tingilinde

covid remote learning and change in 2.007

MIT's fabled 2.007 Design and Manufacturing I course saw important changes last year.  Woodie would been proud.

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The team developed a list of “must haves” when brainstorming how to re-envision 2.007. First and foremost was retaining the confidence-building element of students coming up with their own design and building it with their own two hands, while at the same time learning core mechanical engineering principles.

“It was critical for this year's class for us to provide all the magic and deep engineering learning that comes from our normal hands-on experience, but do it in a remote environment,” adds Winter.

Central to all the teaching staff’s goals was equity. With some students likely participating fully remotely, the teaching team had to come up with solutions that were fair to everyone, whether they lived in a dorm, apartment, or across the country in their family’s home.

The team’s solution was to send a kit of materials to all 130 students in the class. The first generation of the kit was developed last summer by Soledad. By fall, Winter and Soledad were joined by teaching assistant Georgia Van de Zande and four other UROPs to continue iterating the kit.

“Because the students couldn’t come to the Pappalardo lab, we decided to send the Pappalardo lab to them,” says Van de Zande.

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that wasn't supposed to happen

Acrobatics at the ISS

 

the dominator

lower co2 concrete

Making concrete is an enormous source of carbon dioxide.  A variety of approaches are being investigated to lower emissions.  Heres an interesting one.

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Concrete’s CO2 problem starts with limestone, a rock made primarily of calcium carbonate. To make Portland cement – the pasty main ingredient in modern concrete – limestone is mined, crushed and baked at high heat with clay and small amounts of other materials in giant kilns. Generating this heat usually involves burning coal or other fossil fuels, accounting for more than a third of the carbon emissions associated with concrete.

The heat triggers a chemical reaction that yields marble-sized gray lumps known as clinker, which are then ground into the fine powder we recognize as cement. The reaction also releases carbon that could otherwise remain locked in limestone for hundreds of millions of years. This step contributes most of the remaining CO2 emissions from concrete production.

With funding from the Strategic Energy Alliance at Stanford’s Precourt Institute for Energy, Vanorio and colleagues at Stanford are now prototyping cement that eliminates the CO2-belching chemical reaction by making clinker with a volcanic rock that contains all the necessary building blocks, but none of the carbon.

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a tip of the hat to Sukie

if you're interested in transportation infrastructure

Video from David Levinson's recent lectures on the subject..  it's based on his very useful book on the subject:  The Transportation Experience 2nd edition. 

 

dealing with all your old lego bricks

stealthy tape dispenser

Greg notes a stealth tape dispenser ..  not cheap, but if you have the need.

 

how to take a selfie

On Mars with a camera not made for the purpose..

 

urlology

urls - a technical dive into the mess

 

fixing old watches

a tip of the hat to John - apparently watch restoration videos are a thing