A Global Collaborative Effort to Enhance Design in a Mechanical Engineering Curriculum in Saudi Arabia

In 2008, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) in Saudi Arabia and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) partnered together to develop project-based curricular material to be tested out in a new undergraduate course offering in KFUPM’s Department of Mechanical Engineering. This paper details some of the unique challenges to collaborating across countries and time zones, and the approaches the KFUPM-MIT team used to address these. These approaches have so far included the establishment of a shared vision for the project and the use of an array of technologies to facilitate distance communication. The paper concludes with a description of lessons learned that might be useful for future programs that plan to engage in international collaboration on design education.Jāmiʻat al-Malik Fahd lil-Batrūl wa-al-Maʻādi

Developing an eggshell marker based on a dominant female sterile mutation for the identification of complete follicle cell clones in Drosophila melanogaster

Patterning of the body axes of the Drosophila embryo depends on maternally expressed genes, some of which function in the follicular epithelium of the developing egg chamber. Many such genes were identified in genetic screens for homozygous mutant females that produce abnormal embryos. However, mutations in zygotically required maternal effect genes are homozygous lethal, and therefore viable females cannot be recovered using this screening approach. This limitation can be overcome by generating homozygous mutant follicle cell clones in heterozygous females using a system that induces site-specific mitotic recombination events. However, to date, eggs produced from egg chambers with complete follicle cell clones cannot be directly identified. We have developed an eggshell marker for follicle cell clones using a dominant negative (DN) allele of the gene defective chorion (dec). Females with a single copy of this allele, decDN, lay collapsed eggs and are therefore sterile. Site-specific mitotic recombination events induced in females heterozygous for decDN and a mutation on the homologous chromosome arm result in homozygous mutant follicle cells that have lost decDN. Therefore, egg chambers with the entire follicular epithelium homozygous mutant generate intact eggs that can be unambiguously identified amongst otherwise collapsed eggs

RESPONSE OF AISI TYPE 316 STAINLESS STEEL TO INTERRUPTED QUASI-STATIC TO IMPACT TENSION AT ELEVATED TEMPERATURES

Le comportement d'un acier inoxydable de type 316 H soumis à une traction interrompue avec un changement de vitesse de déformation, ainsi que la validité d'une équation mécanique d'état, ont été déterminés par des essais expérimentaux à 300, 400, 550 et 650°C. Les effets de vieillissement dynamique aux plus hautes températures sont aussi examinés.The behaviour of a stainless steel type AISI 316 H under interrupted strain-rate change tensile tests, as well as the validity of a mechanical equation of state for this material, are determined experimentally at 300, 400, 550 and 650°C. The effects of dynamic strain aging at the highest temperatures are also examined