Show Notes

#73 – Amrit Robbins: Cool global cooling cat.

• San Jose’s and San Francisco’s weather are very different.
• “Cat” is timeless within jazz music.
• CFBR means commenting for better reach.
• Friday flamingo party is Amrit’s neighborhood
• Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” got him very interested in climate change.
• Started in political science before changing to atmosphere and energy engineering.
• Net zero is a political issue, not technological.
• An idea for the next Austin Powers movie.
• Make refrigeration consume energy at a different time from when it provides cooling
• Axiom Cloud is doing well, but fighting resistance to change.
• Supermarkets have centralized refrigeration, not individual units.
• Amrit’s favorite energy storage is moderating demand.
• Big refrigeration gains are mostly behind us.
• In grocery stores, refrigerant leaks need addressing.
• Trumpet player since 4th
• In reggae, the trumpet is in the skank
• Reggae band suggestions – Fat Freddy’s Drop and Easy Star All-Stars
• Rusted Root is another band worth listening to.
• White nuthatch reminds Bert of camping
• Very thrilled and optimistic about AI.
• 1960s AI chatbot was called Eliza.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

Show Notes

#72 – Oliver Dewey: Using Beer to Make Carbon Nanotubes.

• Carbon nanotubes are not carbon fibers
  • And they have been made from beer
• Arnold Brewing founded in 1994.
• Chose chemical engineer over chemist because pay is better.
• Brewing the same tasting Budweiser all over the world is tough.
• Has worked for a couple of big brewers
• Dexmat developed Galvorn - lightest, strongest, most flexible conductive material
• Wool has curly fibers and know: Galvorn has straight fibers and no knots.
• Galvorn is piezoelectric and can be a strain gauge.
• Bucky balls invented at Rice University
• “The materials that built the modern world can't build what's next."
• Galvorn can replace copper and be structural at the same time.
• Likes to travel; Madrid, Spain is a favorite. A wine tour in France is on his to do list.
• Remember Y2K?

Adjustable Inserts Webinar

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

Show Notes

#71 – Danno Cabeza: Engineer, Author, Army football fanatic.

• Has written two books. 2nd one, “The Return of Dr. Necropolis”, comes out Dec. 29, 2026.
• Has a process for writing, like an engineer would.
• Operates Asforfootball.com website and Asforfootball podcast about Army football.
• Jeff Kildow is the author of the alternate history book Bert described.
• Swam for West Point
• Got into electricity putting power poles.
• Essentially became an electrical engineer via on the job training.
• Had some good background from West Point.
• Had wanted to be a lawyer – hated the first class he took.
• Still hears “Book ‘em Danno” from Hawaii 5-0.
• He is optimistic for Army football.
• There is a real, but very unlikely, path for Army to win a national championship in football.
• Earl “Dutch” Clarke is on the NFL 100 year team but did not go to the University of Detroit. His son did.
• NIL money; name, image, and likeness; are changing college sports.
• West Point is like a family business. As is the army.
• Danno also ran Olympic length triathlons.
• Explanation of coins at military graves.
• Visiting Arlington National Cemetery
• Swimming relay across Long Island Sound
• Danno makes the best scrambled eggs.

Danno’s website - https://www.asforfootball.com/

Danno’s podcast – As For Football

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

#70 – Chuck Beardslee: The Beer Engineer

• Drinking one of his own beers that he calls Chuck Light
• Cincinnati has drive through beer and wine stores.
• Balloonist in the joke is actually in the Atlantic Ocean about 1,000 miles east of NY.
• He sometimes follows old German brewing techniques.
• A cicerone is like a sommelier for beer.
• Chuck is a certified beer judge but not a cicerone.
• He had several cooking jobs as a youth and still likes to cook.
• He has won two beer competitions.
• As a judge, he sometimes has to give bad grades to good tasting samples.
• Uses Excel for brewing beer.
• Chuck works for Cargill
• He has seen many Cargill food processing facilities and is impressed with what he has seen.
• They have shared some things instead of keeping them as a trade secret.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

