Category Archives: Engineering
The changing landscape of the regulation of professional engineers in Australia: how is your organisation impacted? – Lexology
With recent changes to the registration regimes for professional engineers operating in New South Wales and Victoria, and the potential introduction of a national automatic deemed registration regime, now is the time to review your organisation's compliance with the evolving requirements.
New registration requirements in New South Wales and Victoria took effect on 1 July 2021
We've previously highlighted the regulatory regimes to be introduced by the Design & Building Practitioners Act 2020 (NSW) (DBP Act) and Professional Engineers Registration Act 2019 (Vic) (PER Act). With respect to the engineering profession, the DBP Act and PER Act (and associated regulations) seek to largely replicate the regulatory scheme that has been in place for engineers in Queensland for a number of years. However, unlike the Queensland regime, which includes up to 26 classifications of engineers, the DBP Act and PER Act are currently limited to professional engineering services conducted in the building industry only.
The following registration requirements came into effect on 1 July 2021:
Mutual recognition, automatic deemed registration and the carrying out of professional engineering services in Australia
The standardisation of laws applying to the engineering profession in Australia continues to be a moving feast. At present, under the Commonwealth Mutual Recognition Act 1992 (MR Act), where an engineer duly registered in one state seeks to practice in another state they are required to apply and pay for an additional registration in that other state. However, going forward under the scheme proposed in the Mutual Recognition Amendment Act 2021 (MRA Act) passed in May, the concept of "automatic deemed registration" is to be introduced. The effect of this new concept will be that an engineer registered in one state will be taken to be registered in another state without being required to seek additional recognition (as is the case at present).
The regime proposed by the MRA is not without its critics. Both New South Wales and Victoria have enacted legislation exempting engineers from the MRA Act provisions for a period of 12 months, with Queensland also yet to commit to the regime. In considering the proposed MRA Act, the Board of Professional Engineers of Queensland (BPEQ) recently stated that:
"AMR is a sound proposal in theory but first requires a standardised regulatory framework for engineers across jurisdictions. The proposed AMR scheme may undermine the effectiveness of Queenslands registration scheme and pose risks to the public and profession."
The willingness of the BPEQ to protect its regime for registration was recently demonstrated in an appeal brought in the Federal Court of Australia from a decision of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. In Professional Engineers of Queensland v Gardner [2021] FCA 564 the Court considered whether a "Certifier fire safety" qualification in New South Wales entitled a practitioner to be registered as a fire safety engineer in Queensland. The Court, in allowing the appeal and overturning the decision of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal to recognise the New South Wales qualification for the purpose of the Queensland registration regime, found that:
"Having regard to the respective regulatory regimes, NSW requires one occupation to be registered and Queensland another. No amount of conditioning could convert the occupation of Certifier fire safety into the separate occupation of practising professional engineer in the area of 'Fire'".
and
"a person who is registered as a 'Certifier fire safety' in NSW is not entitled to registration in Queensland as a 'registered professional engineer'."
Next steps for professional engineers
Given the evolving nature of Commonwealth and State legislation applicable to the practice of professional engineering in Australia, we recommend that you:
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Opinion | Advice for Artists Whose Parents Want Them to Be Engineers – The New York Times
Getting your parents to tolerate your choices may be enough.
The parents of Adriana Ramrez are still not fine and will never be fine with her life as a poet, she told me. But they simply tolerate my choices because they love me.
Truthfulness is overrated.
Then theres the strategy that Zia Haider Rahman, a writer, advises: Lie.
Sometimes thats the only way to avoid a pointless confrontation. I have lied often to my parents, in words or by omission. For example: My father is a devout Catholic who goes to church every day, and I am an atheist, but when I come home to visit, I take him to church and say nothing about what I believe. (Our parents have probably lied to us, too.)
The belt-and-suspenders approach.
Pursue your dreams, but prepare a backup plan a double major for example (one major for your parents, one for yourself). This is also good preparation generally for a creative life. Thats what I did by pursuing academia for my day job, in the hope that one day I could call myself a writer.
Be patient.
While young people often want immediate answers, the road to acceptance from parents might be a long one. We may have to gradually wear down our parents, as Matty Huynh did. Instead of declaring I was going to be an artist, I made art, he said. By the time he left law school, his parents had gotten used to climbing around frames and boxes of books in their garage. Continuing to make art had become mundane, an inconvenience, he said, but eventually it became an inevitability.
