The lack of design quality focus in construction: a case for examining suitable design processes

A large number of projects in UK construction now involve contractor-led design and are thus very different from the traditional approach which formed the basis of the original Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Outline Plan of Work. Such integrated and contractor-led approaches support the reform agenda of the late 1990s that was introduced to tackle process inefficiency. However, within the design professions there has been concern that this resulted in buildings that were designed-down to a cost rather than designed-up to a value. An attempt to address this resulted in the formation of the Commission for Architecture and Built Environment (CABE) in 1999 and the launch, in 2003, of the Design Quality Indicator (DQI) which measures how well a building satisfies stakeholders. This paper presents the early phases of doctoral research which will examine the impact of integrated design management approaches upon Design Quality

Constitutive modeling of superalloy single crystals with verification testing

The goal is the development of constitutive equations to describe the elevated temperature stress-strain behavior of single crystal turbine blade alloys. The program includes both the development of a suitable model and verification of the model through elevated temperature-torsion testing. A constitutive model is derived from postulated constitutive behavior on individual crystallographic slip systems. The behavior of the entire single crystal is then arrived at by summing up the slip on all the operative crystallographic slip systems. This type of formulation has a number of important advantages, including the prediction orientation dependence and the ability to directly represent the constitutive behavior in terms which metallurgists use in describing the micromechanisms. Here, the model is briefly described, followed by the experimental set-up and some experimental findings to date

Constitutive modelling of single crystal and directionally solidified superalloys

Successful attempts were made to model the deformation behavior of nickel base superalloys to be used in gas turbine engines based on both a macroscopic constitutive model and a micromechanical formulation based on crystallographic slip theory. These models were programmed as FORTRAN subroutines, are currently being used to simulate thermomechanical loading predictions expected at the fatigue critical locations on a single crystal turbine blade. Such analyses form a natural precursor to the application of life prediction methods to gas turbine airfoils

Influence of Visual Feedback On Dynamic Balance Control in Chronic Stroke Survivors

Chronic stroke survivors have an increased incidence of falls during walking, suggesting changes in dynamic balance control post-stroke. Despite this increased incidence of falls during walking, balance control is often studied only in standing. The purpose of this study was to quantify deficits in dynamic balance control during walking, and to evaluate the influence of visual feedback on this control in stroke survivors. Ten individuals with chronic stroke, and ten neurologically intact individuals participated in this study. Walking performance was assessed while participants walked on an instrumented split-belt treadmill with different types of visual feedback. Dynamic balance control was quantified using both the extent of center of mass (COM) movement in the frontal plane over a gait cycle (COM sway), and base of support (step width). Stroke survivors walked with larger COM sway and wider step widths compared to controls. Despite these baseline differences, both groups walked with a similar ratio of step width to COM sway (SW/COM). Providing a stationary target with a laser reference of body movement reduced COM sway only in the stroke group, indicating that visual feedback of sway alters dynamic balance control post-stroke. These results demonstrate that stroke survivors attempt to maintain a similar ratio of step width to COM movement, and visual cues can be used to help control COM movement during walking post-stroke

"Unfunded liabilities" and uncertain fiscal financing

A rational expectations framework is developed to study the consequences of alternative means to resolve the "unfunded liabilities" problem--unsustainable exponential growth in federal Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid spending with no plan to finance it. Resolution requires specifying a probability distribution for how and when monetary and fiscal policies will change as the economy evolves through the 21st century. Beliefs based on that distribution determine the existence of and the nature of equilibrium. We consider policies that in expectation combine reaching a fiscal limit, some distorting taxation, modest inflation, and some reneging on the government's promised transfers. In the equilibrium, inflation-targeting monetary policy cannot successfully anchor expected inflation. Expectational effects are always present, but need not have large impacts on inflation and interest rates in the short and medium runs.

Comparison of a Particle Filter and Other State Estimation Methods for Prognostics of Lithium-Ion Batteries

A particle filter (PF) is shown to be more accurate than non-linear least squares (NLLS) and an unscented Kalman filter (UKF) for predicting the remaining useful life (RUL) and time until end of discharge voltage (EODV) of a Lithium-ion battery. The three algorithms track four states with correct initial guesses and 5% variation on the initial guesses. The more accurate prediction performance of PF over NLLS and UKF is reported for three Lithium-ion battery models: a data-driven empirical model, an equivalent circuit model, and a physics-based single particle (SP) model

