Hypothesis Framing for Engineering Proposals - Fellowships

[jlel12]

Hi all,

 

I'm currently working on my fellowship applications, and have run across an issue that I've had trouble finding guidance on - hoping you all can help me out.

 

Briefly, I'm intending to propose a mechanical engineering design project in my fellowship applications. The project is modeled (loosely) on Layton Hale's Ph.D thesis project (you can check out his thesis here: http://pcsl.mit.edu/2_72/documents/Hale-New-PDF.pdf), which basically comprised a review of existing precision machines and the compilation of a design guide for future machines. Similarly, I'm intending to explore prior art in designing a type of widget, generate and test a range of designs for these widgets, and ultimately produce a "guide" to widget design based on the results of those tests, much like Hale did.   

 

My issue is with expressing a "hypothesis" for this project, or at least in the traditional, "I hypothesize that addition of X to widget Y will have Z effect," format. Like Hale, I'm intending to produce a corpus of information rather than answer a specific question, something which I feel would be fairly common among engineering proposals for fellowships. However, I haven't found any information on best practices for proposing this type of project, and most other resources I've looked at have heavily emphasized the importance of a clear, answerable hypothesis - something which I'm not sure how to produce.

 

Of the sample research proposals I've looked at, the closest I've found to what I'm talking about is Reid Berdanier's (available from his site: https://www.dropbox.com/s/hsskyhvwlq1monk/Reid%20Berdanier%20Proposal.pdf), where he proposes characterizing flow fields in compressors to assist compressor designers in building better compressors. However, his project is somewhat narrower/more specific than what I'm intending to propose.

 

TL;DR: For graduate fellowship "Proposed Research" essays, do I absolutely need a hypothesis that is structured as "I hypothesize that addition of X to widget Y will have Z effect"? Or can I get away with a more general, investigative research project?

 

So - thoughts? Is this project DOA, or is it feasible with the correct framing of the hypothesis? I'd be particularly interested to hear from other engineers on how you approached broad design-exploration projects like this, and how you'd suggest framing it hypothesis-wise.

 

Thanks much - JL

Edited September 2, 2013 by jlel12

[jlel12]

Bump! Any thoughts, folks?

[Eigen]

I can't say for MechE specifically, but I haven't seen strict hypothesis statements in any of the fellowships I've looked over, mine definitely didn't have one.