Thermal Imaging: Hotspot for Seeking Heat

Santa Barbara is a world leader in infrared technology, with a long history that dates back to the scientists at the 1960s-era Hughes Aircraft Co., which later became the Santa Barbara Research Center.

With present-day industry bigwig FLIR located here, along with defense and aerospace industry heavyweights like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin and companies such as SE-IR Corporation, Electro Optical Industries, Seek Thermal, and Teledyne Scientific & Imaging developing technology for consumer and industrial applications—from smartphones and cars to night-vision cameras and sensors—this sector of tech is definitely a hot one.

“The Santa Barbara office is really the nerve center of a lot of our cores and components,” said Vatche Arabian, director of content marketing for FLIR, whose name is an acronym for “forward-looking infrared.”

With the Central Coast as the home to approximately 450 of its 3,000 employees worldwide, FLIR is considered the global leader in the design, manufacture, and marketing of thermal imaging infrared cameras.

Seek Thermal was founded in 2012 by industry pioneering scientists Bill Parrish and Tim Fitzgibbons, who spent 40 years advancing the state of military and professional-grade thermal-imaging technology. Seek is their third venture, following the successful acquisitions of their last two companies, Amber Engineering and Indigo Systems, which is now part of Raytheon and FLIR, respectively.

Their mission is to make thermal imaging a part of everyday life. “We make devices, for example, that turn your phone into a thermal imager,” explained Seek’s CEO and president Mike Muench. “We make handheld thermal imagers. We make products specifically for the fire and safety space, which are also stand-alone thermal scanning products.”

With manufacturing on-site in Goleta, the team of 100 employees at Seek Thermal was able to respond quickly to the COVID pandemic and the demand for screening measures. Said Muench, “We now make a scanning system for helping businesses to screen employees for elevated body temperature.”

thermal.com

Tech Talk Special Issue for Santa Barbara Independent, published October 1, 2020.

Tech Talk Special Issue for Santa Barbara Independent, published October 1, 2020.

 

Tech Talk Special Issue for the Santa Barbara Independent, originally published on October 1, 2020.

To read the issue as it appeared in print, please click here, Tech Talk 768_10_01_20

 

Raytheon brings science back to school

CMS Girls Engineering Camp, photo by Texas A&M University, courtesy Wikipedia Commons.

CMS Girls Engineering Camp, photo by Texas A&M University, courtesy Wikipedia Commons.

Washington School hosts “Introduce a girl to Engineering Day”

There’s a guy I know who was so concerned about the disproportionate number of women in math and science that when his daughter was born, he vowed that every time she was complimented on her looks, he would add the postscript, “and she’s good at math and science too.”

The aerospace company Raytheon is also concerned about the number of women going into math and science, but it’s taking another tack than my friend.

“Three Cheers to Engineers!” was the slogan at Washington Elementary School on Feb. 25, where Raytheon hosted an “Introduce A Girl to Engineering Day” for more than 60 upper grade students.

“Math Rocks!” was one of the four learning stations, where students were challenged to build moveable cars out of candy, cookies and frosting (similar to ginger bread houses), where each of the ingredients had a point-value, and the points couldn’t add up to more than 300.

“The best part is eating the cars when you’re done,” said Sarah Strickland, one of several financial analysts who helped plan the project.

Electrical Engineer Lisa Dunn, who just two years ago was the president of UCSB’s Society of Women Engineers, worked with a group of kids constructing boats out of tin foil. They used their engineering skills to make a seaworthy craft and their math skills to figure out the maximum number of pennies their boats would float.

Software Engineer Ben Burleson was the “balloon flinker,” helping the students test gravity, using foam cups filled with packing peanuts and attached to helium balloons.

Helium also played a critical role in the hovercraft experiment, where students like Gwen Archambault and Korrina Harmsen created floating vehicles out of balloons and paper plates.

Materials and Process Engineer Elizabeth Mallon gave the keynote speech, explaining the difference between engineering and science to students, who were eager to find out what the different industries are that use these skills and what kind of education is needed.

“They asked a lot of questions,” said Mallon. It’s not like high school presentations where they’re too cool — or too shy — to ask.

“Women are very smart and clever and we want to get more of them in our workforce,” said Francisco Cabrera, in explaining to the students (including a few boys) why Raytheon had sponsored the event.

Raffle prizes included an autographed book about Sally Ride, junior science kits, fiber optic lead pencils and more, including the grand prize — a home planetarium star theatre, which went to Caitlin Connor.

Raytheon also donated engineering books, videos and bookmarks to the Washington School library and all of the participating students received “Three Cheers to Engineers!” t-shirts, as well as goodie bags, said Isabel Villegas, the Human Resources representative who coordinated the whole event, as part of Raytheon’s observation of National Engineering Week.

Last year the company hosted Kellogg School students at Raytheon, but spokesman Ron Colman said next year they’ll pick another elementary school and bring the program to the students, since they got an even better turnout than expected.

Raytheon also hosted a week of job shadowing with members of UCSB’s National Society of Black Engineers, which included an engineering competition, an ice cream social and a free hot dog lunch.

“We’re hoping to hire some of the students that came in,” said Villegas, adding that last year’s AS president Jamie Fitz-Gerald is now working at Raytheon.

Originally published in South Coast Beacon on March 3, 2005.