Comparison of herbicide programs in imidazolinone tolerant corn

Field studies were conducted in 1998 at Jackson, Milan, Knoxville, and Spring Hill, Tennessee, to examine several herbicide programs for weed control in imidazolinone-tolerant corn. Field corn variety FFR 797 IMI was no-till or minimum-till planted at all locations. The treatments were replicated four times in a randomized block design. Treatments ranging from a PRE-only to PRE followed by postemergent (POST) to total POST applied to examine weed control, crop injury, and yield. Crop oil concentrate (COC) was combined with atrazine when applied POST, while nonionic surfactant was added to all other POST treatments. Visual evaluations were taken four weeks after treatment to evaluate control of broadleaf signalgrass (Brachiaria platyphylla (Griseb.) Nash), large crabgrass (Digitaria sanguinalis (L.) Scop), Palmer amaranth (Amaranthus palmeri (S.) Wats), pitted morningglory (Ipomoea lacunosa L.), and sicklepod (Senna obtusifolia (L.) Irwin and Barnaby). None of the treatments controlled sicklepod at Milan due to high population density (600-5000 plants/m2). Imazethapyr + imazapyr + dicamba POST and atrazine + metolachlor PRE followed by prosulfuron + primisulfuron + nicosulfuron POST controlled these weeds while imazethapyr + imazapyr POST, imazethapyr + imazapyr + pendimethalin POST, and atrazine + metolachlor PRE followed by flumetsulam + clopyralid + nicosulfuron POST controlled all weeds \u3e86% except Palmer amaranth (\u3c67%). Imazethapyr + imazapyr + nicosulfuron POST failed to control Palmer amaranth and only controlled sicklepod 75% at Spring Hill. Atrazine + metolachlor PRE followed by nicosulfuron POST did not control Palmer amaranth and pitted morningglory but controlled all other weeds. Atrazine + metolachlor PRE followed by dicamba POST failed to control broadleaf signalgrass and pitted morningglory, but controlled large crabgrass, Palmer amaranth, and sicklepod. Imazethapyr + imazapyr + atrazine POST controlled all weeds except pitted morningglory (71%), while atrazine + crop oil concentrate controlled the dicot weeds but had little monocot activity. Nicosulfuron + rimsulfuron + atrazine POST controlled broadleaf signalgrass and Palmer amaranth, but only partially controlled pitted morningglory control. Sicklepod was controlled at Knoxville but not at Spring Hill by the mixture of these three herbicides. Although atrazine + metolachlor PRE controlled broadleaf signalgrass and sicklepod at Knoxville, the treatment did not control all other weeds at Jackson and Spring Hill. Corn yields were reduced at Milan from sicklepod competition. Yields were also low for treatments that did not provide adequate large crabgrass and Palmer amaranth control. Slight corn injury was observed but did not appear to influence corn yields

How Confusing! Resolving the Three-Way Circuit Split on the Nominative Fair Use Doctrine

Trademark defenses such as descriptive fair use have been codified in the Lanham Act for decades. Despite the practical necessity of nominative fair use, it has yet to be codified into the Lanham Act. While the Supreme Court has offered guidance on descriptive fair use, there is currently no such guidance with respect to nominative fair use. Currently, our best guidance is a confusing three-way Circuit Split on how to approach nominative fair use. Other circuits have largely remained uncertain in how to approach the doctrine or have outright avoided using the doctrine. In analyzing the intricacies of nominative fair use, this note comes to the conclusion that the Third Circuit’s approach best resolves the split by treating the doctrine as an affirmative defense, avoiding judicial confusion and waste, and allowing for the coexistence of consumer confusion and nominative use. In 2017, the Supreme Court denied a petition for certiorari on a Second Circuit case dealing with nominative fair use, leaving the three-way circuit split intact. This leaves amending the Lanham Act as the most direct and sensible approach. The Congress should therefore amend the Lanham Act, formally recognizing the Third Circuit’s approach to nominative fair use to address the Circuit Split and expand the freedoms of trademark defendants by allowing them to use the trademarks of others in a justifiable way

Transcendental Idealism, Transcendental Realism, and the Possibility of Objective Reference

The goal of my thesis is to understand why Kant thinks that transcendental idealism can secure empirical realism, the idea that there really exists an objective world that we can come to know through experience. I maintain that, according to Kant, the possibility of coming to know objective reality depends upon the possibility of referring to objects, which itself, Kant thinks, can be explained by transcendental idealism. The transcendental idealist worldview is supposed by Kant to explain the possibility of referring to objects because it recognizes that objects must conform to cognition and not the other way around. Therefore, I explore what Kant means by objects conforming to cognition. I start with the fact that Kant says that the conditions for the possibility of our experience of objects must be identical with the conditions for the possibility of those objects themselves. I then argue that this means that according to the transcendental idealist worldview, objective reality, if it is to be full-blooded objective reality, must be essentially able to show up for us in experience. In opposition to this worldview stands what Kant calls transcendental realism, the prevailing worldview that supposes that full-blooded objective reality simply cannot be essentially able to show up for us in experience. Kant says that the prevailing transcendental realist worldview, of which he claims all philosophies hitherto are variations, will never be able to explain the possibility of referring to objects, and that only his transcendental idealism can. Because Kant imputes so much importance to the opposition, I elaborate the distinction between transcendental idealism and transcendental realism, and clarify why only the latter can, as the former cannot, explain the possibility of referring to objects and thus the possibility of knowing an objective world, and thereby secure an empirical realism