engineering

J. Michael McCarthy

J. Michael McCarthy is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand J. Michael McCarthy rather than just read about it. In short: John Michael McCarthy (born c. 1952) is an American mechanical engineer known for his work in robotics, kinematics, and linkages. He is a Distinguished Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), where he has taught since 1986.

Key takeaways

J. Michael McCarthy belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect J. Michael McCarthy to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of J. Michael McCarthy from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

John Michael McCarthy (born c. 1952) is an American mechanical engineer known for his work in robotics, kinematics, and linkages. He is a Distinguished Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), where he has taught since 1986.

Biography McCarthy attended Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, earning a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering in 1974. He later attended Stanford University, where he earned a master's degree in 1975 and a doctorate in mechanical engineering in 1979. He joined the faculty of the UC Irvine Samueli School of Engineering in 1986. He was appointed Henry Samueli Chair and director of the Center for Engineering Science in Design from 2006 to 2014. He was also director of the UCI Performance Engineering Program from 2010 to 2020. McCarthy's research has focused on robotic systems, mechanical linkages, and geometric modeling. His research team maintains the Synthetica, Sphinx, and MecGen software packages used in the computer-aided design of spherical and spatial linkage systems. He was chief technology officer (CTO) of Accuray in 2001, where he helped develop and deploy robotic surgery devices using radio wave control. Since 2005, McCarthy has headed his eponymous consulting firm McCarthy Design Associates, specializing in intellectual property and patents for machine design. McCarthy is a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics. He was a chief editor for the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design from 2002 to 2007 and the founding editor for the Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics from 2007 to 2014. He was secretary for the Orange County Engineering Council in 2012. He was also a visiting professor at the Stanford University School of Engineering where he taught Kinematic Synthesis of Mechanisms in 2018.

Racing McCarthy has participated, advised, and refereed Formula racing for three decades. He competed in the Xtreme Gravity Racing (XGR) Competition in 2006 and 2007 and won Most Innovative Design for a novel virtual kingpin steering linkage. He was chair of the governing board of SAE International's Southern California section from 2009 to 2011. He has been a project advisor for UCI Anteater Racing, a college Formula SAE competition team, since 2003.

Awards Outstanding Service Award, ASME (2008) Fariborz Maseeh Best Teaching Award (2009) Machine Design Award, ASME (2009) UCI Teaching Excellence in Undergraduate Engineering Award (2010) Mechanisms and Robotics Award (2011) Robert E. Abbott Lifetime Service Award (2013)

Books Geometric Design of Linkages, Springer (2000); 2nd Ed. 2010; ISBN 978-1441978912 21st Century Kinematics, Springer (2012); ISBN 978-1447145097 Introduction to Theoretical Kinematics: The Mathematics of Movement, MDA Press (2018); ISBN 978-0978518035 Kinematic Synthesis of Mechanisms, MDA Press (2019); ISBN 978-0978518059 Design of Mechanical Walking Robots, MDA Press (2021); ISBN 978-0978518066

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with J. Michael McCarthy

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what J. Michael McCarthy claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to J. Michael McCarthy before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about J. Michael McCarthy ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of J. Michael McCarthy

In research: J. Michael McCarthy appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses J. Michael McCarthy in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: J. Michael McCarthy is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1952 births, 20th-century American mechanical engineers, 21st-century American mechanical engineers, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for J. Michael McCarthy outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study J. Michael McCarthy in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what J. Michael McCarthy means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain J. Michael McCarthy out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is J. Michael McCarthy in simple terms?

Why does J. Michael McCarthy matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study J. Michael McCarthy?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on J. Michael McCarthy.