Exposing students to hands-on experiments has been a common approach to illustrating complex physical phenomena that have been otherwise modelled solely mathematically. Compressible, isentropic flow in a duct is an example of such a phenomenon, and it is often demonstrated via a de Laval nozzle experiment. We have improved an existing converging/diverging nozzle experiment so that students can modify the location of the normal shock that develops in the diverging portion to better understand the relationship between the shock and the pressure. We have also improved the data acquisition system for this experiment and explained how visualisation of the standing shock is now possible. The results of the updated system demonstrate that the accuracy of the isentropic flow characteristics has not been lost. Through pre- and post-laboratory quizzes, we show the impact on student learning as well.

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract Improved Pedagogy for Engineering Ethics Instruction Abstract GE 301- Principles of Engineering Practice is a required course for Valparaiso University College of Engineering students. The course was revamped in Spring 2005 to better emphasize engineering aspects of ethics, economics, sustainability, and sociopolitical issues. As part of teaching ethics, students have traditionally been assigned an individually written ethics paper. Since students were allowed to select their own cases, it was not uncommon for some students to select the same case. There was also limited discussion between students regarding the cases they chose, or how they would judge the behaviors of engineers in these cases. Starting with the Spring 2005 Semester, ethics instruction increased from six to twelve hourly sessions. Additionally, students were assigned to a group. Each group was given a particular case from NSPE and asked to write and present an opinion as if they were an NSPE Board of Ethical Review (BER): summarizing the case, identifying the ethical questions and appropriate ethical canons, researching similar cases, and citing how other BERs ruled and determining whether the engineers involved in the case acted in an ethical manner. If the team could not come to a unanimous decision, they would have to write both a majority and minority opinion. Unlike the previous assignment prior to the Spring 2005 semester, students were required to vigorously discuss and defend their opinions on the cases. Changing the ethics assignment from an individual to a group assignment changed the dynamics in the second half of the GE 301 course. This paper will explore the changes in student interest and behavior introduced by changing the ethics assignment and expanding the number of class periods of ethics instruction. The authors will also explore any impacts this change had on student performance in the course and on the civil engineering departmental assessment of student understanding of ethics. Introduction ABET’s Engineering Criteria 2000 requires that all engineering program graduates be able to demonstrate “an understanding of professional and ethical responsibility.1 ” It is left up to individual institutions to implement this required outcome in light of what is frequently a very tightly packed four years of a typical engineering curriculum. While many church-related, independent, and state-supported institutions mandate coursework in theology, religious studies, or philosophy2, engineering ethics coverage seems to be hit or miss at a time when its importance is magnified by rapid technological, societal, and environmental changes occurring at the current time. Catalano reviews the current state of leading engineering societies’ codes of ethics and what it means to be an “ethical engineer in a morally deep world.” Development of this

Computational fluid dynamics is not often used early in the conceptual design stage of product development due to the lengthy computation times involved with solving complex computational fluid dynamics models. At this early stage, design options are being explored and significant changes are common, and therefore updated solutions must be found quickly to make these models effective. Because of this, computational fluid dynamics models are often reduced to analysis tools used later in the process and are used for refinement rather than for creative engineering design. This paper presents a novel method to create computational fluid dynamics models that can be used earlier in the engineering design process. The key aspects of analysis models used in the initial, creative phase of design are the ability to make changes and re-analyze the altered model quickly. Typically, computational fluid dynamics analysts choose to re-analyze the entire altered model to maintain the same level of accuracy. This can take a significant amount of time because the entire domain must be recalculated. Much of this time is devoted to fine-tuning the model, i.e., improving the accuracy of details of the domain that are sometimes non-essential to the bulk characteristics of the flowfield. However, in the early stage of the design process, decisions are often made based on the large-scale behavior of the fluid flow; fine details are often inconsequential. We have taken advantage of this premise to decrease the turnaround time required to re-analyze a computational fluid dynamics model using the Adaptive Modeling by Evolving Blocks Algorithm. The Adaptive Modeling by Evolving Blocks Algorithm is a genetic programming-based optimization program that segregates a flowfield and places minimal cost solvers in regions with simple flow dynamics while placing full-scale computational fluid dynamics solvers in the more complex regions to preserve accuracy. The program evolves the combined segregation scheme and solver placement until a reliably accurate, faster multi-solver model is found. Substantial reductions in solution times have been found in some cases. The results show an improvement in the speed of the multi-solver when compared with a single-model solution with no significant loss of accuracy.