#69 – Brendan Conboy: Buffalo Engineers

• The old grain elevators in Buffalo, New York are painted to look like a 6-pack of Labatt’s Blue.
• Can you pronounce Scajaquada Highway in Buffalo, NY.
• Where is it pop and where is it soda?
• Chose engineering because it was a good way to get a job, and from a family of engineers.
• Used to be fascinated by the guy cooking hot dogs.
• Last eephus pitch in MLB was Oct 1, 2023.
• A beginner’s engineering kit gift box contained pocket protectors and a slide rule.
• Many pocket protectors are available. Leather(ish) ones here.
• Rowed in high school. After playing football.
• Rowing shell – any rowing boat. Rowing scull – each rower has two oars.
• Calspan in Buffalo influenced both Bert and Brendan to be engineers.
• Writes code for air traffic control systems.
• Software testing is much more sophisticated today than years ago.
• A little about altimeters and Die Hard 2.
• Take any opportunity you can.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

#68 – Maria Shcherbakova: Brains, blood, and boats

• Maria is a neuroengineer in Philadelphia, from Luxembourg
• Petrichor – that smell after it rains (sometimes)
• Maria likes Guinness and California cider
• "Shch” in her last name stems from being born in Moscow Russia and having a Cyrillic passport.
• Luxembourgers and Liechtensteiners – competitive with each other over banks and cows.
• Saw her first open brain surgery at 18 – hooked her the field
• Spent a summer shadowing a neurosurgeon
• Created her own major at Stanford
• Briefly, neuroengineers are trying to map the pathways of the brain so they can externally perturb he system to fix it. Think Neuralink
• Specializes in movement disorders.
• A different form of blood doping. Will it work?
• Are blood donors doing it already?
• PRP therapy – platelet replenishment therapy – locally promotes healing
• Also used for acne
• Ham sandwich – rowing term and yoga term
• Good practical jokes

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

Show Notes

#67 – Rachel Cox: UFOs, aliens, and em dashes..

• Engineer turned writer who considered art.
• Kelly Slater is a surfer
• Co-oped and worked for NASA and worked on a lunar robot
• Transition to writing was gradual.
• Rachel and Bert like using the em dash.
• UFOs and aliens are fun to get into.
• UFO or UAP? Unidentified aerial/anomalous phenomena.
• Movie Arrival – the aliens look like octopi.
• Cuttlefish Video
• The Drake Equation
• Did aliens help with the pyramids?
• Grew up in Louisville but never went to the Kentucky Derby
• Rachel recommends Becoming A Best Boss
• Did design for color blindness
• Color palette information
  • Bang Wong – science-based color pallettes
  • Martin Krzywinski – prettier than Bang Wong’s
  • Paul Tol – further improvement for engineers and scientists
• Mitch Albom is a great writer. “Tuesdays with Morrie” and others
• Rachel likes mixed-medium art.
• Rachel wants to meet aliens smarter than us.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".

#66 – Topher Anderson: Textiles are Everywhere

• Topher is short for Christopher: Textile Topher.
• FYI, Bert is short for Robert.
• Likes to drink Westvleteren 12, a Belgian beer.
• Warp and weft – warp is up and down and weft is weft and white
• Everything is interesting if you look at it close enough.
• Ropes are a type of textile.
• Old mills are very nice functionally and architecturally.
• Vast majority of textiles are not apparel.
• Persian flaw – an intentional defect.
• Skin is a bio-composite textile.
• Cotton threads are stronger when wet.
• Stitching is also very important.
• The Wright Brothers’ mechanic was Charlie Taylor
• Current favorite fibers are conductive fibers.
• Smart textiles have been 5 years away for 20 years.
• Interest in textiles and origami seem to be related.
• Topher loves Argentine tango dancing

To reach Topher topher@textile.org, Textile.org

Bert’s Companies – www.dexterityeng.com, bertsinserts.com

Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".