University of Cincinnati,University System of Ohio

Abstract This case study examines the integration of structured reflection and peer dialogue into construction education to support experiential learning in courses with cooperative education (co-op) components. The instructional intervention was implemented in two course sections and consisted of five structured reflection activities aligned with course topics, followed by guided peer discussions. Students were asked to connect their co-op experiences to classroom concepts and share insights in a facilitated learning environment. Student feedback and instructor observations were used to assess engagement with the intervention. Observed outcomes suggest that structured reflection supported students in articulating and interpreting their workplace experiences, while peer dialogue expanded learning by exposing students to diverse project contexts and practices. Engagement with both activities appeared to deepen over time as students became more familiar with the reflective process. This case provides a replicable instructional approach for integrating experiential learning into construction and engineering education. The findings offer practical insights for designing reflection-based learning activities that strengthen the connection between academic content and professional practice.

Integration of Natural Language Models (NLMs) into industrial robots enhances operational efficiency and intuitive human-robot interactions, and thus it represents a significant opportunity in the pursuit of Industry 4.0/ 5.0. This paper provides a comprehensive survey on the technological advancements and applications in this area, by emphasizing their role in improving task execution, cognitive capabilities, and communication in the industrial environments. Meanwhile, related challenges are analyzed and discussed. In particular, NLMs inherently struggle with contextual understanding, which can lead to inappropriate or impractical outputs in complex industrial environments. Also, the external noise and the need for real-time responsiveness present further complications to the effectiveness of NLMs. Concerns regarding safety, transparency, privacy, and ethical usage amplify the need for regulatory considerations. In addition, standardized approaches to interpreting vague human instructions are called for to improve the interaction between humans and robots. It is pointed out that the broader impacts of NLMs can extend beyond industrial environments into commercial and social settings, thereby enhancing service quality and customer interactions. As a result, the review is expected to provide insights on how to effectively integrate NLMs with robotic systems, stimulate research to address the remaining challenges, and enhance transparency to improve social acceptability.

Spatial ability has been identified as an essential cognitive ability for educational performance broadly in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. Further, children with higher levels of this ability are more likely to choose STEM educational pathways. It is theorised that a benefit of spatial ability lies in affording young people further capacity to think and reason effectively in diverse problem-solving contexts, which translates into desirable educational outcomes. However, substantial evidence has identified a gender gap favouring boys particularly in the mental rotation spatial factor, and there is less evidence for any similar gender gaps for other spatial factors, particularly in adolescence. Resolving this knowledge gap would offer a knowledge base on which to design educational interventions, particularly in terms of what spatial factors to target and when. In response to this, this paper reports on three large scale studies from the US, Ireland, and Austria in which mental rotation and visualisation performance data were collected across adolescence. Single-paper meta-analyses, for both mental-rotation and visualisation tasks, reveal medium and small gender differences respectively favouring boys, with these gender differences already apparent from the beginning of adolescence. Age was a significant moderator for both, indicating that the gender difference continues to grow during adolescence, and instrument type moderated mental rotation effect size magnitude but the effect size for visualisation was robust across instruments. The results support the introduction of interventions to reduce or prevent these gender gaps in childhood, otherwise early in adolescence, and further research into the potential sources of gender differences in spatial ability and of educational consequences of the visualisation factor specifically beyond mental rotation.

Marine calcifying organisms secrete shells of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) that play a crucial role in regulating the oceanic biological pump and atmospheric CO2 levels. Here, we quantify CaCO3 production of planktonic foraminifera, which accounts for roughly half of the global pelagic biogenic CaCO3 flux, in the western tropical Pacific since 46 ka. Foraminiferal CaCO3 production and its proportion of total biogenic flux both increased from the last deglaciation to early Holocene (19-8 ka), consistent with the anomalously high CO2 content of tropical Pacific subsurface water. By analyzing planktonic foraminiferal shell flux, shell size and calcification density, we suggest that the observed enhancement of foraminiferal carbonate pump was primarily driven by deglacial ocean warming, which promoted the proliferation of foraminifera, especially heavily calcified species. Therefore, we infer that the oceanic carbonate pump may have acted as a critical positive global-warming feedback on glacial-interglacial timescales.

Magnetic cellulose nanocrystal (MCNC) nanocomposites are promising sustainable and biocompatible platforms for magnetic hyperthermia; however, the molecular mechanisms governing Fe3O4 adsorption and deposition onto CNCs remain poorly understood. Here, sulfated (S-CNC) and TEMPO-oxidized CNCs (T-CNC) were used to prepare nanocomposites at 1:2 and 1:4 CNC:Fe3O4 mass ratios, enabling a systematic evaluation of how surface chemistry and nanoparticle loading dictate interfacial interactions and magneto-colloidal behavior. Bare magnetite nanoparticles were 21 ± 5 nm by TEM but grew to 144 ± 18 in the DLS measurement at pH 7. The S-CNC nanocomposites had hydrodynamic sizes between 144 and 210 nm, not much larger than the 140 nm long CNC rods, suggesting an enhanced dispersion stability compared to Fe3O4 alone. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy combined with density functional theory revealed that -OH and -COOH groups drive electrostatic adsorption with charge transfer from Fe3O4 to the CNC surface, while T-CNCs showed more favorable adsorption energies and evidence of covalent Fe-O bonding. Vibrating sample magnetometry demonstrated superparamagnetic behavior for all samples, with S-CNC/Fe3O4 1:4 and 1:2 displaying saturation magnetizations of 78 and 77 emu/g-Fe3O4, close to the 83 emu/g of bare magnetite. The T-CNC composites showed lower (60 and 66 emu/g-Fe3O4) saturation magnetizations. Zero-field-cooled/field-cooled measurements resulted in a blocking temperature of 112 K for all samples, except T-CNC/Fe3O4 1:2 (100 K). Magnetic hyperthermia studies revealed that specific absorption rate (SAR) increased with field strength and Fe3O4 content; however, S-CNC/Fe3O4 (1:2) achieved the highest intrinsic SAR per gram of Fe3O4 (649 W/g-Fe3O4) likely due to its anisotropy and fast magnetic relaxation. Cytotoxicity assays confirmed that all nanocomposites were nontoxic toward mammalian cells. These results establish quantitative structure-property relationships between CNC surface chemistry, interfacial bonding mechanisms, and magnetic heating performance, providing a foundation for rational design of biocompatible magnetic nanocomposites for hyperthermia and related applications.