Assert your independence, respectfully.
Parents, especially immigrant parents, have often worked incredibly hard to create opportunities for their children. Still, some parents have to learn that their childrens lives are not theirs, no matter what they sacrificed. Respect is the key, says Kavita Das, a writer: It comes down to helping them understand that we are not throwing away all their hard work but honoring their hard work, because it allowed us to pursue our dreams.
Mr. Huynh suggests putting less weight upon your parents approval: It might sound aggressive to say one shouldnt ask for permission, but its kinder not to expect a blessing from people who have no experience and only anxieties about your moonshot dreams.
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Opinion | Advice for Artists Whose Parents Want Them to Be Engineers - The New York Times
Engineers ponder what comes next as they seek to avoid another condo collapse in Florida – USA TODAY
Surfside, Florida: Cameras capture moment condos collapse
A security camera captured the moment a condo partially collapsed in Surfside, a town near Miami, Florida.
Associated Press, USA TODAY
SURFSIDE, Fla. Perhaps it was a fatal flaw in the pool deck that over decades weakened a supporting concrete slab, or a rising sea that drove corrosive saltwater against critical columns in the lower-level garage.
Maybe concrete throughout the building had been poured too thin to protect reinforcing steel, or condo owners and town officials hoped for the best when they should have prepared for the worst.
In the days since the June 24 collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium near Miami, victims, families, and a shocked nation have pondered those theories and others in a vain search for an answer to the same, desperate question.
What happened?
Yet the only consensus among 10 engineers and other experts interviewed by USA TODAY is that an answer will take time.
This will be a fact-finding not fault-finding technical investigation, said James Olthoff, director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, during a Wednesday press briefing to announce that agencys investigation. It will take time, possibly a couple of years. But we will not stop until we determine the likely cause of this tragedy.
In the end, experts said, it will likely be a combination of many factors and missed opportunities that ended in what could become the deadliest building collapse in American history not caused by a terrorist act or natural disaster. The confirmed death toll stood at 22on Friday, with 126 others still missingin.
Whether this particular building succumbed to some shortcoming in practice and construction, we just dont know, said Glenn Bell, past president of the Structural Engineering Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers, who has investigated building failures.
'Major problems': There were many warnings before the Florida building collapsed
But even as the official investigation begins, engineers, scientists, and regulators elsewhere are seeking lessons from whats known so far.
The engineering community will look at this and hopefully learn a lot from it to minimize the chance of this happening in the future, said Reginald DesRoches, provost of Houstons Rice University and a civil and structural engineer.
Emerging evidence points to a potential failure at the lowest levels of the 12-story condominium. Engineering reports and condo association letters reported serious concerns with the buildings pool deck and concrete pillars in the underground garage. Former workers and building residents recalled significant flooding, whether it be from the pool or groundwater.
That raised questions about the potential for rising sea levels and tides to push seawater into the building, corroding materials and leading to a potential failure. Harold Wanless, a geologist and sea level expert at the University of Miami, said the region has experienced about a foot of sea level rise since the 1940s. But less is known about where and how the corrosive saltwater affects structures, and that concerns Wanless.
Exactly what kind of concrete was used in the building, and at the base of the building? … Thats very important because there are all kinds of concrete, Wanless said. Some are very good and can handle salt well. And there are others that dont do well at all.
Files from the Florida Department of Transportation show that the groundwater near Champlain South begins about 2.5 feet underground and is moderately aggressive in its corrosiveness. The groundwater quality came up during construction in a 1979 notice sent by Miami-Dade Countys environmental resources management division. It noted that due to the high chloride content and elevation of the groundwater at this location, builders would have to install special fiberglass tanks for gas and oil that wouldnt corrode.
The Backstory: What our reporters saw, heard and experienced at the Florida condo collapse
But those conditions arent remarkably different from any other place along the barrier island where Surfside rests, according to Lee Hefty, the current director of Miami-Dades environmental division. Numerous experts noted that similar projects have long been constructed in coastal areas without incident, so long as the engineering and maintenance are sound.
You can build anywhere as long as you provide the necessary strength to support your structure, said Abieyuwa Aghayere, a professor of structural engineering at Drexel University in Philadelphia. In an environment like this, what it calls for is a more regular, periodic inspection of these kinds of buildings, because its a very corrosive environment.
