SPATIAL TECHNOLOGIES AS A TOOL FOR DEVELOPING SUSTAINABLE URBAN TRANSPORT IN MIDDLE INCOME ECONOMIES

Urban transport is one of the most important elements for the development of sustainable urban areas in middle income economies. In many of these countries, the amount of vehicles on highway facilities in their urban areas is often increasing at such a rapid that is overwhelming their capacity- resulting in such problems as increased air pollution, debilitating congestion and increased depletion of energy resources. Their public transport systems are also under stress due from the influx of low income populations from rural areas added to a significant portion of the population that continues to rely on public transport. Acerbating the problem is the accompanying urban sprawl of most cities in middle income economies. It is obvious that these economies cannot proceed in this manner, but need to investigate appropriate sustainable solutions while continuing to advance economically. Spatial technologies (Geographic Information Systems, Remote Sensing, etc.) and spatial analysis tools are essential instruments for analyzing urban transport problems and the development of sustainable urban transport plans in these countries. The paper discusses the link between urban transport and sustainability of urban areas in middle income economies and demonstrates how spatial technologies can contribute to development of strategies/plans for sustainable urban transport

Conceptual design of a fleet of autonomous regolith throwing devices for radiation shielding of lunar habitats

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in conjunction with Universities Space Research Association (USRA) has requested that the feasibility of a fleet of regolith tossing devices designed to cover a lunar habitat for radiation protection be demonstrated. The regolith, or lunar soil, protects the lunar habitat and its inhabitants from radiation. Ideally, the device will operate autonomously in the lunar environment. To prove the feasibility of throwing regolith on the Moon, throwing solutions were compared to traditional, Earth-based methods for moving soil. Various throwing configurations were investigated. A linear throwing motion combined with a spring and motor energizing system proved a superior solution. Three different overall configurations for the lunar device are presented. A single configuration is chosen and critical parameters such as operating procedure, system volume, mass, and power are developed. The report is divided into seven main sections. First, the Introduction section gives background information, defines the project requirements and the design criteria, and presents the methodology used for the completion of this design. Next, the Preliminary Analysis section presents background information on characteristics of lunar habitats and the lunar environment. Then, the Alternate Designs section presents alternate solutions to each of the critical functions of the device. Fourth, a detailed analysis of throwing the regolith is done to demonstrate its feasibility. Then, the three overall design configurations are presented. Next, a configuration is selected and the conceptual design is expanded to include system performance characteristics, size, and mass. Finally, the Conclusions and Recommendations for Future Work section evaluates the design, outlines the next step to be taken in the design process, and suggests possible goals for future design work

A Non-Hypothetical and Incentive Compatible Method for Estimating Consumer Willingness-to-Pay for a Novel Functional Food: The Case of Pomegranates

A preference and valuation mechanism that compared results of an experimental auction and nonhypothetical preference rankings was developed and used to elicit preferences for pomegranate products from a representative sample of shoppers in Texas. Familiarity with pomegranate products increased willingness-to-pay (WTP) for pomegranates, as did tasting and providing additional information on the health benefits of the products. Ready-to-eat and juice products were preferred to whole fruit products. Subjects did not indicate an increased WTP for Texas varieties over California Wonderful pomegranate based on auction bids but indicated a preference for one Texas variety in the nonhypothetical ranking procedure; thus, the auction results and nonhypothetical preference ranking procedures were divergent. Further, there were interaction effects of the information treatments with the product characteristics.willingness-to-pay, pomegranate, experimental auction, ranking, health, novel product, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Marketing, D12, Q13,

Automated Retrieval of Non-Engineering Domain Solutions to Engineering Problems

Organised by: Cranfield UniversityBiological inspiration for engineering design has occurred through a variety of techniques such as creation and use of databases, keyword searches of biological information in natural-language format, prior knowledge of biology, and chance observations of nature. This research focuses on utilizing the reconciled Functional Basis function and flow terms to identify suitable biological inspiration for function based design. The organized search provides two levels of results: (1) associated with verb function only and (2) narrowed results associated with verb-noun (function-flow). A set of heuristics has been complied to promote efficient searching using this technique. An example for creating smart flooring is also presented and discussed.Mori Seiki – The Machine Tool Compan

