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Engineering design is known as an answer to an ill-defined problem. As any answer to an ill-defined problem, it can never be completely right or absolutely wrong. The methods that universities use to teach engineering design, as a consequence of this, suffer from the same fate. However, the accumulated experience with the "chalk and talk" teaching tradition has led to a reality in which the employers of fresh graduates are not happy with the engineers they are getting. Part of their complaints are related with the inability of recently graduate engineers to work in problems where the boundaries are not well defined, are interdisciplinary, require the use of effective communication and integrate non-technical issues. These skills are mostly absent from traditional engineering curricula. This paper demonstrates the implementation of engineering design perspectives enhancing some of the aforementioned skills in a traditional mechanical engineering curriculum. It emphasises in particular a design project that is tackled in a sequence of conventional courses with a focus that depends on the course objectives and disciplinary domain. This transdisciplinary design project conveys the idea (and effectively implements it concurrently) that design is multidisciplinary.

Offshore wind (OSW) energy is a renewable source with strong prospects of development that may decisively contribute towards energy independence. Offshore wind is, however, not yet ubiquitously cost competitive, and frequently requires support schemes to finance its extensive capital requirements. Therefore, cost reduction strategies are necessary for the future development of offshore wind technologies. Even if structural health monitoring (SHM) systems are currently applied for the inspection of critical mechanical structures, they have not been the focus of research from offshore wind stakeholders. The main goal of this study is to evaluate the viability of SHM systems on the support structures of bottom-fixed offshore wind (BFOSW), alongside the impact of implementing these systems on life-cycle. Economic models are used to estimate the impact of implementing these systems, explained using a case-study of the Kaskasi farm in the German North Sea. General results indicate that installing SHM systems on the support structures of offshore wind can shift the maintenance strategies from preventive to predictive, allowing the intervals between inspections to be increased without a reduction on equipment availability. The greatest benefit is related with the possibility of extending the operational life of the farm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Collective Thomson Scattering (CTS) diagnostic will be a primary diagnostic for measuring the dynamics of the confined fusion born alpha particles in ITER and will be the only diagnostic for alphas below 1.7 MeV [1]. The probe beam of the CTS diagnostic comes from a 60 GHz 1 MW gyrotron operated in a ~100 Hz modulation sequence. In the plasma, the probing beam will be scattered off fluctuations primarily due to the dynamics of the ions. Seven fixed receiver mirrors will pick up scattered radiation (the CTS signal) from seven measurement volumes along the probe beam covering the cross section of the plasma. The diagnostic is planned to provide a temporal resolution of ~100 ms and a spatial resolution of ~a/4 in the core and ~a/20 near the plasma edge where a = 2.0 m is the nominal minor radius of ITER. The front-end quasi-optics will be installed in an equatorial port plug (EPP#12). A particular challenge will be to pass the probing beam through the fundamental electron cyclotron resonance, which is located in the port plug (R=10.3 m) for the nominal magnetic field Bt = 5.3 T. Hence, particular mitigation actions against arcing have to be applied. The status of the design and specific challenges will be discussed.

Product development is the set of activities starting with the perception of a market need and ending in the production and sale of a new product satisfying that need. Broadly speaking, it is a process that should follow a structured methodology, if a certain level of effectiveness and efficacy is envisaged. In the Portuguese industrial environment, there is, in general, a weak perception of this methodology. Even when this perception exists, it is hardly integrated with the company's culture and related processes. In university engineering degrees curricula, there is very little integration of interdisciplinary knowledge that leads to a global understanding of what engineering and product development integrated with entrepreneurship issues should be. This work presents an integrative approach to bridge this gap between industry and university by the teaching of a course on product development and entrepreneurship, at a graduate level. Special attention is given to innovation and creative thinking during concept development, through the introduction of a structured method to promote it, and to the appeal of intellectual property rights to motivate innovative thinking among students. Teaching product development integrated in an entrepreneurship framework promotes students skills in what it takes to start a new business and makes them feel comfortable in executing the idea-to-product viability evaluation in a business perspective. (Contains 1 table and 3 figures.)