Interactive Virtual Laboratory for Experience with a Smart Bridge Test

Virtual laboratory experiments can be cost effective, convenient instructional resources that have appeal to a wide range of learning styles. Expensive, time-consuming laboratory tests can be experienced repeatedly and remotely using interactive simulations and original video footage or animations. A virtual experiment can incorporate meaningful exercises, procedural options, and background hyperlinks to create a comprehensive hands on environment. Also, it may be used as preliminary training for the actual experiment. An interactive LabVIEW-based laboratory for a load test simulation of an existing demonstration bridge was created. This smart truss bridge is instrumented with fiber optic strain sensors situated on the trusses. The user interface incorporates a synchronized image of the loaded bridge and a graph of the associated strains. A static display mode allows the choice of load placement and of data for single or multiple sensors. A continuous display mode shows the dynamic images of the bridge and strains on truss members. Options include the display of experimental data or of theoretical calculations. Hyperlinks give access to information on the sensors, the bridge construction, and the theoretical analysis. The program interface can also be used in the actual experiment to display data. The intended application is a laboratory for an interdisciplinary class on smart materials and sensors. The Lab VIEW program can be easily modified for tests on other structures such as a full-scale bridge

The new concrete

The New Concrete is a long-overdue survey of the rise of concrete poetry in the digital age. The accessibility of digital text and image manipulation, modern print techniques and the rise of self-publishing have invigorated a movement that first emerged in an explosion of literary creativity during the 1950s and 1960s. This new volume is a highly illustrated overview of contemporary artists and poets working at the intersection of visual art and literature, producing some of the most engaging and challenging work in either medium. Featuring an introductory essay by renowned American poet Kenneth Goldsmith and edited by celebrated poets Victoria Bean and Chris McCabe, The New Concrete is an indispensable introduction to the breadth of concrete poetry being produced today. Edited by Victoria Bean and Chris McCabe, with an essay by Kenneth Goldsmit