log on at http://globalchallenge.mit.edu/teams and get to know this year’s teams
• Cast your vote from the Solar-Powered Autoclave team’s profile page here.
• Spread the word! Use our social media hooks to promote the teams you support

Join on May 2 for the award ceremony where we’ll announce up to $150,000 in implementation awards – register to host an online viewing party at here.

And don’t forget: if you’re in Boston this weekend you won’t want to miss MIT’s Next Century Convocation. Get all the details here.

In September, the World Health Organization hosted their First Global Forum on Medical Devices in Bangkok, Thailand. Conference participants included winners from the Call for Innovative Technologies, policy makers, researchers, and clinicians. I had the chance to attend this event on behalf of Salud del Sol, Inc.; Innovations in International Health at MIT; and the solar autoclave research team. It was an incredible conference to be a part of and an honor for the solar autoclave to be recognized among such creative technologies as the remote anemia monitoring system from Biosense and Mark Zimmerman from Nepal, who is developing a simplified anesthesia unit for remote settings.

Dr. Margaret Chan, Director General of the WHO, captivated the group of 300 plus conference participants with her inauguration address, which I would describe as the most inspirational locker room speech for global health:

We are here, in part, because of concern about runaway health care costs and pressure to contain these costs. As noted in a 2007 World Health Assembly resolution, health technologies, and medical devices in particular, represent an economic as well as a technical challenge to health systems.

That resolution expressed concern about the waste of resources caused by investments in medical devices that do not meet high-priority needs, are incompatible with existing infrastructures, are irrationally or incorrectly used, or do not function efficiently. This tells us some of the pitfalls.

But we are also here because the unquestionable benefits of medical devices are so unevenly distributed. I wonder if there is any other area that illustrates so profoundly the great difference in the ability of wealthy and developing countries to reap the benefits of advances in medicine and technology?

We are looking forward to continued conversation and relationship-building opportunities from this conference!

On Thanksgiving, we met up with Susan Kinne, director of Grupo Fenix, an organization committed to the development of solar technologies in the country.  Susan showed us around the neighborhood we were staying in and then brought us to the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniera (UNI).  We were able to meet with Gunther Klatte and other students at the UNI to discuss joint research opportunities between the UNI and Salud del Sol.

Lauren, Erin, Susan and I then traveled to Sabana Grande, Nicaragua, about a 3.5 hour bus ride north of Managua.  Sabana Grande was an excellent experience and very, very different from Managua.  Sabana Grande is rural, while Managua has a population of about 5.5 million people.  On Friday, we conducted meetings with Las Mujeres Solares de Totogalpa, the Solar Women of Totogalpa.  We talked with the group about construction capabilities in the country, and also talked about the women’s continued interest in building the autoclave.  We learned that they are still very interested in the project and would like to work on implementing the design when Salud del Sol has a working model.

Salud del Sol then met with one of the rural nurses who works in the clinics to get a better idea of her specific needs in the clinics.  We were also able bring the most current prototype that was developed at MIT to get some user feedback.

The three of us, accompanied by Susan, then traveled back to Managua on Saturday morning and did some site seeing and shopping at a local outdoor market in Masaya, Nicaragua. We then met with Gloria Crowe, a Salud del Sol, Inc. board member for dinner Saturday night.

All three of us flew back to the United States on Sunday.  Overall it was a very successful trip!

 
“Our experience was amazing, there is a huge potential and opportunity for renewable solar energy in developing countries”, according to Dan Selby. Selby and Elsass also had the opportunity to live with host families in the rural villages during part of their visit. 
“We are very thankful for continued work and support that Salud Del Sol has done for the people of Sabana Grande. Their mission is much like that of Rotary International with an ultimate goal of making the world a better place for everyone to live and enjoy,” said Selby.