Reviewing original design plans of the building, Aghayere saw indications of vulnerabilities to coastal conditions. In addition to seawater pushing up against and corroding weight-bearing structures at lower levels, corrosive salt air can eat away at concrete and exposed metal if they are not properly protected.
Aghayere noted that designs called for three-quarters of an inch of concrete around the reinforcing steel bars known as rebar in balconies and the buildings slabs. Current engineering standards call for 1.5 inches, but Aghayere and other experts werent sure what requirements were in place when the building was constructed. The thin concrete layer could have led to exposure and weakening of the rebar.
Indeed, numerous inspections and reports filed over the past three years showed crumbling concrete and exposed rebar at several places in the building.
I can see why thered be issues with the rebar in that kind of environment, Aghayere said.
He and others said inspections should occur more regularly than the 40 years required by Miami-Dade and Broward counties for recertification.
In coastal areas, recertification, in my opinion, should take place at a 20-year building anniversary and then every 10 years, said Jorge Kuperman, principal architect of JSK Architectural Group in nearby Coral Gables, Florida.
Two days after the collapse, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava announced 30-day audits of hundreds of buildings that are at least five stories and 40 years old to ensure they complied with the countys existing recertification requirement.
Florida lawmakers are thinking about going further.
State Sen. Jason Pizzo said he plans to file legislation that would likely focus on building requirements, re-inspection standards for older buildings, the risk of seawater intrusion and the financial obligations of condominium associations.
We should at least be looking at two things: The actual physical structure itself, the design and material used, and the accelerated environmental conditions that are affecting these buildings near the beach, said Pizzo, a Democrat whose district includes Surfside and 14 other Miami-Dade municipalities.
In addition to earlier and more rigorous inspections, experts pointed to some scientific techniques that could avert similar catastrophes.
After a consulting engineer warned of concrete deterioration in a 2018 report to the condo association, tests should have been done on the concretes strength either by compressing it or conducting a chemical analysis, said Syed Ashraf, a structural engineer who has experience retrofitting older high-rises in Miami. Ashraf said such testing is simple and not really expensive.
If the inspector had tested the concrete at the time, Ashraf surmised, he would have seen that the strength of the concrete was very low and there was danger of a collapse.
It remains unclear if failing concrete played a role in the buildings collapse. Some experts noted it could have been triggered by an unidentified event or one difficult to anticipate, such as a sinkhole in the underlying limestone bedrock.
As first reported by USA TODAY, a 2020 study that used satellite data to analyze flooding in the Miami area found that Champlain South appeared to be sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters a year in the 1990s. The technology could not determine whether the land beneath the condo was actually sinking, or whether a structural flaw was causing the building to sink into the earth or sag onto itself.
Still, Shimon Wdowinski, a professor in the Department of Earth and Environment at Florida International University who conducted the study, said the incident made him realize the potential to use the technology to detect issues with buildings.
Another technology called lidar, a laser-based system that can scan environments and buildings to create a digital map, also shows promise, said Clinton Andrews, a professor of urban planning and director of the Center for Green Building at Rutgers University.
Researchers at Rutgers last year drove a car equipped with the technology around the beach town of Asbury Park, New Jersey, and created a three-dimensional replica of it, Andrews said. They also used it on several buildings in the Bronx in New York City, where they combined lidar with thermal imaging to detect structural defects in buildings, such as a contractor forgetting to install insulation and a leak causing water damage.
Andrews said the technologys cost is decreasing to levels affordable at the municipal level. It could detect structural problems in buildings and help prevent future catastrophes.
Its sensitive enough to detect issues like subsidence, Andrews said, using the scientific term for sinking earth.
Even with the best possible technology to detect a problem, experts said preventing disasters still depends on humans raising alarms and someone responding.
While lawsuits and public debate will parse over what should have been done about the early warnings at Champlain Towers South, the experts were slow to find fault.
Bell, with the American Society of Civil Engineers, cautioned against jumping to conclusions that engineers who inspected the building on behalf of the condo failed to take proper action.
"It's very difficult to judge what is in an evaluator's mind and what actions he should or should not have taken," Bell said.
Kuperman, the Miami-area architect, said nothing in the Miami-Dade code stipulates when an engineer is to raise an alarm.
In fact, a licensed professional does not have the faculty or authority to raise alarms but (only) to put on record what is observed, Kuperman said.
