Mississippi State University’s team placed first overall among 17 other universities at the third annual national Challenge X competition to find innovative ways of redesigning a fuel-efficient and environmentally-friendly SUV.

The university team of undergraduate and graduate students headquartered at the Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, was awarded the top position overall and in 10 individual categories at the nine-day competition in Milford, Mich. The challenge: to re-engineer a 2005 Chevrolet Equinox crossover sports utility vehicle using advanced propulsion technologies that increase fuel efficiencies and reduce environmental impact while retaining consumer appeal.

The competition was organized by General Motors and the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, and sponsored by companies such as UGS, Michelin, Caterpillar, BP, National Science Foundation and AVL North America. Judging criteria in the competition involved more than a dozen evaluations, among them acceleration, off-road performance, greenhouse gas impact, fuel economy, emissions, and consumer acceptability. Oral presentations and technical research papers were also part of the judging.

Mississippi State University will receive a total of $31,500 in prize money, including $15,000 from the National Science Foundation for the outstanding faculty adviser, electrical and computer engineering professor Marshall Molen.

The team designed a "through-the road parallel hybrid electric" vehicle with a 1.9L GM direct injection turbo diesel engine fueled by B20 biodiesel. The vehicle increased its fuel economy by 48 percent compared to the original design.

One thing that separated the MSU team from the other schools, was the use of Dassault Systems software to design, simulate and analyze components for the project. “CATIA V5 was instrumental in redesigning components to fit our needs. The FEA package Abaqus was used to simulate stresses on those components, and CATIA was used to generate code to drive our CNC machines to manufacture the parts,” said Neil Littell, PLM Coordinator for the Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems at Mississippi State University.

"Developing more energy-efficient and 'greener' automotive technologies has become a global priority," said John F. Mizroch, principal deputy assistant secretary with DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. "Students competing in Challenge X are on a quest to deliver environmentally friendly, functional and fuel efficient vehicles that consumers want to buy."

MSU students worked many hours over the last three years on the competition, which has been continued for an additional year. In 2006, the team placed third overall in the competition, along with winning first place in several individual categories including “Best Engineering and Fabrication Workmanship”.

Others competing in Challenge X include the universities of California at Davis, Michigan, Tennessee, Texas at Austin, Tulsa, Waterloo, and Wisconsin-Madison, as well as Michigan Technological, Ohio State, Pennsylvania State, San Diego State, Texas Tech, Akron, Virginia Tech, and West Virginia universities, and Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.

For more information about the Challenge X team at Mississippi State University and the Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, please visit www.cavs.msstate.edu.