Amy Smith is an inventor and teacher dedicated to developing technologies that optimize limited resources and solve seemingly intractable problems in developing countries.  As a mechanical engineer, she creates life-enhancing solutions and labor-saving technologies for people at the far end of dirt roads in the world’s most remote societies—people facing crises that erupt in health clinics with no electricity and in villages with no clean water.  Striking in their simplicity and effectiveness, her inventions include grain-grinding hammer mills, water-purification devices, and field incubators for biologic testing, each reflecting her inordinate creativity and ingenuity.  Determined to expand her reach, she is systematically inspiring engineering students to follow her lead and develop solutions to the problems that plague huge segments of the world’s population. 

Amy Smith received a B.Sc. (1984) and an M.S.E. (1995) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  Between undergraduate and graduate school, she served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Botswana (1986-1990).  In 2000, Smith joined the staff of the M.I.T. Edgerton Center, where she co-founded the M.I.T. IDEAS Competition, (Innovation, Development, Enterprise, Action, Service), for students who developed designs to solve community problems.