Telescopic walls could rise on demand to stop flood waters
BUFFALO, New York: Jorge Cueto was running a successful consulting and construction company in Bogota, Colombia, and teaching civil engineering in a university five years ago, but he felt the need to do more. He wanted something new.
“I wrote on the application for the Fulbright scholarship what I was trying to do. I was looking for something new, but I didn’t know what it was,” he said.
He won the scholarship, and by a fortunate coincidence — one of his favourite professors in Bogota had graduated from the University at Buffalo — he came to UB. After finishing his master’s degree and writing his PhD thesis, Cueto recently won UB’s Engineering & Applied Sciences Outstanding Young Alumnus Award.
The award is a recognition of outstanding contributions to his career field and comes after a long struggle to win support for his invention, which is also the subject of his thesis: a telescoping structural system. Cueto devised a patent-pending system of telescoping rectangular fibrereinforced concrete boxes that he hopes will be the basis for “rise on demand” flood walls. The walls can be installed below ground level, so as not to block any water views, and can be raised when the threat of flooding occurs.
His invention, called Smart Walls, won a Small Business Innovation Research grant from the National Science Foundation.
The inspiration for the
I was literally sitting at my desk in my apartment. I am usually very efficient with space, to optimise its use. When I started thinking of the hollow space inside massive columns. You’re not using that space, and I was playing with an umbrella. — Jorge Cueto, doctorate student
telescoping walls came in an emerging technologies class. The assignment was to identify a problem and then design a solution.
“I was literally sitting at my desk in my apartment. I am usually very efficient with space, to optimise its use. When I started thinking of the hollow space inside massive columns. You’re not using that space, and I was playing with an umbrella,” he recalled.
The idea clicked, and he started designing a telescopic structure.
Cueto, 34, entered numerous business contests in search of money for his fledgling company, Smart Walls Construction LLC. But success eluded him until he received the NSF award.
“The NSF grant was the last straw for me. It allows the company to have a real prototype to be tested and shown to potential clients and investors,” Cueto said.