Advanced Manufacturing vs. COVID-19
Immediately recognizing that advanced manufacturing can contribute to solutions for the pandemic, in March 2020 America Makes developed a plan to team up with the FDA, NIH, and VA and leverage additive manufacturing to fight COVID-19. Other institutes followed with their own projects supporting the nation.
In addition, NIST awarded $12.3 million in grants to five Manufacturing USA institutes to support high-impact projects for pandemic response, with funding authorized by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act signed by the President.
The opportunities extended by the institutes brought together government entities and the private sector to rapidly develop innovative projects that contributed to our nation’s COVID-19 response efforts. These projects:
- Expanded the production of needed medical countermeasures
- Provided workforce training that responded to changing conditions
- Increased testing capacity to track workplace infections
- Helped manufacturers prepare for the future in the face of shifting economic realities
Along with these CARES-funded projects, Manufacturing USA, the manufacturing innovation institutes and the federal agencies that sponsor them — the Departments of Commerce, Defense, and Energy — as well as six additional partner agencies, have committed resources and facilitated coordination among institute members and communities to quickly pivot and augment their programmatic efforts in response to the pandemic crisis.
Here are some highlights from these advanced manufacturing efforts aimed at aiding the United States in its fight against COVID-19.
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The COVID-19 pandemic was a wake-up call for manufacturers. As lockdown orders took hold across the country, many factories scaled back or closed, leaving workers unable to return to their jobs.
But while many office staff and managers have been able to work from home, factories have not yet been designed in a way that allows workers on the factory...
An advanced manufacturing program is being offered to small businesses hit hard by the pandemic.
Lift Detroit is offering certification to 250 manufacturing workers in CNC machine operations, industrial technology maintenance, welding and robotics.
The program is known as “Operation Next” and is free through funding from the CARES Act.
Officials...
LIFT opened its Operation Next advanced manufacturing certification program to employees of Detroit-area small and medium-sized manufacturers to help them recover from the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Available to industry for the first time, the new Operation Next civilian program, funded through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and...
Bioscience research is undergoing a wave of automation and digitization, turning a manual, laborious practice into a true industry.
Why it matters: Biotechnology promises to revolutionize everything from medicine to energy, but for that to happen, the field needs to move out of the traditional lab and into something resembling a foundry. The growth...
With a single example, Ira Moskowitz makes the case for why the organization he leads may be critical for advancing manufacturing in the United States.
Moskowitz, CEO of the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute since June 2020 after decades in private industry, cites the projects ARM has funded for robotic assembly and installation...
Public-private partnership could help coronavirus vaccine developers increase thermal stability, strengthen potency assays and fine-tune adventitious agent testing, among other things.
Sens. Chris Coons, D-Delaware, and Marco Rubio, R-Florida, joined Reps. Haley Stevens, D-Michigan, and Troy Balderson, R-Ohio, in introducing on July 29 the Resilient Manufacturing Task Force Act of 2020, a bipartisan, bicameral bill to help build a stronger, more resilient post-COVID economy.
The bill is cosponsored by Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-New...
The Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) awarded $3.4 million in grants to support “high-impact projects” for Covid-19 pandemic response.
The funding is authorized through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act signed by President Donald Trump in March 2020.
The funding goes to four...
America Makes has received a $1.4 million grant from the United States Department of Commerce’s National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST), announced by United States Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross during a press conference at the America Makes facility in Youngstown, Ohio. The grant will help America Makes continue work to address...