Teambuilding, Innovation And The Engineering Communication Interface

Recent engineering industry-based research has identified a number of skill deficiencies in graduating engineers. Emphasis on communication and teamwork informed by attributes of self management, problem solving and mutual accountability have been recognized as important needs by The Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET of the United States and are now required in undergraduate course material. The Engineering College at the American University of Sharjah has recognised this reality with the development of a course in language enhancement and professional communication centred on engineering multidisciplinary projects (EMDPs). This paper will outline four innovative practices that together inform this course; team-building, teamwork management, collaborative problem solving, resource management. Brief illustrative descriptions of: team-building through the use of the Belbin Team Role Inventory; management of teamwork development via planning and documentation; personnel and collaborative problem solving and interactive information sources hosted via a LibGuide will elaborate these innovative practices.

Organizational Excellence and Agility - Correlation Model

The strive to sustain excellence within organizations has increased with the constant change in customer demands and toughening of competition. With these rapid changes occurring, the need for organizations to be agile has become a significant element in their operation schemes to sustain the excellence and be future-ready. This need raises the question of the relationship between organizational excellence and agility. Various models and frameworks have been developed to achieve excellence and agility in organizations. However, limited studies have correlated the two. This research investigates the relationship between excellence and agility within organizations and develops an assessment correlation index matrix between the two domains. That will help organizations understand their states in agility and excellence. The out-take for an organization is to know its categorization in the correlation model (beginner, master, conservative or fashionist) and determine the under-achieving pillars in each domain. The results of the study have shown that there is a high positive correlation between the two domains in both the public and private organizations. Although while one would expect that private organizations would have higher correlation between the two domains, it has been observed in this study that public organizations within the UAE have shown higher correlation data. This could be attributed to the fact that the Government of the UAE has introduced various initiatives since the 90’s that encouraged public organizations to implement excellence models such as DQA and SKEA. Moreover, the study has shown that regardless of the size of the company, the correlation between agility and excellence is highly positive

Unconventional CO₂‑Binding and Catalytic Activity of Urea-Derived Histidines

The development of an ideal sorbent/catalyst for CO2 capturing and fixation into cyclic carbonates under mild conditions is still ongoing. We report on furnishing l-histidine ester dihydrochloride (His-OMe) into a functionalized urea, 5,6,7,8-tetrahydro-7-(methoxycarbonyl)-5-oxoimidazo­[1,5-c]­pyrimidine (His-Urea, 2). The latter is prepared via a microwave and a modified sonochemical approach using propylene carbonate and N,N′-carbonyldiimidazole, which is further functionalized by different mono- or disubstituted alkyl halides with acceptable yields. Upon activation of 2 or its hydroxylated version 4b with NaH, the CO2 capturing in dimethyl sulfoxide is proven to be a dicarboxylated species (carbamide and alkyl carboxylates, 2·2CO2Na) or alkyl carbonate adduct in the case of 4b, as verified by 1H/13C NMR and ATR-FTIR spectroscopies. A first-time preparation of the dimeric ([DiHis-Urea-Pr]­Br, 6) is reported among the prepared bio-based materials. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations confirm the most active reaction site and verify the CO2-sequestrated adducts. Furthermore, the synthesized substrates (2, 4a–b, and 6) are tested for the cycloaddition reaction of epichlorohydrin with CO2 under mild reaction conditions, with good-to-excellent catalytic activity up to quantitative conversions under arbitrary conditions (3.0 mol% catalyst loading, 90 °C, 8 h, 1 atm CO2). The suggested reaction mechanism is verified via DFT calculations, in which the ring closure is the rate-determining step

ESICM LIVES 2016: part two : Milan, Italy. 1-5 October 2016.

Meeting abstrac