Construction Management Services for the new WPI Residence Hall

This project presents an alternative design for the foundation wall of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute new residence hall to resist lateral loading during construction. The cost implications of this alternative design were also investigated. A 3-D model of the structure of the building was also constructed using Autdesk Revit software and a quantity takeoff was developed using this model. A cost estimate and takeoff for the structure were also performed and an earned value analysis was developed to access the progress of construction of the exterior walls

Interactive Accessibility for the Visually Impaired

To help those visitors with visual impairments access the experiences and content presented in the light area in Launch Pad (a hands-on gallery at the Science Museum London), two exhibit extensions were developed. Exhibit extensions are tools that allow visitors to interact with the phenomena of an exhibit on a personal level. These exhibit extensions dealt with the reflective abilities of light and the color spectrum of light, and allow visually impaired visitors to conceptualize the scientific principles involved through tactile and auditory means. The extensions also bridge the gap in the understanding between those who experience visual phenomena and those whose sight is limited. The design of the exhibits was supported by research into techniques for educating the visually impaired

The SPARC Toroidal Field Model Coil Program

The SPARC Toroidal Field Model Coil (TFMC) Program was a three-year effort between 2018 and 2021 that developed novel Rare Earth Yttrium Barium Copper Oxide (REBCO) superconductor technologies and then successfully utilized these technologies to design, build, and test a first-in-class, high-field (~20 T), representative-scale (~3 m) superconducting toroidal field coil. With the principal objective of demonstrating mature, large-scale, REBCO magnets, the project was executed jointly by the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PSFC) and Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS). The TFMC achieved its programmatic goal of experimentally demonstrating a large-scale high-field REBCO magnet, achieving 20.1 T peak field-on-conductor with 40.5 kA of terminal current, 815 kN/m of Lorentz loading on the REBCO stacks, and almost 1 GPa of mechanical stress accommodated by the structural case. Fifteen internal demountable pancake-to-pancake joints operated in the 0.5 to 2.0 nOhm range at 20 K and in magnetic fields up to 12 T. The DC and AC electromagnetic performance of the magnet, predicted by new advances in high-fidelity computational models, was confirmed in two test campaigns while the massively parallel, single-pass, pressure-vessel style coolant scheme capable of large heat removal was validated. The REBCO current lead and feeder system was experimentally qualified up to 50 kA, and the crycooler based cryogenic system provided 600 W of cooling power at 20 K with mass flow rates up to 70 g/s at a maximum design pressure of 20 bar-a for the test campaigns. Finally, the feasibility of using passive, self-protection against a quench in a fusion-scale NI TF coil was experimentally assessed with an intentional open-circuit quench at 31.5 kA terminal current.Comment: 17 pages 9 figures, overview paper and the first of a six-part series of papers covering the TFMC Progra