Maximising Academic and Social Outcomes

The MASOEE project brings together engineering faculties in the EUniWell alliance to share best practices for teaching transversal skills so that engineers contribute to societal well-being. The study combines the expertise of several engineering faculties at European universities. It focuses on sharing and developing expertise to improve the social outcomes of engineering students. Namely, researchers examine the similarities and differences between partners regarding their student bodies, teaching, programme structures, and institutions’ culture. Moreover, the work also explores how transversal skills are taught, what student attitudes are in terms of learning these skills, and how educators can better teach them. The research design includes several activities across four work packages (WPs). To ensure that partners use the same skill descriptions, we use well-established organizations' existing definitions. WP1 strives to identify best practices within EUniWell based on the 15 entrepreneurial competencies defined in EU EntreComp Framework. WP2 targets engineering students' ability to solve complex challenges, communication, and networking skills defined in the "21st century skills" by the World Economic Forum. WP3 investigates the engineering schools’ capacity to train engineering students in sustainable competence, forming responsible engineers capable of developing sustainable solutions using the skills defined by the EU GreenComp. WP4 supports the other packages with engineering education research, specifically data collection and analysis, knowledge forming, and evaluation. The project runs from August 2022 until September 2023. The MASOEE project partners gather knowledge within their organisations through joint surveys and focus groups and collectively identify and share best practices. The engineering identity, taught as transversal skills by participating partners, can evolve from a traditional technologist identity along three paths: the self-made engineer, the progressive technologist, and the responsible engineer. By sharing best practices for teaching these skills, we believe we will better understand what the future engineer - who integrates all three identities – will be.<br/

Maximising Academic and Social Outcomes

The MASOEE project brings together engineering faculties in the EUniWell alliance to share best practices for teaching transversal skills so that engineers contribute to societal well-being. The study combines the expertise of several engineering faculties at European universities. It focuses on sharing and developing expertise to improve the social outcomes of engineering students. Namely, researchers examine the similarities and differences between partners regarding their student bodies, teaching, programme structures, and institutions’ culture. Moreover, the work also explores how transversal skills are taught, what student attitudes are in terms of learning these skills, and how educators can better teach them. The research design includes several activities across four work packages (WPs). To ensure that partners use the same skill descriptions, we use well-established organizations' existing definitions. WP1 strives to identify best practices within EUniWell based on the 15 entrepreneurial competencies defined in EU EntreComp Framework. WP2 targets engineering students' ability to solve complex challenges, communication, and networking skills defined in the "21st century skills" by the World Economic Forum. WP3 investigates the engineering schools’ capacity to train engineering students in sustainable competence, forming responsible engineers capable of developing sustainable solutions using the skills defined by the EU GreenComp. WP4 supports the other packages with engineering education research, specifically data collection and analysis, knowledge forming, and evaluation. The project runs from August 2022 until September 2023. The MASOEE project partners gather knowledge within their organisations through joint surveys and focus groups and collectively identify and share best practices. The engineering identity, taught as transversal skills by participating partners, can evolve from a traditional technologist identity along three paths: the self-made engineer, the progressive technologist, and the responsible engineer. By sharing best practices for teaching these skills, we believe we will better understand what the future engineer - who integrates all three identities – will be.<br/

Water Use Behavior in a Multicultural Urban Area in Sweden

The increasing world population and climate change are major concerns for the supply of water needs. Understanding user behavior facilitates the development of effective strategies of domestic water management. This research applied a questionnaire survey and data analysis methods to analyze the water consumption behavior of tenants in a multicultural urban area, dominated by immigrants of different ethnic origins, in the city of Växjö in Sweden. Results showed that the majority of the studied participants perceived themselves to be environmentally friendly. They reported to be engaged in water conservation activities quite often, but analysis showed that they did not have accurate perceptions of their water consumption. Positive attitudes towards water conservation and self-reported water conservation activities significantly but negatively influenced respondents’ actual water consumption, i.e., water consumption was higher. Subjective norms did not have a significant influence. The results also revealed that individual measurement and debit positively influenced, i.e., reduced, actual water consumption. Therefore, water management systems should include an individual measurement and debit system combined with a visualization system to enable tenants to monitor the quantity and cost of their water consumption

Evaluation of two different carriers in the biodegradation process of an azo dye

Purpose The MBBR solution has been applied for the textile wastewater treatment. However, in order to develop cost-effectivesolutions, waste biomass can be used as carrier. Rice husks are agricultural waste which have been used as an adsorbent of dyes;besides, they can provide and sustain suitable microorganism communities for the degradation of dyes. This study aimed toevaluate the biodegradation of the azo dye Direct Red 75 in two treatment systems with different carriers.Methods Bioreactor Awas composed by an anaerobic bioreactor filled with Kaldnes K1 carriers employed in the MBBR technologyand the study was performed in 2 different temperatures, 30 ± 0.5 °C and 21 ± 2 °C. Biofilter B was composed by a sequencedanaerobic-aerobic system with rice husks as carriers and this study was performed at 21 ± 2 °C. The rice husks was also employed asa source of microorganisms in both systems. Decolourization, surface area of the carriers and other parameters were analysed.Results Biofilter B showed high rates of decolorization, mainly over 90% in all HRT tested (24, 48 and 12 h), presenting itself asa stable system, whereas Bioreactors A showed better performances with 48 h of HRT, about 85%for A at 30 ± 0.5 °C and 45%at21 ± 2 °C. With a similar amount of carriers, analyses showed that rice husks had a much larger surface for microorganisms togrow on than Kaldnes K1.Conclusion The Biofilter B is a worthwhile system to be investigated and applied for the decolourization of textile wastewatertreatment; for instance, in developing countries

Microbial Biotreatment of Actual Textile Wastewater in a Continuous Sequential Rice Husk Biofilter and the Microbial Community Involved

<div><p>Textile dying processes often pollute wastewater with recalcitrant azo and anthraquinone dyes. Yet, there is little development of effective and affordable degradation systems for textile wastewater applicable in countries where water technologies remain poor. We determined biodegradation of actual textile wastewater in biofilters containing rice husks by spectrophotometry and liquid chromatography mass spectrometry. The indigenous microflora from the rice husks consistently performed >90% decolorization at a hydraulic retention time of 67 h. Analysis of microbial community composition of bacterial 16S rRNA genes and fungal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) gene fragments in the biofilters revealed a bacterial consortium known to carry azoreductase genes, such as <i>Dysgonomonas</i>, and <i>Pseudomonas</i> and the presence of fungal phylotypes such as <i>Gibberella</i> and <i>Fusarium</i>. Our findings emphasize that rice husk biofilters support a microbial community of both bacteria and fungi with key features for biodegradation of actual textile wastewater. These results suggest that microbial processes can substantially contribute to efficient and reliable degradation of actual textile wastewater. Thus, development of biodegradation systems holds promise for application of affordable wastewater treatment in polluted environments.</p></div

Microbial decolorization in the biofilter.

<p>Degradation of textile wastewater in reactors at steady state from 190 to 750nm; wastewater: TWW line, reactor 1: line 1, reactor 2: line 2, reactor 3: line 3, reactor 4: line 4, reactor 5 line 5. The vertical line marks the lambda max.</p

Characteristics of textile effluent and treated water.

<p>Characteristics of textile effluent and treated water.</p

Identification of sequenced Fungi ITS regions.

<p>Identification of sequenced Fungi ITS regions.</p