Instead, the experts said responsibility for determining when a building is unsafe and needs to be condemned or evacuated should fall on cities or counties. Ashraf, the structural engineer working in Miami, took issue with Ross Prieto, a former Surfside building official who after receiving the 2018 inspection report told the condo association that the building was in very good shape, according to minutes of an association meeting.
I totally disagree with the building official, Asharaf said. He should have given a notice of violation. It does not mean that he's shutting the building down, but it would have expedited the process and the collapse would not have happened.
Prieto has not returned calls and messages left by USA TODAY.
Asked whether the incident could trigger changes in how engineers respond to troubling inspections, Bell said that a professional obligation to protect the public is already written into engineering codes and standards.
If there is an issue where a structural engineer feels there is an imminent threat to public safety, they need to do things to encourage that its addressed, Bell said.
As more facts emerge, Bell said he believes the engineering community will make changes to safeguard buildings. That typically starts with new national policies among engineering organizations that filter down into new state and local laws.
Since this failure, there have been discussions in the profession about what were doing currently and what well be doing going forward, Bell said.
Aleszu Bajak, John Kennedy, Sudiksha Kochi, Erin Mansfield, Jesse Mendoza, Rick Neale, and Elizabeth Weise of the USA TODAY Network contributed.
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Engineers ponder what comes next as they seek to avoid another condo collapse in Florida - USA TODAY
Engineering school creating tools for the next generation of warfare – Business Observer
When you think of a satellite, what comes to mind? Some sort of spaceship with panels beaming information back and forth from Earth? Or, maybe, a dish on a neighbors roof or behind a house off some country road?
Youd be right in both cases. But the satellite sitting on a worktable at the Institute of Applied Engineering in Tampa is different.
Its a little black box, about the size of a box of playing cards if the playing cards were square. It opens, revealing panels covered in panels that the military uses towell thats about all that can be said about this satellite for now.
Actually, one more thing can be said about it: It was designed at the institute by a group of engineers as part of a military contract. It will be tested in a real-world environment outer space and one day, possibly, manufactured by contractors at the request of the Pentagon.
'I believe engineering should be everywhere. Engineering should be on display. Engineering should be out with the community, not behind castlewalls.RobertBishop,Institute ofApplied Engineering, Tampa
Tucked in a corner of the University Mall on Fowler Avenue in Tampa, next to what once was a Dillards, the institute, a nonprofit that is partof the University of South Floridas school of engineering, works on government research contracts. It's focus:find engineering solutions for the Department of Defense, federal and state agencies, as well asvarious industries. A working lab, the institute also gives undergraduate students workforce skills and helps others work on advanced degrees.
The space it occupies is part of a redevelopment of the mall aimed atcreating a hub of innovation-focused tenants, mostly in research, technology and medicine.The project is called Rithm At Uptown it stands for research, innovation, technology, humanity and medicine.
As the rare shopper straggles by, engineers, scientistsand technicians inside the institutes facility work awayon hardware-and-software-based applied research, as well developing advanced technological tools.
RobertBishop, dean of the USF engineering school and president and CEO of the institute, began thinking about the Institute as far back as 2015.
Raised on military bases in Europe, he earned his undergraduate and masters degrees from Texas A&M and is Ph.D. from Rice University. After a few years in the private sector, he joined the faculty at The University of Texas in Austin and later moved to Marquette University in Milwaukee. He came to USFas dean of the engineering school about seven years ago.
Bishop consideredthe institute an avenue to catapult the school of engineering into one of the top programs in the country. For that to happen, though, USF needed to work with specialists and organizations in order to improve itsresearch and create the academic backbone.
The key to that was building a relationship with the Department of Defense, particularly MacDill Air Force Base, a 20-mile drive from campus.
He began to develop the relationships and in February 2020 the U.S. Special Operations Command, based at MacDill, awarded the Institute a five-year contract that could, eventually, be worth up to $85 million. The contract, according to the Institute, calls for it to use its expertise in applied research and advanced technology developmentsto support USSOCOMs needs in a range of scientific and engineering disciplines.
SOCOM develops and employs fully capable Special Operations Forces to conduct global special operations, according to its website. Its duties are the stuff of Tom Clancy novels, counterterrorism, humanitarian assistance, special reconnaissance and countering weapons of mass destruction.
For Bishop, the institute and the work it does with the military, and others, is about doing what engineers do best: solving problems.