A Capstone C30 MicroTurbine has been installed, instrumented, and utilized in a junior-level laboratory course at Valparaiso University. The C30 MicroTurbine experiment enables Valparaiso University to educate students interested in power generation and turbine technology. The first goal of this experiment is for students to explore a gas turbine generator and witness the discrepancies between idealized models and real thermodynamic systems. Secondly, students measure and analyze data to determine where losses occur in a real gas turbine. The third educational goal is for students to recognize the true costs associated with natural gas use, i.e. the hidden costs of transporting the gas to the consumer. Overall, the gas turbine experiment has garnered positive feedback from students. The twenty-six students who performed the lab in Spring 2014 rated the quality and usefulness of the gas turbine experiment as 4.28 and 4.19, respectively, on a 1–5 Likert scale, where 1 is low and 5 is high.

Numerous publications have emphasized the importance of technical communication skills in the field of engineering. Capstone Senior Design courses are typically selected to evaluate and enhance the technical communication skills of engineering students. To effectively implement technical communication into a Capstone Senior Design course, four main challenges must be overcome. The first challenge is to provide students with consistent, quality feedback. The second challenge is to overcome resource constraints to effectively implement communication instruction in the course. The third challenge is to provide students with exposure to multiple communication mediums and audiences. The fourth challenge is to develop techniques to motivate students to improve their communication skills. This paper provides the techniques used in the Valparaiso University Capstone Senior Design course to address all four of these challenges.

This article describes seven laboratory experiments that have been developed for the automatic controls course at Valparaiso University. It also presents the results of a self-assessment survey taken by the students after they had done these laboratory experiments. Automatic controls recently became a required course for all undergraduate mechanical engineering students. When taught as an elective, it was noticed that many students tended to struggle with this class. Most students perceive this class to be a collection of different mathematical tools without any application or use in their future careers. To alleviate this situation and assist students in visualizing control systems in practical situations, a half-credit elective control laboratory, which consists of five experiments and two laboratory projects, has been developed. These experiments will help students to understand the application of this topic and to learn to develop appropriate mathematical models and control routines in closed-loop systems with computers in the loop.

It has been well documented that international service-learning design projects in engineering provide many educational benefits to the students involved in these projects. This article addresses the question of whether or not the benefits gained from international service-learning design projects extend to those students who are not directly involved with these projects but are peers of those who are. To answer this question, graduates of the senior design projects course at Valparaiso University from 2003 to 2008 were surveyed on the course learning objectives, their desire to participate in service-related activities, and their social and cultural awareness. The responses from this survey show that peers of students who experienced an international service-learning design project developed a stronger desire to participate in service-related activities than those alumni who experienced the course when an international service-learning design project was not offered. The responses also show that these same peers felt they were more aware of societal issues and other cultures as well. This article discusses the senior design course, the international service-learning design project, the survey, the results of this survey, and suggested improvements that will extend the benefits of an international service-learning design project beyond those students with direct involvement to their peers.

All seniors in computer, electrical, and mechanical engineering at __________ University take a multidisciplinary senior design course. In the first week of the Fall semester, students are assigned to teams (based on their ranked preference), and each team is then given a project that contains both electrical and mechanical aspects. Some past projects have included competing in national design competitions, developing a student entrepreneurial project, creating a prototype for industry, advancing a National Science Foundation sponsored research project, or helping people in developing countries. Teams are typically made up of two to three electrical/computer engineering students and two to three mechanical engineering students. All teams have a primary advisor from one discipline and a secondary advisor from another discipline to balance the expertise available to each team. The structure of the course follows the design process from conception to a computational model of the design to the creation of a physical prototype. The loop is closed by requiring each team to test their prototype based on design requirements developed earlier in the design process. In the summer of 2006, the College of Engineering and the College of Business Administration offered their first course in a new Master of Engineering Management (MEM) program. A unique aspect of this program is the MEM 625/626 course sequence. In this pair of courses, MEM graduate students become project managers for the senior design teams in the undergraduate, multidisciplinary senior design course described above. This has had numerous benefits for both programs. Undergraduates are now given an experience that more closely resembles that which many will find in industry upon graduation, while the graduate students are given a chance to practice the project management skills learned in their own coursework. This paper describes the decisions made during the process of incorporating the graduate students into the undergraduate, senior projects course, the benefits of these choices, and the lessons learned throughout this process.

