Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 January 2007
Over the past 20 years I have focused on the synthesis process, the process of creation, of bringing together ideas and objects to fulfill and enable needs. Synthesis is a core engineering activity, the partner in the design and analysis cycle of engineering (and other) design. Synthesis is the basis of innovation, the enabler of creating that which is new. Over the past 20 years, research and practice in the area of synthesis and innovation has become more intricate, more complex, and more complete in its breadth of exploration and depth of understanding and delivery. Research in the area that was started over the past 10 to 20 years is now being commercialized, beginning to impact the way design is practiced. The state of the art of algorithms, theories, and processes for the computing basis of synthesis research today can be found in Formal Engineering Design Synthesis (Antonsson & Cagan, 2001). This discussion is not a review of the literature or state of the art, but rather my views of the field of innovation, its emergence into a scientific study, areas of focus for future research, and some of my experiences in each of these areas.