Parental Co‐Construction of 5‐ to 13‐Year‐Olds\u27 Global Self‐Esteem Through Reminiscing About Past Events

The current study explored parental processes associated with children\u27s global self‐esteem development. Eighty 5‐ to 13‐year‐olds and one of their parents provided qualitative and quantitative data through questionnaires, open‐ended questions, and a laboratory‐based reminiscing task. Parents who included more explanations of emotions when writing about the lowest points in their lives were more likely to discuss explanations of emotions experienced in negative past events with their child, which was associated with child attachment security. Attachment was associated with concurrent self‐esteem, which predicted relative increases in self‐esteem 16 months later, on average. Finally, parent support also predicted residual increases in self‐esteem. Findings extend prior research by including younger ages and uncovering a process by which two theoretically relevant parenting behaviors impact self‐esteem development

Using Service-Learning to Promote Social Justice Advocacy and Cognitive Development During Internship

Little empirical research has examined how to effectively prepare counseling students as social justice advocates. In a quasi-experimental design, a service-learning intervention was used in community counseling internship to promote students’ social justice advocacy competency as well as cognitive development, including moral and intellectual development. Findings demonstrated a significant increase in social justice advocacy competency in both the experimental and control groups at the end of one quarter of community counseling internship. In addition, the experimental group had significantly higher scores on the Public Information advocacy domain sub-scale of the Advocacy Competency Self-Assessment Survey. Teaching strategies such as service-learning may prepare counselor trainees for community engagement when they are in practice

A Product Architecture-Based Conceptual DFA Technique

A conceptual design for assembly (DFA) method is introduced in this paper. The method incorporates DFA analysis into the conceptual design phase. Current DFA methods, essentially all of which are post-design DFA analyses, are reviewed with emphasis on the popular Boothroyd and Dewhurst method. The product architecture-based conceptual DFA method developed and presented in this article uses two relatively new concepts: the functional basis and the method of module heuristics. The functional basis is used to derive a functional model of a product in a standard language and the module heuristics are applied to the functional model to identify a modular product architecture. The embodiment or form definition phase then attempts to solve each module with one part (or as few as possible). The critical advantage of the conceptual DFA method is that it does not require a physical prototype or completed design geometry, thus reducing the number of design iterations before seeing DFA benefits. One case study compares the conceptual DFA method with the Boothroyd and Dewhurst DFA method and shows their equivalence in part count reduction. A second case study examines the evolution of products over the years. This study reveals the evolution of products into designs with smaller part counts, closely matching the modules identified by the conceptual DFA method. This lends credence to the method proposed in this paper as a useful tool for reducing the design cycle time

Developmental change in the association between adolescent depressive symptoms and the home environment: results from a longitudinal, genetically informative investigation

Background: Depression is already highly prevalent by late adolescence, indicating that research into its developmental emergence should consider earlier risk factors and environmental contexts. The home environment is a key context for children and adolescents throughout development. However, the nature of relationships that exist between aspects of the home environment and the development of depressive symptoms cannot be assumed. Genetically informative studies have been used to provide insights about the aetiology of such relationships, often finding them to be partly confounded by the influence of children's genes. Here, we investigate developmental change in the aetiology of the association between aspects of the home environment and depressive symptoms at the onset of adolescence. Methods: We used longitudinal child‐ and parent‐report data from >5,000 twin pairs enrolled in the UK‐representative Twins Early Development Study. Multivariate, genetically sensitive structural equation models were used to decompose latent variance and covariance in depressive symptoms (measured at 12 and 16 years) and aspects of the home environment (at 9 and 14 years) into genetic and environmental influences. Results: Going from childhood to adolescence, genetic influences accounted for an increasing proportion of the association [30% (16–42) of r = .44 in childhood; 40% (25–61) of r = .43 in adolescence], at the expense of shared environmental influences, which decreased from 70% (58–83) to 48% (29–62). Unique environmental influences accounted for a significant proportion of the association in adolescence only [12% (06–18)]. Developmental changes could largely be attributed to subtle shifts in the relative importance of stable aetiological factors, rather than the emergence of influences unique to adolescence. Conclusions: These findings emphasise the importance of developmental and aetiological context in interpreting associations between aspects of the home environment and child emotional outcomes