Large-scale Reservoir Simulations on IBM Blue Gene/Q

This paper presents our work on simulation of large-scale reservoir models on IBM Blue Gene/Q and studying the scalability of our parallel reservoir simulators. An in-house black oil simulator has been implemented. It uses MPI for communication and is capable of simulating reservoir models with hundreds of millions of grid cells. Benchmarks show that our parallel simulator are thousands of times faster than sequential simulators that designed for workstations and personal computers, and the simulator has excellent scalability

Enhancing student learning through the assessment of outcomes:developing and demonstrating essay writing skills

This paper documents current developments in the UK Open University (UK/OU) with reference to the requirement in the UK that all Higher Education institutions now have to describe their programmes in terms of learning outcomes. In response to this, the UK/OU set up a three-year Learning Outcomes and Their Assessment (LOTA) Project to explore and implement an outcomes-based approach to curriculum design and delivery throughout the university. The intended learning outcomes for all courses and all programmes of study have now been documented in course and programme specifications. Currently the challenge is to ensure that assessment strategies and assessment methods support the development of the stated outcomes and enable them to be appropriately assessed. The LOTA Project has always seen assessment as part of the learning process through both formative and summative assignments. In many OU courses academic essays are used to assess students work, both throughout a course and in the final examination. The paper goes on to describe an action research project that set out to examine the extent to which assessment through essays encouraged students to both develop and demonstrate the outcomes claimed by each course. The aim of the project was to explore the process of essay writing and essay marking. It involved pairs of tutors who exchanged and double-marked the essays of two of their students throughout the course and met at the end of the year to compare their experiences. The assessment materials provided by the course team were examined and the progress of the students analysed through their essays. The evidence suggests that essay writing can be used to assess learning outcomes but that present practice shows these are not explicit and that many students fail to demonstrate them. With clearer guidance to tutors and to students, both cognitive and communication skills could be developed more effectively and assessed more rigorously. The findings contribute to on-going work to find better ways of enhancing students' learning through the articulation and assessment of outcomes. The paper concludes that moving towards an outcomes-based curriculum, with appropriate assessment strategies, can enhance student learning but the process needs to be more transparent and to explicitly encourage a meta-cognitive approach

Towards outcomes-based assessment:an unfinished story of triangulation and transformation

Over the past ten years Higher Education in the United Kingdom (UK) has changed in many ways, mainly influenced by the recommendations of the Dearing Report (published in 1997). One paragraph in the report instigated a fundamental reorientation in the articulation within higher education of teaching, learning and assessment in terms of learning outcomes. Subsequent quality assurance initiatives have reinforced this approach. For the last ten years, the Centre for Outcomes-Based Education (COBE) in the UK Open University (UK OU) has been leading the transformation of the OU curriculum into an outcomes-based approach. The key to this process has been the 'triangulation' between curriculum, staff and student development. Throughout the process, our main concern has been to describe, develop and implement an appropriate way to assess learning outcomes both at course and award level. This paper re-views the process and poses some fundamental questions about an outcomes-based approach to the design and delivery of the curriculum and to the development of staff and students

Practitioner enquiry and professional development: 'action research' re-visited and re-viewed in the context of outcomes-based education

[From the abstract]: In the past five years there has been considerable change in curriculum design and delivery in universities in the UK, as the sector moves towards an outcomes-based approach. This is having a marked effect on teaching and learning, and particularly on assessment strategies and methods. Accompanying the curriculum change we have seen an increased emphasis on the role of teaching in HE, with central funding to support staff through 'subject networks', key publications and resources. At the same time there has been high-profile recognition for 'teaching excellence' and a move towards the 'accreditation' of HE academic staff with mandatory continuous professional development (CPD) as part of quality enhancement ..

Minerals in Afghanistan : The Aynak Copper Deposit

The area around Aynak, 30 km south-south-east of Kabul in south-east Afghanistan, has been the focus of copper working since ancient times. Numerous old excavations and pits, as well as remains of smelting furnaces, have been discovered at Aynak and also nearby at Darband and Jawkhar. In 1974, Russian geologists prospected and mapped the Kabul area and rediscovered the Aynak, Darband and Jawkhar copper prospects. In 1974–1976 and again in 1978–1989, the Soviet Geological Mission conducted detailed exploration of Aynak, but this work ceased in 1989 with the withdrawal of Russian advisors, and the subsequent civil war halted any further work

Minerals in Afghanistan : rare-metal deposits

In Afghanistan rare metals (lithium, caesium, tantalum and niobium) occur in three main deposit types: pegmatites, mineralised springs and playa-lake sediments (Figure 1). The most potentially significant, easily extractable resources of rare metals in Afghanistan occur in mineralised springs and playas, although there is also considerable potential for exploiting hard-rock pegmatite deposits. Globally, rare metals are produced from deposits in these three settings, chiefly in Chile, Argentina, the USA and Turkey. Lithium has many uses, for example in batteries, in the glass and ceramics industry, and in high performance alloys for aircraft. Most tantalum is used to produce capacitors that are used in laptop computers, mobile phones and digital cameras. Niobium is primarily used in specialist steels although it also shares some uses with tantalum since it has almost identical chemical properties

Minerals in Afghanistan : the potential for copper

There are around 300 documented copper deposits, occurrences and showings in Afghanistan as shown in Figure 1. A variety of styles of copper mineralisation occur in rocks ranging in age from Proterozoic to Neogene. These include sediment-hosted, skarn, porphyry, and vein-hosted, as well as other types. The largest and best-known copper discovery in Afghanistan is the world-class Aynak stratabound deposit hosted within Vendian-Cambrian quartz-biotite-dolomite metasedimentary rocks 30 km south-south-east of Kabul. Soviet surveys in the 1970s and 1980s indicated resources of 240 Mt at 2.3 % Cu. However, Afghanistan has yet to be evaluated in the light of modern mineral deposit models and improved analytical methods. From a global perspective, Afghanistan is relatively under explored and the potential for further discoveries of copper and other minerals is high. A summary of the potential for copper in Afghanistan is shown in Table 1

Minerals in Afghanistan : the potential for gold

Gold has been worked in Afghanistan for centuries from many areas including Takhar province in the north and from Ghazni, Zabul, and Kandahar provinces in the south-west of the country. Currently, gold is produced almost solely by artisanal miners working the Samti Placer Deposit in Takhar Province. Gold deposits and prospects are known in rocks of Proterozoic to Neogene age. Many styles of gold mineralisation occur, in particular skarn, vein-hosted, porphyry and alluvial. Afghanistan is relatively under-explored and has not yet been evaluated in the light of modern mineral deposit models and using up-to-date sophisticated analytical methods and exploration techniques. There is significant potential for further discoveries of gold mineralisation throughout the country in a variety of styles especially porphyry Cu-Au and skarn Cu-Au