273,192 research outputs found

    The role of Computer Aided Process Engineering in physiology and clinical medicine

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    This paper discusses the potential role for Computer Aided Process Engineering (CAPE) in developing engineering analysis and design approaches to biological systems across multiple levels—cell signalling networks, gene, protein and metabolic networks, cellular systems, through to physiological systems. The 21st Century challenge in the Life Sciences is to bring together widely dispersed models and knowledge in order to enable a system-wide understanding of these complex systems. This systems level understanding should have broad clinical benefits. Computer Aided Process Engineering can bring systems approaches to (i) improving understanding of these complex chemical and physical (particularly molecular transport in complex flow regimes) interactions at multiple scales in living systems, (ii) analysis of these models to help to identify critical missing information and to explore the consequences on major output variables resulting from disturbances to the system, and (iii) ‘design’ potential interventions in in vivo systems which can have significant beneficial, or potentially harmful, effects which need to be understood. This paper develops these three themes drawing on recent projects at UCL. The first project has modeled the effects of blood flow on endothelial cells lining arteries, taking into account cell shape change resulting in changes in the cell skeleton which cause consequent chemical changes. A second is a project which is building an in silico model of the human liver, tieing together models from the molecular level to the liver. The composite model models glucose regulation in the liver and associated organs. Both projects involve molecular transport, chemical reactions, and complex multiscale systems, tackled by approaches from CAPE. Chemical Engineers solve multiple scale problems in manufacturing processes – from molecular scale through unit operations scale to plant-wide and enterprise wide systems – so have an appropriate skill set for tackling problems in physiology and clinical medicine, in collaboration with life and clinical scientists

    A Study of Swelling Behaviour in a Tunnel Using Finite Element Methods

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    The aim of this research is to show swelling behaviour in a tunnel excavated through rocks by modeling them and using laboratory results. The engineering challenge is how to design a tunnel which contains swelling rocks such as marl. This aim is achieved through two methods. In the first method, the Field System Solution program (FISS) is calibrated using experimentally obtained laboratory graphs of the saturated rocks around the tunnel, and the parameters are applied to the geometry of the tunnel. Comparing a critical state model with stresses around the tunnel, stability of the rocks was examined. In the second method, stability of the rocks around the tunnel was investigated by using the Nisa-II program, adjusting the laboratory swelling graphs with the creep function to the program and, finally, drawing Von Mises stresses around the tunnel

    Emerging cad and bim trends in the aec education: An analysis from students\u27 perspective

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    As the construction industry is moving towards collaborative design and construction practices globally, training the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) students professionally related to CAD and BIM became a necessity rather than an option. The advancement in the industry has led to collaborative modelling environments, such as building information modelling (BIM), as an alternative to computer-aided design (CAD) drafting. Educators have shown interest in integrating BIM into the AEC curriculum, where teaching CAD and BIM simultaneously became a challenge due to the differences of two systems. One of the major challenges was to find the appropriate teaching techniques, as educators were unaware of the AEC students’ learning path in CAD and BIM. In order to make sure students learn and benefit from both CAD and BIM, the learning path should be revealed from students’ perspective. This paper summarizes the background and differences of CAD and BIM education, and how the transition from CAD to BIM can be achieved for collaborative working practices. The analysis was performed on freshman and junior level courses to learn the perception of students about CAD and BIM education. A dual-track survey was used to collect responses from AEC students in four consecutive years. The results showed that students prefer BIM to CAD in terms of the friendliness of the user-interface, help functions, and self-detection of mistakes. The survey also revealed that most of the students believed in the need for a BIM specialty course with Construction Management (CM), Structure, and Mechanical-Electrical-Plumbing (MEP) areas. The benefits and challenges of both CAD and BIM-based software from students’ perspectives helps to improve the learning outcomes of CAD/BIM courses to better help students in their learning process, and works as a guideline for educators on how to design and teach CAD/BIM courses simultaneously by considering the learning process and perspectives of students. © 2018 The autho