Bishop believes that engineers working with others, from any field, can develop solutions for a host of issues from finding ways to deal with the long term effects of repetitive, sub-concussive blasts on soldiers, to designing and operating small satellites that push the frontiers of thin communications into orbit, to helping policymakers make decisions that will lead to wars that are less lethal.
I believe engineering should be everywhere, Bishop says. Engineering should be on display. Engineering should be out with the community, not behind castlewalls.
The institute, though, is not actually working to develop products. What it does is research and find solutions, building prototypes passed onto the agency that hired it. Said agency then evaluates the product and makes a determination whether to move forward with contractors.
One of the Institutes main, though unheralded, functions is giving engineering students real life experience, preparing them to go out into the workforce locally and statewide. Bishop saysthe Institutes ability to get these students hands-on training, while not flashy, is crucial.
In my opinion, thats a part of our mission. That maybe doesnt sound as exciting as putting satellites up in space, Bishop says, but we put satellites up in space with 23 students, undergrads. Undergraduates helped build and design three satellites.
The students work with Ph.D. candidates and established engineers on a wide range of projects at the institute. Rather than working on theoretical projects and assignments in a classroom, students workon contracts for clients. That means they have to learn to handle oversight and be accountable while meeting the rigorous standards demanded by a paying client. And in most cases, that client is the U.S. Department of Defense.
To me, thats the story. That industry is benefitting from the work were doing here, Bishop says. We are an educational institution, our main mission is students. But its very rare that you have an organization that giving students the opportunity to do things with a customer.
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Engineering school creating tools for the next generation of warfare - Business Observer
Three really exciting engineering jobs open at the moment – VentureBeat
Where does your enterprise stand on the AI adoption curve? Take our AI survey to find out.
After what feels like a lifetime of lockdowns, restrictions, and hitting pause on life, things are slowly returning to normal. And frankly, we couldnt be happier. During this global pandemic, countless businesses all over the world introduced hiring freezes, furlough schemes and had to make some tough decisions. But there has been a shift, and we have front row seats. The world is returning to work, and this has resulted in some pretty amazing companies setting off on hiring sprees, with growth ambitions for the next few months.
And thats what brings us here today. We wanted to shine a bit of a spotlight on three brilliant jobs that are open right now, and give you a bit of cool information about them.
Core Hosts are the heart and soul of Airbnb and their truest differentiator. Hosts are the brand and enable amazing travel experiences for guests. They are ordinary people who had the courage to share their primary and secondary homes with complete strangers across the world.
As a senior technical individual contributor, you will partner closely with the CTO of Hosting and senior leaders across the broader technical organization. Although you will be at one of the highest levels of seniority, all individual contributors at Airbnb are Software Engineers which means we expect you to be hands on and contribute code.
The successful candidate will define overall technical architecture for major parts of the Hosting business, and architect large-scale reliable systems to support continuous growth of the business. They will also influence the organization, engineering leaders, product managers, and the business to develop a unified approach to overall Hosting architecture.
Apex Tech Solution is looking for a System Administrator to maintain, upgrade, and manage their software, hardware, and networks. Resourcefulness is a necessary skill in this role. You should be able to diagnose and resolve problems quickly. You should have the patience to communicate with a variety of interdisciplinary teams and users. Your goal will be to ensure that their technology infrastructure runs smoothly and efficiently.
The successful candidate will be responsible for installing and configuring software and hardware, managing network servers, and technology tools. They will monitor performance and maintain systems according to requirements, and also take the lead on troubleshooting issues and outages. In order to be successful in this role, you will need to have proven experience as a System Administrator, Network Administrator, or similar role, along with extensive experience with databases, networks (LAN, WAN), and patch management. Knowledge of system security (e.g. intrusion detection systems) and data backup/recovery is also a plus.
Everyone at Airbnb thinks about trust, but this team obsesses over it daily. At the core of trust is safety, and they spend a significant amount of their time and energy keeping the community safe. The Trust Org is responsible for protecting the Airbnb community and platform from fraud while also ensuring that hosts, guests, homes, and experiences meet high standards. They constantly work to fight against online and offline fraud. They also work on the onboarding and screening of users, and think about complex topics such as identity to ensure that every interaction with Airbnb helps build trust. Trust Engineering within the Trust Org is responsible for the technology vision and development of a complex stack that runs on every key interaction on the platform.
