Impact award for Dr Colin Keogh
BRAY engineer Dr Colin Keogh has been awarded the Irish Research Council Impact Award, for making a highly significant impact outside of academia.
Dr Keogh of UCD started a global open source response to the global ventilator shortage, building out a team to design and develop open-source ventilators to help in the fight against Covid-19.
He works in the innovation space and his research and work focuses on applying technology and innovation to solve global problems.
He has used his training and research to directly deploy new innovative ideas and processes with companies, communities and volunteers to help tackle problems in a variety of sectors, including healthcare, climate and business.
Dr Keogh, a past pupil of St Kilian’s Community School, is also an active technology consultant and developer, advising a number of companies and bodies, from small start-ups to Government departments, in areas such as disruptive technologies, engineering practice, advanced energy systems, innovation, design and early stage growth and prototyping.
Dr Keogh is also the co-founder of Sapien Innovation, an innovation consultancy specialising in applied innovation, creativity and design thinking services, and of the Rapid Foundation, a social enterprise which aims to disperse 3D printing technology to third world locations and conducts printing workshops with schools in the UK and Ireland.
His work with the Rapid Foundation has included the design of 3D printed prosthetics for children with missing or ‘non-standard’ limbs.
He is currently leading new research in the energy, SDG’s, additive manufacturing and innovation fields at UCD, with a focus on policy and technology forecasting, enhanced innovation methodologies, additive
manufacturing, third world impact and integrating advanced technologies into social, environmental, philanthropic and entrepreneurial activities.
By 2017, Colin had been named as one of Forbes 30 under 30 in the area of science and medicine, and was named a Nissan Generation Next Ambassador.
He said then that he was determined to change the world by using science and technology to solve some of the world’s biggest problems, utilising low-cost disruptive technologies to make an impact on global issues.