    Merging process models and plant topology

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    The paper discusses the merging of first principles process models with plant topology derived in an automated way from a process drawing. The resulting structural models should make it easier for a range of methods from the literature to be applied to industrial-scale problems in process operation and design. © 2011 Zhejiang University

    E-Learning Tools to Facilitate Instruction of a Large Enrollment Structural Engineering Course

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    A significant challenge in teaching large civil engineering courses is engaging and providing feedback to students in a meaningful and timely manner. This paper presents a solution that uses e-learning tool Xorro-Q in the successful instruction of a Structures II course of 250+ second year students since 2016 at a research-intensive university in New Zealand. During the course, Xorro-Q has been utilized as an online practice-based learning tool where students can repeat questions without penalty and automatically receive detailed instructor-developed feedback (diagrams, text, or link to website/video) in response to specific incorrect answers. Additionally, Xorro-Q permits a variety of questions used to promote student proficiency in both calculations and intuition of structural behavior. Some question styles come standard with other online homework interfaces such as multiple choice, numeric or word input, and labelling; others like hotspot images and extended text input are uniquely able to serve the needs of this type of structural engineering course. Together, the grading metrics from Xorro-Q has enabled students to receive useful feedback and instructors a snapshot of student understanding that is necessary to implement just-in-time teaching. This paper will include examples of structural engineering question styles posed to students in Xorro-Q. Furthermore, it will provide an analysis of student surveys to guide other engineering instructors on utilizing similar e-learning tools in a large enrollment course. To date, the two completed surveys indicate that repetition of questions in Xorro-Q – especially hotspot drawing questions – allowed students to develop confidence in the course topics, and detailed feedback helped them immediately address their conceptual difficulties

    A benchmark study on identification of inelastic parameters based on deep drawing processes using pso – nelder mead hybrid approach

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    Optimization techniques have been increasingly used to identification of inelastic material parameters owing to their generality. Development of robust techniques to solving this class of inverse problems has been a challenge to researchers mainly due to the nonlinear character of the problem and behaviour of the objective function. Within this framework, this work discusses application of Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and a PSO – Nelder Mead hybrid approach to identification of inelastic parameters based on a benchmark solution of the deep drawing process

    Goods and services tax (GST) on construction capital cost and housing property price

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    Good and Service Tax (GST) an indirect broad-based conswnpti.on tax. Following with the implementation of GST in Malaysia on 1st April 2015, it is suspected that the construction capital cost and housing property price will increase accordingly. This study is aim to review the GST effect associated on construction capital cost and it influences towards housing developer and housing property price. Additionally, this study highlights what was the developer point of view on the GST given to them and also the housing price further proposes initiatives to the housing developers. Argument of GST effect is useful for the public administrators so that to re-consider the rate of GST and also beneficial to the construction parties to account with the GST implementation. As conclusion, this study review that GST do give an impact towards the construction capital cost, housing developer and housing property price in terms of knock-on effect

    Effect of PAO-based Îł-Fe2O3 and surfactant concentration on viscosity characteristic

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    This is a preliminary study on the viscosity characteristics of polyalphaolefin (PAO)- based Îł-Fe2O3 under zero magnetic fields. By varying the concentration of magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs), PAO-based Îł-Fe2O3 with different concentrations were synthesized by co-precipitation method. The effect of this factor on the viscosity characteristic of Îł-Fe2O3 (< 30 nm) was investigated on the basic of a series of rheological measurement. The use of oleic acid (OA) as a coating agent and surfactant was also investigated by varying its concentration. The results show the concentration of MNPs and the amount of OA has obvious effect on viscosity characteristics of PAO-based Îł-Fe2O3. In the case of comparison between the concentrations of MNPs, higher concentration of MNPs increased the viscosity of the PAO-based Îł-Fe2O3 and exhibit nearly Newtonian behavior. The large amount of OA also exhibits the increment on viscosity characteristic of MNPs. The experimental data were compared with the Bingham and Casson model and the results revealed that the rheology of the polyalphaolefin (PAO)-based Îł-Fe2O3 fitted the Casson model better
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