Theyre looking for a senior staff engineer to join their Foundational Modeling team (part of Trust Engineering) that is responsible for a Machine Learning Platform, a core capability that enables Trust product teams to build machine learning solutions to stop bad actors from doing bad things on Airbnb. As a senior staff engineer on the Foundational Modeling team, you will help keep Airbnb users safe by working across diverse teams and systems to enable sophisticated safety strategies. You are eager to understand complex systems top to bottom and thrive working across technologies and codebases.
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Three really exciting engineering jobs open at the moment - VentureBeat
GR Engineering to tackle surface infrastructure for Tanami Expansion 2 – International Mining
Posted by Daniel Gleeson on 2nd July 2021
GR Engineering Services Ltd has executed a subcontractor agreement with RUC Cementation Mining Contractors Pty Ltd in relation to work on Newmonts Tanami gold mine in the Northern Territory of Australia.
RUC has been engaged by Newmont under a head contract to complete certain construction works for the Tanami Expansion 2 project. Included within this is shaft lining, equipment and headframe construction.
The scope of work for which GR Engineering is responsible comprises the construction and commissioning of the temporary and permanent works associated with the surface infrastructure.
Based on the current budget for the scope of work, it is anticipated that revenue from the subcontractor agreement will be approximately A$68 million ($51 million), GR Engineering said. Work is expected to be completed by April 2023.
Back in November, the two companies signed a teaming agreement related to the project.
Geoff Jones, Managing Director of GR Engineering, said: GR Engineering is pleased to have executed this first subcontractor agreement with RUC and we look forward to working with RUC to deliver safe and successful outcomes for Newmont and on other future projects. GR Engineering continues to build its pipeline of work for financial year 2022 and financial year 2023.
The Tanami Expansion 2 project is expected to increase the annual capacity of the processing site to 3.5 Mt/y, from 2.6 Mt/y, and extend the life of the mine beyond 2040.
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GR Engineering to tackle surface infrastructure for Tanami Expansion 2 - International Mining
LSU engineering professor works with Coast Guard on hurricane preparedness – Greater Baton Rouge Business Report
An LSU civil and environmental engineering assistant professor is working with the U.S. Coast Guard to conduct hurricane reconnaissance in an effort to better prepare Louisiana for storms.
Over the past year, LSU assistant professor Navid Jafari has worked alongside the U.S. Coast Guard in New Orleans to leverage drones to facilitate its search and rescue operations immediately after a hurricane.
In early 2020, Jafari received a $180,000 National Science Foundation grant to work with researchers from both Texas A&M University and the LSU Department of Environmental Sciences to find a way to more quickly gather infrastructure data after a natural disaster strikes and help emergency operations centers make data-driven decisions to save lives.
Jafari has found that drones can help lead boat operators to specific locations for rescue, but further research is needed to make improvements such as making the small drones more visible to boat operators and ensuring communication isnt lost the further out the boat goes. Read more about Jafaris research here.
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Inside the risky bat-virus engineering that links America to Wuhan – MIT Technology Review
For Baric, that research started in the late 1990s. Coronaviruses were then considered low risk, but Barics studies on the genetics that allowed viruses to enter human cells convinced him that some might be just a few mutations away from jumping the species barrier.
That hunch was confirmed in 200203, when SARS broke out in southern China, infecting 8,000 people. As bad as that was, Baric says, we dodged a bullet with SARS. The disease didnt spread from one person to another until about a day after severe symptoms began to appear, making it easier to corral through quarantines and contact tracing. Only 774 people died in that outbreak, but if it had been transmitted as easily as SARS-CoV-2, we would have had a pandemic with a 10% mortality rate, Baric says. Thats how close humanity came.
As tempting as it was to write off SARS as a one-time event, in 2012 MERS emerged and began infecting people in the Middle East. For me personally, that was a wake-up call that the animal reservoirs must have many, many more strains that are poised for cross-species movement, says Baric.
By then, examples of such dangers were already being discovered by Shis team, which had spent years sampling bats in southern China to locate the origin of SARS. The project was part of a global viral surveillance effort spearheaded by the US nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance. The nonprofitwhich has an annual income of over $16 million, more than 90% from government grantshas its office in New York but partners with local research groups in other countries to do field and lab work. The WIV was its crown jewel, and Peter Daszak, president of EcoHealth Alliance, has been a coauthor with Shi on most of her key papers.