The work presented in this paper focuses on our mechanics-statics course. When solving 3D free-body diagram problems, students often have difficulty in interpreting the spatial layout of structures when problems are presented on the written page or on a chalkboard/whiteboard. Our method projects free-body diagrams on a 3D display where they can be rotated or translated. Students were tested on their ability to recognize whether 3D vectors acting on the diagrams had components in the positive or negative x, y, and z axes. The diagrams were modeled from 2D drawings from standard textbook homework problems. The control for this experiment was students viewing the model in this classic sense. To date we have quantitative and qualitative data from three different semesters of the course. The contributions of this work include an assessment of how much is gained by teaching statics using virtual reality hardware and an analysis of students' abilities in interpreting free body diagrams presented in different formats

Most of today’s educators have been taught by the conventional two-dimensional technology known as the chalkboard. It has been the default teaching medium and is still used effectively by many in the engineering field as the preferred means of conveying information to students. However, one great inherent problem is its difficulty in conveying three-dimensional (3D) information. As virtual reality (VR) becomes more and more prevalent in the automobile industry, the power industry, and many others, it seems evident that the ability to display and interact with 3D information be brought to the classroom. This paper explores the possibilities of using VR as a teaching device in a variety of engineering courses as well as presents some anecdotal evidence of its popularity and its problems from students in a statics course in which VR was used to display 3D vectors. The cost of its use from an instructor’s point of view will also be addressed.

Engineering problems are typically solved by direct solution. For the direct solution of engineering problems the boundary conditions and physical properties of the domain are given, and the dependent variable is calculated throughout the domain. In contrast to this, for inverse engineering problems the dependent variable is known at select locations in the domain, and the material properties and/or the boundary conditions need to be determined. This paper will present a novel technique for the inverse solution of a heat transfer engineering design problem in which the temperature profile and materials are known, but the placement of these materials and the heat flux on the boundaries are unknown. This technique uses evolutionary optimization in the form of the Adaptive Modeling by Evolving Blocks Algorithm (AMoEBA) to determine the material configurations. The material configurations, geometry, and properties are defined by evolving binary trees. The evolved domains are solved directly and then compared with the known temperature profile. Fitness of the new designs is determined by the least squared error between the proposed and the known profile. When this fitness reaches a defined level, the material placement scheme of the real system is found, and boundary conditions matching the problem definition are identified.

Silicone implant correction of pectus excavatum has yielded satisfactory results in asymptomatic patients. Problems have been encountered with accurate implant fabrication and fit due to the soft-tissue masking of actual sternal contours. We have employed computed tomography to reconstruct the pectus deformity to improve implant design and fit. Instability can be prevented with the reduced need for intraoperative manipulation as well.

In completing a satisfactory repair of the prominent ear, the shape of the antihelical fold is often the key to the aesthetic outcome. Correction involves not just creating a fold in the antihelix but also establishing a smooth sweep or antihelical curve anterior to posterior as well. The essential components described include accurate scoring of the antihelical fold followed by placement of mattress fixation sutures, with emphasis on obliquely placed sutures to control the final curve and shape of the antihelix. Sutures placed obliquely can solve the problem of persistent upper-pole prominence as in a telephone deformity, or overfolding which can stigmatize otoplasty.

It is our view that in Canada at the federal level there is a considerable degree of clarity in the way in which our laws are expressed. This will no doubt be considered by some to be a very provocative statement but I am led to thinking this because there does not seem to be a great deal of concern or debate in Canada about the quality of the expression of our laws. Of course someone can always find in our statutes examples of awkwardly worded provisions or provisions that seem to be impossible to understand, but those cases are rare. There are also examples such as income tax laws or laws concerning other highly technical subject-matters which appear to make no sense to the reader, but again these are few and simplification of such laws is sometimes not possible. When complaints are heard, such laws are usually given as the example. The reason why the quality of expression of our laws seems to elicit little or no debate, in contrast with the apparent experience in some of the other Commonwealth jurisdictions, may be due to a number of factors that affect us in our work, and what I wish to do here is give you a brief description of the Legislation Section and how we work and some of the factors and influences that I think have led us to where we are today in terms of the readability of our statute law.

Two cases of chronic expanding hematoma are presented. Although the location and presentation vary, chronic expanding hematoma has a distinct histopathologic pattern. A diagnosis of neoplasm is suggested by its slow growth pattern. The criteria for their formation are incompletely understood, and in one case, a hematoma occurred despite apparent adequate drainage. Computed tomography is helpful in distinguishing chronic expanding hematoma from other soft-tissue masses.

The ability to increase available local tissue by controlled soft tissue expansion has led to a rapid increase in the use of this technique in clinical practice. Our experience in the treatment of children with a wide variety of lesions, in all body areas, demonstrates the advantages and benefits of this relatively new procedure for the pediatric age group. While complications such as infection, implant exposure, deflation, hematoma, and seroma may occur and alter the timing of reconstruction, they rarely compromise the final result. Tissue expansion offers many advantages in soft tissue reconstruction in children when tissue of color, texture, and characteristics similar to that of the defect may be limited.

