Inventive principles

The USA, unlike many other world regions, also adopts the first to invent principle. Put simply (although patent disputes are rarely simple), if two inventors file similar patents, the patent will be granted to the one who proves that he/she was the first to invent the product , even if he/she was not the first to file for a patent. Proving you were the first to invent can be complex and usually hinges around the availability of full and detailed laboratory notebooks or other records as to how and when the invention was made. 

The First-to-invent Principle of the United States and Its Consequences on Laboratory Notebook Keeping... 

All you have to do is identify your generic useful feature (parameter), as well as your generic harmful feature, then go to the contradiction matrix cell that resides at their intersection. Inside that cell, you ll find any of 40 inventive principles (Exhibit 23.2) by which you can solve your contradiction. 

EXHIBIT 23.3 (Downloadable). This is a very small cross-section of the larger contradiction matrix, showing the problem parameters and inventive principles associated with our stylized example (volume of a moving object versus temperature). It also shows other parameters and principles chosen at random. 

The key to the 40 inventive principles is that they were derived from an extensive analysis and categorization of more than 2 million patented innovations. In each and every case, the patented innovations employed at least one of the 40 inventive principles to solve some identified technical contradiction. This is why some call these 40 principles the genetic code of innovation, and why TRIZ experts will tell you that someone else in another held at another time has already solved your contradiction. 

For more specific examples of the 40 inventive principles, see Simplified TRIZ New Problem-Solving Applications for Engineers and Manufacturing Professionals, second edition, by K. Rantanen and E. Domb, Boca Raton, FL Auerbach, 2007, or go to www.triz-journal.com/archives/contradiction matrix. 

The contradiction matrix typically displays anywhere from one to four inventive principles that can help you solve your contradiction. If you re in... 

For example, if you need the volume of air flow to go up but the surface temperature to stay constant, what do you do According to the contradiction matrix, you go to inventive principles 2, 10, 18, and 34, because when you cross-reference these parameters, that s what the contradiction matrix gives you. 

When you look up inventive principles 2, 10, 18, and 34 (see Exhibit 23.2), you get the following, in respective order taking out, preliminary action, mechanical vibration, and discarding and recovering. You now have four important clues for solving the air-flow/surface temperature contradiction. 

There are certain instances in the contradiction matrix where no numbers appear, as you can see in Exhibit 23.3. This indicates that there are no data to suggest the benefit of any one or more principles over any other principles. In these instances, you can apply any or all of the 40 inventive principles versus any particular subset. Or you can consider reframing your contradiction using different problem parameters. 

Now comes the moment of truth—actually applying the inventive principle to solve your technical contradiction. This requires good analogical thinking skills because you have to consider the identified inventive principles as a guide for coming up with a specific solution to your original specific problem, or technical contradiction. 

These TRIZ stages/tools can be classified as tools for model of problem and tools for model of solution as shown in Fig. 7.6. There are four classes of model of problem—namely, engineering contradiction, physical contradiction, function model, and substance-field model. For the model of solutions, we have the specific inventive principles, specific scientific effect, and specific standard inventive solution. The bridge between the problem and the solution is the TRIZ tools such as contradiction matrix, separation/satisfaction bypass, scientific effects, and system... 

To resolve the contradiction between parameters 1 and 7, the following inventive principles ate suggested 29, 2,40, and 28. These principles are used to derive solutions to resolve the contradiction, that is, solving the problem of the vacuum cleaner. Similarly, parameters 1 and 9, 1 and 22, 23 and 7, 23 and 9, and 23 and 22 can be used to derive mote possibiUties of inventive principles. This will create mote concepts and potential ideas to solve the problem at hand. This is summarized in Table 7.1. 

Inventive principles for technical contradiction elimination are used to eliminate problems represented in terms of technical contradictions. Inventive principles describe either solution pattern which can be applied to resolve the contradiction or a direction in which a problem has to be solved. There are 40 inventive principles for resolving technical contradictions available in TRIZ... 

The first technique and still the most popular. TRIZ slates that to obtain inventive solution, the contradiction has to be eliminated while no compromise is allowed. The necessity to eliminate contradictions is the driving force of technological progress. The matrix was designed on the basis of 39 generalized parameters. The same lists of parameters are placed along vertical and horizontal axes of the matrix. A point of intersection of two generalized parameters indicates which inventive principle(s) is to be used in each particular situation... 

Studying inventions led Altshuller to two interesting observations. First, the same contradictions could be found in many inventive problems and in various areas of engineering that is, they were universal, not domain specific. Second, inventors, in no matter what domain, were using the same ways to eliminate the same technical contradictions. These two observations combined led Altshuller to the conclusion that both contradictions and the heuristics for their elimination (called later Inventive Principles ) are entirely domain independent. Next, he had a dream If we knew all Inventive Principles, then the life of inventors would be so much easier. He was a man of action and made finding inventive principles one of his top research priorities. Soon, after only several years, he had a collection of 40 inventive principles, which can be described as a group thus ... 

Inventive Principles is a collection of 40 heuristics that are necessary and sufficient to eliminate all possible technical contradictions in inventive conceptual designing. 

For any technical contradiction, identified by two conflicting characteristics of an engineering system, the table provides numbers of all inventive principles that could be potentially used to eliminate this contradiction. 

For example, when a technical contradiction between the volume of a moving object and its speed is considered, the table offers four numbers of inventive principles, namely 29,4,38, and 34. They are listed in order of their diminishing potential usefulness. These numbers identify such inventive principles as... 

The first potentially useful principle is clear the remaining ones may require explanation. These explanations should come from a TRIZ expert who understands all the inventive principles and the science behind them. 

The contradiction table can be best explained from the knowledge perspective. In this case, the contradiction table can be interpreted as a certain universal body of inventive knowledge. It is in the form of a collection of decision rules related to all the technical contradictions associated with 39 identified features of an engineering system. Each decision rule has two conditions and at least one recommended decision. Each condition is related to a different feature of an engineering system from a given contradiction. The decision is the recommended action—or more precisely the inventive principle or simply principles—that should be used in this case. When several principles are available, they are listed in the order of diminishing potential usefulness. In the case of the specific contradiction discussed earlier, the decision rule is as follows ... 

If condition No. 1 (first feature in the contradiction) is volume of a moving object and condition No. 2 (second feature in the contradiction) is speed then the decision is to use Inventive Principles No. 29 or 4 or 38 or 34. 

Each technical contradiction may be eliminated using at least one inventive principle. 

In a recent case study, the conflicts inherent in the functional requirements (about 20 of them) of insect cuticle, a relatively simple but weU-studied skin, were defined and resolved using the TRIZ system. This showed that most of the functions of cuticle are provided by detailed control of properties over a very short distance at a chemical and morphological level, summarized by the Inventive Principle Local Quaflty, a principle which is rarely used in technology. The manipulations which Local Quaflty suggests are ... 

An external skeleton is a barrier to transmission of sensory information about the external enviromnent. The resolution here is achieved by having holes through it (an Inventive Principle of porosity ), although the holes have to be carefully designed if they are to give reliable information, be sensitive and not weaken the material (control of local quality again). 

---