By taking thousands of samples from guano, fecal swabs, and bat tissue, and searching those samples for genetic sequences similar to SARS, Shis team began to discover many closely related viruses. In a cave in Yunnan Province in 2011 or 2012, they discovered the two closest, which they named WIV1 and SHC014.
Shi managed to culture WIV1 in her lab from a fecal sample and show that it could directly infect human cells, proving that SARS-like viruses ready to leap straight from bats to humans already lurked in the natural world. This showed, Daszak and Shi argued, that bat coronaviruses were a substantial global threat. Scientists, they said, needed to find them, and study them, before they found us.
Many of the other viruses couldnt be grown, but Barics system provided a way to rapidly test their spikes by engineering them into similar viruses. When the chimera he made using SHC014 proved able to infect human cells in a dish, Daszak told the press that these revelations should move this virus from a candidate emerging pathogen to a clear and present danger.
To others, it was the perfect example of the unnecessary dangers of gain-of-function science. The only impact of this work is the creation, in a lab, of a new, non-natural risk, the Rutgers microbiologist Richard Ebright, a longtime critic of such research, told Nature.
To Baric, the situation was more nuanced. Although his creation might be more dangerous than the original mouse-adapted virus hed used as a backbone, it was still wimpy compared with SARScertainly not the supervirus Senator Paul would later suggest.
In the end, the NIH clampdown never had teeth. It included a clause granting exceptions if head of funding agency determines research is urgently necessary to protect public health or national security. Not only were Barics studies allowed to move forward, but so were all studies that applied for exemptions. The funding restrictions were lifted in 2017 and replaced with a more lenient system.
If the NIH was looking for a scientist to make regulators comfortable with gain-of-function research, Baric was the obvious choice. For years hed insisted on extra safety steps, and he took pains to point these out in his 2015 paper, as if modeling the way forward.
The CDC recognizes four levels of biosafety and recommends which pathogens should be studied at which level. Biosafety level 1 is for nonhazardous organisms and requires virtually no precautions: wear a lab coat and gloves as needed. BSL-2 is for moderately hazardous pathogens that are already endemic in the area, and relatively mild interventions are indicated: close the door, wear eye protection, dispose of waste materials in an autoclave. BSL-3 is where things get serious. Its for pathogens that can cause serious disease through respiratory transmission, such as influenza and SARS, and the associated protocols include multiple barriers to escape. Labs are walled off by two sets of self-closing, locking doors; air is filtered; personnel use full PPE and N95 masks and are under medical surveillance. BSL-4 is for the baddest of the baddies, such as Ebola and Marburg: full moon suits and dedicated air systems are added to the arsenal.
There are no enforceable standards of what you should and shouldnt do. Its up to the individual countries, institutions, and scientists.
In Barics lab, the chimeras were studied at BSL-3, enhanced with additional steps like Tyvek suits, double gloves, and powered-air respirators for all workers. Local first-responder teams participated in regular drills to increase their familiarity with the lab. All workers were monitored for infections, and local hospitals had procedures in place to handle incoming scientists. It was probably one of the safest BSL-3 facilities in the world. That still wasnt enough to prevent a handful of errors over the years: some scientists were even bitten by virus-carrying mice. But no infections resulted.
In 2014, the NIH awarded a five-year, $3.75 million grant to EcoHealth Alliance to study the risk that more bat-borne coronaviruses would emerge in China, using the same kind of techniques Baric had pioneered. Some of that work was to be subcontracted to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
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Inside the risky bat-virus engineering that links America to Wuhan - MIT Technology Review
5 children’s books that teach valuable engineering lessons – The Conversation US
Most people think of the childrens classic Charlottes Web as a story of devoted friendship between a spider and a pig. But it can also be read as a story of a budding engineer Charlotte who prototypes, builds, tests and revises her web to solve a problem.
As teacher educators, we use childrens books to make lessons about science and engineering accessible to children of all ages.
Through books, children can experience how engineers use design-based thinking, which focuses on creative and innovative solutions, to solve problems. They can also explore the history of things that they use every day, such as crayons, bridges and cars. And they can expand their image of who can be an engineer or inventor.
Our work suggests that picture books and biographies for young adult readers can be particularly effective for introducing children to the engineering design process. These are the actions ask, imagine, plan, create, test and improve that engineers take to design a solution to a problem. They also help children understand engineering habits of mind. These are the traits, such as creativity and persistence, that help engineers successfully solve problems.
