A Mexican scientist won first place at an eco design contest set up by FTF Freescale Semiconductor.  The winning design was for the Digital Sun Distiller, and it was developed by Jose Luis Rojas, Iluxon S.A de C.V from San Luis Potosi, Mexico. Based on Freescale's technology, the distiller has been designed for cleaning water and reusing it at home, saving tons of water and energy since it uses solar panels.  The winning entroes were determined by attendees at the Freescale Technology Forum attendees voted. The Digital Sun Distiller received the most votes, and Rojas was recognized on stage as the winner. He received $10,000 USD and an invitation to compete in the Grand FTF Challenge with other first place global winners to vie for $50,000.  "Sustainability is the next challenge in technology development as it places considerations like power consumption and environmental impact at the forefront of embedded design," said Rich Beyer, Chairman and CEO of Freescale. "We're delighted to see the level of engineering innovation and ingenuity displayed by the top FTF Americas Design Challenge finalists and congratulate Rojas on his success with the Digital Sun Distiller".  Incidentally, the second-place winner in the green FTF Design Challenge was a Canadian, Mark Donkers from OES, Inc. London, Ontario. The Clean Water Diverter is based on Freescale's technology as well. Donkers also received a cash prize.  "The world's fresh water supply is becoming scarcer everyday," Donkers said. "Using fresh water for such purposes as flushing waste water is a terrible use of a valuable resource.  Significant energy is consumed in the sterilization, transportation and post-treatment of our drinking water. The Clean Water Diverter will allow people to not only reduce their water bill but also reduce their environmental footprint."         The third-place winner is the ZigBee®-based wireless sensor network for Greenhouse Automation developed by Alfredo Cabral from CODE Ingenieria in Toluca, Mexico, and teammates Fernando Gasca, Jaime Sanchez, Jose Maria Ruiz de Velasco, and Marco Tulio Gonzales.  "Greenhouse management involves continuous monitoring and activation of different units to maintain a suitable environment for plant growth," said Cabral. "Greenhouse control is a rather difficult task to be performed manually and is susceptible to inefficient energy management and suboptimal performance. Therefore, greenhouse automation systems have become a standard for optimal performance in terms of energy consumption, costs reduction and productivity."  There are many smart and hard working people in my country. Most of the time they don't get the support from the media or the government support they should. I'm very proud and happy to see Mexican scientists developing such great ideas and of course all in favor for a better life.  For Spanish speakers, here's the link to the El Universal article(http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/articulos/47888.html)