A corpus-based analysis of lexical verbs in L2 professional engineering writing

This study focuses on the use of English lexical verbs in the writings of Malaysian professional engineers. The research objectives were to: (1) identify frequently used lexical verbs in written engineering texts, (2) determine whether these frequent verbs are highly relevant for engineering, and (3) whether the verbs are technical or nontechnical in nature. A total of 20 written texts consisting of official reports, ‗pass down‘ instructions and memos from the fields of electrical, electrical and mechanical engineering were collected. The texts were contributed by non-native English speaking Malaysian engineers from various Malaysian-based companies. The annotated data was analysed using the AntConc 3.5.7 software. All verb forms were found to be used in texts namely the base, the infinitive, the past tense, the third person singular simple present tense, the present continuous and the past participle forms. The corpus contained the highest number of lexical verbs in the base form compared to the singular simple present form which had the lowest occurrence. A further analysis showed that the base form was used in the imperative to relay task instructions to peers or subordinates, while the singular present form may correlate with the infrequent usage of the active form in engineering texts. Of all 30 frequent verbs in the top 5 for each verb form, only eleven can be considered as highly relevant for engineering despite their non-technical nature. The results further suggest that overlaps exist between commonly used non-technical verbs in academic and professional engineering writing

A Quick Guide to Aligning Assessment

Nurturing high-quality students is a top priority for institutions of higher education. The success of such an endeavour largely depends on the consistency between student assessments, programme goals, and the intended learning outcomes. To ensure that these aspects are appropriately aligned, the right knowledge and information must be made accessible to academics who are involved in the assessment of students’ learning. This handbook, aptly named A Quick Guide to Aligning Assessment with Learning Domains aims to provide easy access to fundamentals of outcome-based assessment alongside discipline-specific examples to be adapted in line with a programme’s needs. It is hoped that by understanding the concepts of assessment and learning domains, academics will be better equipped to plan and manage their teaching and learning activities to meet the demands of quality assessment. This handbook is an outcome of a project initiated by the Centre for Applied Learning and Multimedia (CALM) of Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) under the Fellowship of Teaching and Learning (FoTL) initiative

A comparative study of low-cost coating processes for green & sustainable organic solar cell active layer manufacturing

Owing to their facile integration into existing commercial products, high volume manufacturing of organic solar cells (OSCs) can be expected in the upcoming years. Therefore, it is important to evaluate the performance and sustainability of various active layer coating methods for OSCs. Herein, we compare four active layer coating processes: spin-coating, blade-coating, spray-coating and push-coating for poly(2,7-carbazole-alt-dithienylbenzothiadiazole):[6,6]-Phenyl-C71-butyric acid methyl ester (PCDTBT:PC71BM) active layers deposition. The optical, morphological and photovoltaic parameters of the active layers are studied. The suitability of each coating method for industrial manufacturing of PCDTBT:PC71BM OSCs is discussed in terms of environmental impact, necessary investments and running costs. Our results confirm that, despite producing high quality and high performance OSCs, spin-coating is unsuitable for high volume manufacturing due to the large amounts of materials and hazardous solvents wasted in the process. Blade-coating provides a good balance between low running costs, low environmental impact and decent performances but the process introduces lateral compositional gradients which could be detrimental for large area OSC processing. Spray-coating requires minimal initial investments but has relatively low performance and low manufacturing sustainability. Push-coating yields OSCs which perform as well as spin-coated ones, with a much lower environmental impact and cost. We should thus look forward to seeing whether this green and sustainable technology can develop into a large area coating process in the future

Alternative and Online Assessment in the Context of Outcome Based Education: A Practical Guide

Alternative assessment measures the learner’s ability and proficiency in performing complex tasks that are related to the intended learning outcomes and relies on direct measures of target skills in a specific knowledge or skill-domain. Meanwhile, online assessment is an assessment conducted in an online environment on a fully automated platform. Both types of assessments are getting a substantial attention worldwide due to their many advantages. However, several factors must be taken into consideration in implementing the alternative and online assessment in an outcome-based education (OBE) system. Thus, this paper provides a practical guide to alternative and online assessment in the context of OBE -including the constructive alignment, student learning time and development ofassessment rubrics. Other considerations are also discussed, namely the validity and reliability of the alternative and online assessment, and deterring plagiarism and cheating