Here are five of our favorite science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) books for children, and some of the engineering lessons that they teach.
Lonnie Johnson was always curious about how things worked. One day, while trying to figure out a way to replace the harmful chemicals found in refrigerators and air conditioners, he connected a pump with a nozzle to his bathroom faucet. When he turned the faucet on, water blasted across the room. Johnson had invented a water gun! Johnson tested and redesigned his new invention until it became the perfect summer toy the Super Soaker.
This picture-book biography introduces young readers to the prototype-test-redesign process that is central to engineering.
Grab a front-row seat to the story of how Tony Sarg, an immigrant from Western Europe, created one of Americas most iconic holiday traditions the giant balloons of Macys Thanksgiving Day Parade.
This picture-book biography highlights how engineers draw on imagination and inspiration to improve their designs. After reading, children can use these same traits to create their own Indonesian rod puppets. These puppets inspired Sarg to flip his marionette strings upside-down so that his famous balloons could soar.
Lilian Todd a self-taught inventor, engineer and contemporary of the Wright brothers worked to improve airplane designs in the early 1900s. This picture-book biography of her life illustrates how an engineers designs frequently fail. And it uses quotes from Todds perspective There is no work so discouraging, so exasperating, so delightful so exhilarating as building aeroplanes to capture her resilience in overcoming these challenges.
As children often face similar obstacles in their own STEM journeys, Todds story provides a model for how children can prepare for, reflect on and move forward from moments of failure.
Weve all eaten Hersheys chocolate bars and Hersheys Kisses. However, the road to commercial success for Milton Hershey was circuitous, and he failed many times before he succeeded.
This biography, written for ages 8-12, highlights the power of persistence and the design axiom: Fail often so you can succeed sooner.
This biography, written for ages 10-13, tells how teenaged William Kamkwamba built a wind turbine to produce electricity for his family in Malawi. The story shows how anyone, of any age, anywhere in the world can be an engineer.
This book is a great selection for a family or multi-age book club as it is also available as a picture book, a biography for adults and even a movie. Everyone can pick the version that is best for them and gather in person or via video chat to talk about lessons learned from Kamkwambas dream, determination and design.
Many books that are already in homes, schools and local libraries can also be used to introduce the engineering design process and habits of mind. We recommend looking for the following story features when choosing a book to explore design-based thinking with children.
First, the story presents a problem in a real-life context. Second, the story describes a design plan or way to solve the problem. Third, a character creates, tests and evaluates a prototype of this design. And finally, a character improves the design and applies the revised solution.
Parents and teachers can find more high-quality STEM books on the National Science Teaching Associations Best STEM Books K-12 or our own expanded list of favorites.
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5 children's books that teach valuable engineering lessons - The Conversation US
Universities of Manchester and Chile combine engineering programmes to address energy resilience and sustainability – The University of Manchester
Professor Ennio Vivaldi, President, University of Chile, said: "This dual PHD program is part of a long-term collaboration of both universities, including the Newton Fund grant awarded in 2018 to enhance resilience by restoring the electricity supply following socio-natural disasters. We believe that these kinds of collaborative activities are the best contribution we can do at the moment of uncertainty that mankind faces. Transdisciplinary efforts, the relationship of the universities, and the complementarity of our efforts moving forward in social engagement are essential to provide solutions in this context. Probably, these joint efforts for creating new knowledge are one of the best ways that both institutions can contribute to society."
This new partnership programme will present a unique opportunity for talented researchers to address complex global challenges. Apart from the very attractive proposition this presents to aspiring young researchers, this initiative will consolidate the partnership between our two institutions as academic colleagues drive forward research initiatives that have material impacts in the progress of developing countries.
HMA Louise De Sousa, British Ambassador to Chile, said: At the beginning of this year, our Prime Minister unveiled the UKs ambitious plan to become a global science superpower, recognising not only the UKs world-class research and innovation, but also emphasising the need to encourage collaborations and promote the environment to attract the worlds top scientists and research to our shores. This dual PhD reflects his vision.
The PhD programme will be four years in total with two years spent at The University of Chile and two years spent at The University of Manchester. The dual PhD programme was launched at a special online ceremony hosted by the University of Chile on 1 July. Attendees included HMA Louise De Sousa, British Ambassador to Chile, HE David Gallagher, Chilean Ambassador to the UK, and Aisen Etcheverry, Director, Chilean National Agency for Research and Development (ANID).
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