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract Session 1160 Virtual Reality for 3D Visualization in a Statics Course Peter E. Johnson1, Jeffrey D. Will2, and Christopher R. Graunke2 1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, Valparaiso University 2 Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Valparaiso University Introduction Learning subjects in the sciences or engineering require the ability of students to think in three dimensions. However, this is one of the greatest challenges to students [1]. Even in the best students, these skills are typically underdeveloped [2]. There is a great need for students to be taught how to understand and visualize spatial relationships [3], yet research is sparse in this area. One particular area of science and engineering that heavily relies on students’ abilities in visualizing objects and their relationships in 3D is statics. Often taken early in the student’s study, most students come into the subject having little 3D visualization ability, which is a great challenge for them. Thus, statics courses are typically “training grounds” for students to develop visualization acuity as well as learn to solve for forces and masses in diagrams. Hardware to display 3D models and interact with them has been in existence for several decades, though only since 1993 has it seen applications in education [4]. Educational advances have increased since that time, albeit slowly. Important advances include Christopher Dede’s application of visualization hardware to general scientific concepts [5] and the teaching of electromagnetics in particular with the well-known MaxwellWorld [6]. Other applications include education of elementary school students in basic zoological concepts at Georgia Tech [7, 8], the NICE project for elementary education at the University of Illinois at Chicago [9]-[11], and engineering education research at East Carolina University [12]. This paper describes work done to study subjects in a statics class taught at Valparaiso University as to the development of their ability to visualize in 3D. Four different media were explored, from paper-and-pencil to a fully immersive virtual reality experience. Wide-ranging data in this course was collected, and its analysis is here presented. A framework for analyzing virtual reality media for applications in education is included. Special effort is directed towards practicality in the field of engineering education, i.e., analyzing the cost to benefit ratio of using different teaching technologies. Lessons learned from this experiment are included. A key factor in the utility of this work is that only recently have virtual reality hardware systems become financially available to primarily undergraduate institutions. A new kind of stripped-down virtual reality display has emerged that makes the technology affordable to most. Thus, bringing virtual reality into the classroom and assessing the cost benefit ratio from a student cognition standpoint is of special interest at the present time. Proceedings of the 2005 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2005, American Society for Engineering Education

Abstract Interpolation, compression, or even use of a large data set is enhanced if the data set can be partitioned into sub- sets with a more uniform internal character. This paper presents a technique for more rapid automatic segregation of data sets with an evolutionary algorithm. We improve performance of our evolutionary algorithm by imposing a graphical geography that, we conjecture, slows the spread of information within the evolving population and so retards premature convergence. We present results on a trial data segregation problem for 23 dieren t graphical geographies. Change of geography has a statistically signican t impact on performance.

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract Managing Senior Projects – Educating Graduates and Undergraduates in a Senior Project Course Abstract—All seniors in computer, electrical, and mechanical engineering at __________ University take a multidisciplinary senior design course. In the first week of the Fall semester, students are assigned to teams (based on their ranked preference), and each team is then given a project that contains both electrical and mechanical aspects. Some past projects have included competing in national design competitions, developing a student entrepreneurial project, creating a prototype for industry, advancing a National Science Foundation sponsored research project, or helping people in developing countries. Teams are typically made up of two to three electrical/computer engineering students and two to three mechanical engineering students. All teams have a primary advisor from one discipline and a secondary advisor from another discipline to balance the expertise available to each team. The structure of the course follows the design process from conception to a computational model of the design to the creation of a physical prototype. The loop is closed by requiring each team to test their prototype based on design requirements developed earlier in the design process. In the summer of 2006, the College of Engineering and the College of Business Administration offered their first course in a new Master of Engineering Management (MEM) program. A unique aspect of this program is the MEM 625/626 course sequence. In this pair of courses, MEM graduate students become project managers for the senior design teams in the undergraduate, multidisciplinary senior design course described above. This has had numerous benefits for both programs. Undergraduates are now given an experience that more closely resembles that which many will find in industry upon graduation, while the graduate students are given a chance to practice the project management skills learned in their own coursework. This paper describes the decisions made during the process of incorporating the graduate students into the undergraduate, senior projects course, the benefits of these choices, and the lessons learned throughout this process. 1. Introduction The engineering graduate of 2007 must demonstrate a wide variety of expertise, ranging from foundational knowledge in mathematics and science to critical thinking, creativity, design expertise, and communication skills. In addition to these abilities, it is becoming apparent that knowledge of business and management skills is also essential for the career-long success of an engineer.1-4 Engineering management can, in fact, be considered its own discipline, and a number of universities offer specific engineering management degrees that help students prepare to become both technically skilled and knowledgeable about managing other engineers in a professional setting.5-9 Even within traditional engineering programs, the importance of engineering management is emphasized in a variety of settings, including senior design projects10-12 and undergraduate research programs.13 With the ever-increasing curricular pressures on undergraduate engineering programs, it is difficult to see how significant engineering management could be incorporated without necessarily decreasing the emphasis on other areas of importance.14 Such decisions should be considered seriously and made in the context of the learning objectives of the program.15 One