Welcome to the April 2007 issue of The TRIZ Journal!

By Katie Barry, Ellen Domb and Michael S. Slocum

This month we have articles from the U.K., the U.S.A., Israel, France, the Netherlands and Iran. Two themes predominate this month: 1) formulating a problem so that it is easy to decide which tools to use to solve the problem and 2) using familiar tools in a wide variety of applications.

• Evaporating Contradictions – Coupled Contradictions by Darrell Mann continues the explanation started last month of a graphical technique, based on the evaporating cloud method, for making the linkage between technical and physical contradictions visible, so that the ways of solving the problem are made visible. The emphasis this month is on the relationships between the solutions, and how "dissolving" a contradiction can eliminate all the other contradictions that are networked to it.
• In Problem Situation Specification, Gregory Frenklach and Michael Pomerantz use classical problems from ARIZ to illustrate a systematic method of identifying the nature of a problem in one of two groups, with step-by-step methods for finding solutions to problems in each group.
• The continuing tutorial series by Val Kraev is in its seventh month and this lesson tackles inventive principles. The 40 principles and the contradiction matrix are popular TRIZ tools. This tutorial will help readers learn to use them effectively.
• Ali Reza Mansoorian illustrates how nature has solved many technical problems using methods that engineers find in TRIZ in Comparing Problem Solving in Nature and TRIZ. Bionics, biomimetics and bionical engineering all refer to the study of biological systems for application in human systems. Mansoorian has examples from birds, fish and spiders that will stimulate interest.
• TRIZ Components Defined by Val Souchkov answers readers' frequent requests for "modern" definitions of the many tools and techniques of TRIZ. The list is comprehensive and written in general terms.
• This month Student Corner author Abram Teplitskiy is joined by Merle Cunningham and Kelly Cunningham as co-authors of Art of Invention in Art. Merle and Kelly Cunningham have been Dr. Teplitskiy's illustrators in previous articles, and the three of them bring a unique perspective to using artistic representations to stimulate creative thinking. As always, we encourage teachers and parents to use the Student Corner materials with students of all ages.
• Be sure to read the Letter to the Editor about last month's Student Corner article, The Gift of Serendipity.

Remember to check the Training and Events Calendar frequently – new items are added weekly, and sometimes daily! Editor Katie Barry will be at the Front End of Innovation conference in May in Boston, Mass., U.S.A. (TRIZ Journal readers can use priority code XM1904RL to receive a 15 percent discount), and many of our authors as well as the editors are planning now for the Japan, Mexico and European meetings in the fall.

Editors Katie, Ellen Domb and Michael Slocum will all be at the Altshuller Institute's TRIZCON2007 in Louisville, Ky., U.S.A. Please introduce yourselves and tell us how we can improve The TRIZ Journal for you!

If you have been working with or researching TRIZ, please consider sharing your results with the TRIZ Journal audience. The editors and readers are always looking for new case studies and analyses.

Until May, happy TRIZ reading!

About the Authors:

Katie Barry is the editor of RealInnovation.com. Contact Katie Barry at editor (at) realinnovation.com or visit http://www.realinnovation.com.

Ellen Domb is the founder and principal TRIZ consultant of the PQR Group. She is also the founding editor of The TRIZ Journal and a commentator for Real Innovation. Contact Ellen Domb at ellendomb (at) trizpqrgroup.com or visit http://www.trizpqrgroup.com.

Michael S. Slocum, Ph.D., is the principal and chief executive officer of The Inventioneering Company. Contact Michael S. Slocum at michael (at) inventioneeringco.com or visit http://www.inventioneeringco.com.