The Victorian engineers displayed considerable ingenuity in overcoming technical problems and successfully manufactured the first carbon filament incandescent lamps. Apart from Swan and Edison, many others shared in this achievement. The materials and scientific knowledge at that time were limited; this article reviews the key steps that were made in manufacture-particularly in producing homogeneo...
This paper discusses a proposed multimedia textbook to be implemented in a virtual education environment (VEE) at the Multimedia University in Cyberjaya, Malaysia. The aim of the multimedia textbook, which is targeted at engineering courses, is to bring out a student's creative abilities and to minimise basic study and learning time so that more subjects can be provided to prepare students for fut...
DNA chips, or biochips, have been developed to sequence unknown genes and to study gene expression, but the working principle suggests that they can be used for engineering applications that require parallel processing. DNA chips are proposed here as the physical substrate to store and evaluate a set of rules for knowledge-based systems.
In the past, rocket scientists-people with advanced degrees in sciences-have been employed in Wall Street to develop new financial products by using financial engineering models. Today, these people are called financial engineers. Engineering schools and mathematics departments in universities are conducting multidisciplinary courses in subjects that apply science and engineering concepts to finan...
The advent of fuel cells for the generation of electricity for portable, small and large-scale stationary and automotive purposes portends radical changes in electricity supply over coming decades. The five main types of fuel cell technology are reviewed (alkaline fuel cell (AFC), solid polymer fuel cell (SPFC), phosphoric acid fuel cell (PAFC), molten-carbonate fuel cell (MCFC), and solid-oxide fuel cell (SOFC)) along with their characteristics and electrochemical reactions plus those of a more recent nonhydrogen based regenerative fuel cell for large-scale power delivery.
The acoustic emission (AE) technique is concerned with the detection of structure-borne ultrasonic activity that is naturally generated during the operation of all structures, machinery and processes. Most examples of its application involve the purchase and use of commercially available instrumentation by end-users. To satisfy these demands AE instrumentation has evolved into various forms for use by researchers, engineers and craftpersons. The increasing credibility of AE as a robust industrial measurement technique is creating opportunities for AE sensing to be built into machinery by original equipment manufacturers. In this paper, the evolution of AE technology towards an OEM technique is described and illustrated with examples of some of the information AE can provide in the industrial environment.
Four short articles in French describe the setting up of a bid for European R&D funding, the experiences of a British engineer in France, the requirement for engineering students at a Grande Ecole to study a foreign language, and the provision of industrial and academic training for top-flight engineers in France and the UK.
The UK's higher education funding bodies periodically carry out an assessment of the quality of research at British universities and higher education colleges. The results of the assessment enable approximately. #1 billion of public funds for research to be distributed selectively each year on the basis of quality. The most recent assessment was carried out in 2001 (the first was conducted in 1986...
Whereas the 19th century was the century of the steam engine and the 20th century was the century of the internal combustion engine, it is likely that the 21st century will be the century of the fuel cell. Full cells are now on the verge of being introduced commercially, revolutionising the way we presently produce power. Fuel cells can use hydrogen as a fuel, offering the prospect of supplying th...
Describes a TCS Programme between the Mechatronics Research Centre at Loughborough University and Feedback Instruments Ltd. The objective of the work was the mechatronics workbench, a concept for a range of didactic equipment facilitating the teaching and training of mechatronics principles in industry and in further and higher education institutions on a global scale.
There are many pedagogical and resource issues associated with teaching very large groups. These relate to the delivery of course materials, student support and assessment. This paper describes the delivery and assessment of a course in Accounting and Finance studied by 310 students in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. `Blackboard', a Web-based managed learning environment (MLE), was used to support lectures, providing access to a study guide, detailed notes and case studies. The Speedwell multiple-choice examination system was used for summative assessment.
Since the invention of the scanning tunnelling microscope (STM) in the early 1980s atomic level microscopy has taken on a new dimension. The STM and the atomic force microscope (AFM) have become key instruments in the study of phenomena in the smallest dimensions ranging from magnetism in ultra-thin films, through the understanding of how atoms and molecules organise themselves, to insights into the propagation of electron waves. A good understanding of these issues will facilitate the manufacture of components or devices that are a few atomic dimensions in size and this will have far-reaching implications in fields ranging from medicine through to consumer electronics. As early as the 1970s, the scientific community was discussing the possibility of embedding a few molecules, or even a single molecule, between electrodes to perform the basic switching function. This is now possible in the case of individual components but key challenges lie with the economic commercial fabrication of whole devices. A key challenge lies in determining whether such quantum computers will work and how quantum effects can be used to perform variety of previously unsuspected and potentially useful schemes of information processing.
A study of more than 9000 unit enrolments in an Australian engineering programme found that: (a) the off-campus withdrawal rate was close to twice that for on-campus students; (b) whether a student withdrew or not was highly correlated to their mode of study; (c) the rate of withdrawal was significantly different between the two student groups; (d) the grade distribution for completing students was significantly different between the two groups; (e) the mean final grade was significantly higher for off-campus students; (f) the failure rate for off-campus students was significantly lower; and (g) the overall wastage rate (withdrawn rate plus fail rate) was significantly higher for off-campus students.
A rising demand for specialists in measuring and diagnostic systems (MDS) able to apply multidisciplinary knowledge from medicine, theory of measurements, automation and physics was the stimulus for launching a course in this field for students of biomedical engineering at Wroclaw University of Technology. The course was to provide training in medical system design, development and implementation, and cover the topics of general mathematical models of the phenomena, data acquisition, data processing, interpretation and result visualisation. The main aim was to link modern technology with the traditional measurement approach to biological quantities. During the course students are presented with real-world problems from the field of medicine. This article outlines the course curriculum and its Web-centric approach to laboratory equipment.
