67,566 research outputs found
BIM adoption and implementation for architectural practices
Severe issues about data acquisition and management arise during the design creation and development due to complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity. BIM (Building Information Modelling) is a tool for a team based lean design approach towards improved architectural practice across the supply chain. However, moving from a CAD (Computer Aided Design) approach to BIM (Building Information Modelling) represents a fundamental change for individual disciplines and the construction industry as a whole. Although BIM has been implemented by large practices, it is not widely used by SMEs (Small and Medium Sized Enterprises).
Purpose: This paper aims to present a systematic approach for BIM implementation for Architectural SMEs at the organizational level
Design/Methodology/Approach: The research is undertaken through a KTP (Knowledge transfer Partnership) project between the University of Salford and John McCall Architects (JMA) a SME based in Liverpool. The overall aim of the KTP is to develop lean design practice through BIM adoption. The BIM implementation approach uses a socio-technical view which does not only consider the implementation of technology but also considers the socio-cultural environment that provides the context for its implementation. The action research oriented qualitative and quantitative research is used for discovery, comparison, and experimentation as it provides ĂŻÂżÂœlearning by doingĂŻÂżÂœ.
Findings: The strategic approach to BIM adoption incorporated people, process and technology equally and led to capacity building through the improvements in process, technological infrastructure and upskilling of JMA staff to attain efficiency gains and competitive advantages.
Originality/Value: This paper introduces a systematic approach for BIM adoption based on the action research philosophy and demonstrates a roadmap for BIM adoption at the operational level for SME companie
Collaborative design : managing task interdependencies and multiple perspectives
This paper focuses on two characteristics of collaborative design with
respect to cooperative work: the importance of work interdependencies linked to
the nature of design problems; and the fundamental function of design
cooperative work arrangement which is the confrontation and combination of
perspectives. These two intrinsic characteristics of the design work stress
specific cooperative processes: coordination processes in order to manage task
interdependencies, establishment of common ground and negotiation mechanisms in
order to manage the integration of multiple perspectives in design
Cultural heritage and sustainable development targets : a possible harmonisation? Insights from the European Perspective
The Agenda 2030 includes a set of targets that need to be achieved by 2030. Although none
of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) focuses exclusively on cultural heritage, the
resulting Agenda includes explicit reference to heritage in SDG 11.4 and indirect reference to other
Goals. Achievement of international targets shall happen at local and national level, and therefore,
it is crucial to understand how interventions on local heritage are monitored nationally, therefore
feeding into the sustainable development framework. This paper is focused on gauging the
implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals with reference to cultural heritage, by
interrogating the current way of classifying it (and consequently monitoring). In fact, there is no
common dataset associated with monitoring SDGs, and the field of heritage is extremely complex
and diversified. The purpose for the paper is to understand if the taxonomy used by different
national databases allows consistency in the classification and valuing of the different assets
categories. The European case study has been chosen as field of investigation, in order to pilot a
methodology that can be expanded in further research. A crossâcomparison of a selected sample of
publicly accessible national cultural heritage databases has been conducted. As a result, this study
confirms the existence of general harmonisation of data towards the achievement of the SDGs with
a broad agreement of the conceptualisation of cultural heritage with international frameworks, thus
confirming that consistency exists in the classification and valuing of the different assets categories.
However, diverse challenges of achieving a consistent and coherent approach to integrating culture
in sustainability remains problematic. The findings allow concluding that it could be possible to
mainstream across different databases those indicators, which could lead to depicting the overall
level of attainment of the Agenda 2030 targets on heritage. However, more research is needed in
developing a robust correlation between national datasets and international targets
FLARE: A design environment for FLASH-based space applications
Designing a mass-memory device (i.e., a solid-state recorder) is one of the typical issues of mission-critical space system applications. Flash-memories could be used for this goal: a huge number of parameters and trade-offs need to be explored. Flash-memories are nonvolatile, shock-resistant and power-economic, but in turn have different drawback: e.g., their cost is higher than normal hard disk and the number of erasure cycles is bounded. Moreover space environment presents various issues especially because of radiations: different and quite often contrasting dimensions need to be explored during the design of a flash-memory based solid-state recorder. No systematic approach has so far been proposed to consider them all as a whole: as a consequence a novel design environment currently under development is aimed at supporting the design of flash-based mass-memory device for space application
The ecological system of innovation: A new architectural framework for a functional evidence-based platform for science and innovation policy
Models on innovation, for the most part, do not include a comprehensive and end-to-end view. Most innovation policy attention seems to be focused on the capacity to innovate and on input factors such as R&D investment, scientific institutions, human resources and capital. Such inputs frequently serve as proxies for innovativeness and are correlated with intermediate outputs such as patent counts and outcomes such as GDP per capita. While this kind of analysis is generally indicative of innovative behaviour, it is less useful in terms of discriminating causality and what drives successful strategy or public policy interventions. This situation has led to the developing of new frameworks for the innovation system led by National Science and Technology Policy Centres across the globe. These new models of innovation are variously referred to as the National Innovation Ecosystem. There is, however, a fundamental question that needs to be answered: what elements should an innovation policy include, and how should such policies be implemented? This paper attempts to answer this question.Innovation; Delphi Method; Balanced Scorecard; Quadruple Helix Theory; Analytic Hierarchy Process; Ecological System of Innovation, Framework, Systems Dynamics
Quantitative Genetics and Functional-Structural Plant Growth Models: Simulation of Quantitative Trait Loci Detection for Model Parameters and Application to Potential Yield Optimization
Background and Aims: Prediction of phenotypic traits from new genotypes under
untested environmental conditions is crucial to build simulations of breeding
strategies to improve target traits. Although the plant response to
environmental stresses is characterized by both architectural and functional
plasticity, recent attempts to integrate biological knowledge into genetics
models have mainly concerned specific physiological processes or crop models
without architecture, and thus may prove limited when studying genotype x
environment interactions. Consequently, this paper presents a simulation study
introducing genetics into a functional-structural growth model, which gives
access to more fundamental traits for quantitative trait loci (QTL) detection
and thus to promising tools for yield optimization. Methods: The GreenLab model
was selected as a reasonable choice to link growth model parameters to QTL.
Virtual genes and virtual chromosomes were defined to build a simple genetic
model that drove the settings of the species-specific parameters of the model.
The QTL Cartographer software was used to study QTL detection of simulated
plant traits. A genetic algorithm was implemented to define the ideotype for
yield maximization based on the model parameters and the associated allelic
combination. Key Results and Conclusions: By keeping the environmental factors
constant and using a virtual population with a large number of individuals
generated by a Mendelian genetic model, results for an ideal case could be
simulated. Virtual QTL detection was compared in the case of phenotypic traits
- such as cob weight - and when traits were model parameters, and was found to
be more accurate in the latter case. The practical interest of this approach is
illustrated by calculating the parameters (and the corresponding genotype)
associated with yield optimization of a GreenLab maize model. The paper
discusses the potentials of GreenLab to represent environment x genotype
interactions, in particular through its main state variable, the ratio of
biomass supply over demand
Design: One, but in different forms
This overview paper defends an augmented cognitively oriented generic-design
hypothesis: there are both significant similarities between the design
activities implemented in different situations and crucial differences between
these and other cognitive activities; yet, characteristics of a design
situation (related to the design process, the designers, and the artefact)
introduce specificities in the corresponding cognitive activities and
structures that are used, and in the resulting designs. We thus augment the
classical generic-design hypothesis with that of different forms of designing.
We review the data available in the cognitive design research literature and
propose a series of candidates underlying such forms of design, outlining a
number of directions requiring further elaboration
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