Conversion of Electrospun Polyarylonitrile (PAN) into Carbon Fibres

Electrospun polyacrylonitrile (PAN) polymer is one of the most often utilised precursors for the synthesis of carbon fibres. In this work, PAN was electrospun prior to stabilisation at 280oC and carbonisation at 1200oC. The carbonisation process has successfully converted the electrospun PAN into carbon fibres with approximately similar diameter produced. The ATR-FTIR spectrum shows the as-received and as-spun PAN have a similar chemical structure showing all the solvent has completely vaporised. The conversion of electrospun PAN into carbon fibres are evident from the ATR-FTIR spectrum and XRD peak. There is no apparent peak in the ATR-FTIR spectrum due to the absorbing nature of black carbon, but the XRD data reveals two diffraction peaks at scattering angles of 25o and 44o , which are identical to those previously described for graphitic structures. The conductivity of the carbonised electrospun PAN was found to be 14.2 ± 0.04 Scm-1 which is in agreement with findings from others. This indicates that the carbonisation parameter used in this study is sufficient to synthesize a carbon fibre with a moderate conductivity level which is suitable to be used as electrical conductors or in semiconductor applications

Calcium Carbonate from Clam Shell as a Thermal Conductor in Particulate Filled Polymer Matrix Composites

The thermal conductivity of the raw and stearic acid treated calcium carbonate (CaCO3) from clam (Polymesoda bengalensis) shell powder infused in unsaturated polyester matrix has been measured. Eight different mean diameter sizes of clam shell filler were infused into unsaturated polyester (UPE) matrix. Thermal conductivity of neat UPE sample and when embedded with raw and stearic acid treated CaCO3 filler with different mean diameter sizes and filler loadings were measured according to ASTM E1225-99. The result showed that UPE matrix composites with untreated clam shell produced higher thermal conductivity than treated clam shell. At constant filler content, the thermal conductivity of UPE/CaCO3 composites was increased gradually as the filler size was decreased. The higher the filler content, the higher the thermal conductivity of the composites. Therefore, the inclusion of higher filler loading with finer filler size of seafood waste from clam shell can improve the performance of polymer matrix composites as a heat conduct

Characterisation of Polymesoda bengalensis Shell Powder

Seafood shell is abundant and has no eminent use and thus, commonly regarded as waste.Reusing and converting it into a useful material can decrease the amount of waste.Therefore, a study of the crystalline structure should be performed before identifying the potential use of the material. Theaim of this study istoidentifythe element and polymorph of Polymesoda bengalensis shell. The characterisations involved the usage of X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM)andenergy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). The XRD study revealed that theshellpowder mostly consisted of aragonite. The analysis from SEM also revealed that the aragonite was in the form of rod-like crystal. The morphology of sectional, inner and outer surfaces of the shell was s foundthat the aragonite was arranged in the form of a cross-lamellar structure of various sizes. The elemental content of the shell showed that CaCO3in this shell contained large amounts of calcium and carbon

Effect of Spraying Parameters on the Morphology of Spray-Coated Active Layers for Organic Solar Cells

Over the past decade, organic solar cells (OSCs) have demonstrated their great potential for the low-cost mass production of renewable energy. However, the conventional active layer deposition technique (spin-coating) is not suitable for mass production due to its incompatibility with the roll-to-roll process. Spray-coating is a promising candidate for in-line production of OSCs but parameters such as distance between the spray nozzle and substrate, applied pressure and number of sprays should be optimized to produce adequate film thickness and morphology. Here, we verified how these processing parameters influence the thin film properties and observed that film thickness increases with decreasing nozzle-substrate distance, increasing number of sprays or applied pressure. The processing parameters were adjusted to produce spray-coated films with similar properties to the spin-coated ones thus confirming that spray-coating could replace spin-coating for mass production of OSC devices