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Events for February 11, 2009
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Meet USC
Wed, Feb 11, 2009
Viterbi School of Engineering Undergraduate Admission
Workshops & Infosessions
This half day program is designed for prospective freshmen and family members. Meet USC includes an information session on the University and the Admission process; a student led walking tour of campus and a meeting with us in the Viterbi School. Meet USC is designed to answer all of your questions about USC, the application process and financial aid.Reservations are required for Meet USC. This program occurs twice, once at 9:00 a.m. and again at 1:00 p.m. Please visit http://www.usc.edu/admission/undergraduate/visit/meet_usc.html to check availability and make an appointment. Be sure to list an Engineering major as your "intended major" on the webform!
Location: USC Admission Center
Audiences: Prospective Freshmen and Family Members - RESERVATIONS REQUIRED
Contact: Viterbi Admission
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Preparing for the Career Fair
Wed, Feb 11, 2009 @ 12:00 PM - 01:00 PM
Viterbi School of Engineering Career Connections
Workshops & Infosessions
Make a great first impression! Learn how to optimize your time, approach employers and prepare for the recruiting event of the semester
Location: Ronald Tutor Hall (RTH) 109
Audiences: Current Engineering Undergraduate/Graduate Students
Contact: RTH 218 Viterbi Career Services
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Managing Risk in Megacities: Challenges and Opportunities for Researchers and Practitioners
Wed, Feb 11, 2009 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker:Fouad Bendimerad, Ph.D., P.E., Chairman of the Board,
Earthquakes and Megacities Initiative (EMI), www.emi-megacities.org Abstract:2007 was a turning point for humanity as for the first time in history, the world urban population has exceeded its rural population. In the next 20 years, the world's population is predicted to increase by an additional 2 billion. Most of the increase will be in cities of developing countries. Eventually, cities will account for all future global population growth with record concentrations in large urban conglomerations and megacities in the developing world. By 2015,12 out of the largest 15 cities in the world will be in developing countries.
Losses from a major disaster in large cities and megacities will harm large populations both within and far beyond their boundaries. Unfortunately, the planning and development of cities has only given scant consideration to the consequences of hazards such as earthquake, floods, hurricanes and others. Eight out of the ten most populous cities in the world can be severely affected by an earthquake, whereas six out of ten are vulnerable to storm surge and tsunami waves. Effects of climate change can exhacerbate the impacts of these hazards.
Urban risk from extreme hazards has largely been ignored. The premise has been that cities, especially megacities, have the capacity to address risk on their own. It is now clear that most cities, particularly in the developing world, are not effectively managing their risk. Dealing with megacities risk is becoming a global urgency. The role of academia is critical in providing and disseminating knowledge about risk, and in providing practical tools and methods to public officials and managers of megacities to achieve a more sustainable urban development.
The Earthquakes and Megacities Initiative (EMI) was created in response to the critical need to speed up risk management research and practice of complex urban centers. EMI creates mechanisms for the delivery of scientific and technical knowledge to the city managers, while supporting megacities in building disaster risk management practice. It achieves this by fostering partnerships and cooperation between megacities and scientific organizations, and advocating for megacities risk reduction in international forums.
This seminar provides an overview of issues related to megacities risk management and will show examples of methodologies, analytical tools and practical applications from various cities in the world.Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - 209
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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On Focusing of Shock Waves
Wed, Feb 11, 2009 @ 03:30 PM - 04:30 PM
Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Veronica Eliasson Postdoctoral ScholarGALCIT California Institute of TechnologyPasadena, CA In this project we study converging shocks in gas, both experimentally and numerically. The interest in converging shocks stems from their ability to concentrate energy in a small volume. However, it has proven difficult to experimentally obtain a stable cylindrical converging shock wave because initial shape perturbations are amplified during the nonlinear focusing event. In this talk, we address the issue of generating and studying stable converging shocks with various geometrical shapes.
A shock tube is used to transform an initially planar shock into a cylindrical ring-shaped shock. These cylindrical shock waves are then further transformed into different geometrical shapes during the focusing phase by two methods. One method consists of changing the shape of the outer boundary of the test section of the shock tube, while the other introduces cylindrical obstacles in specific patterns inside the test section. As a result, a polygonal shape is most often obtained and depending on the number of sides of the shock, either a Mach or regular reflection occurs at the corners during the focusing event.
The shock wave focusing is also studied numerically using Euler equations of gas dynamics for a gas obeying the ideal gas law with constant specific heats with a high-order accurate Godunov method. The governing equations are discretized on body-fitted overlapping structured grids, and adaptive mesh refinement is used to dynamically track the shocks and contact surfaces. Two problems are analyzed; an axisymmetric model of the shock tube used in the experiments and a cylindrical shock wave diffracted by cylinders in a two-dimensional test section.
Location: Seaver Science Library (SSL) - Rm 150
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: April Mundy
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Munushian Lecture: Charles Townes on How the Laser Happened
Wed, Feb 11, 2009 @ 03:30 PM - 05:15 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Nobel Laureate (Physics, 1964) Charles Townes speaks about the intersection of physics and electrical engineering," and the invention of the laser -- about how the interaction between physics and engineering and other fields, is important in originating new ideas, with the creation of the laser as case-in-point. Dr. Townes served as Provost and Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1966, he became Institute Professor at M.I.T., and later in the same year resigned from the position of Provost in order to return to more intensive research, particularly in the fields of quantum electronics and astronomy. He was appointed University Professor at the University of California in 1967. In this position Dr. Townes is participating in teaching, research, and other activities on several campuses of the University, although he is located at the Berkeley campus.In addition to the Nobel Prize, Townes has received the Templeton Prize, for contributions to the understanding of religion, and a number of other prizes as well as 27 honorary degrees from various universities.Reception, 3:30 p.m., Lecture begins at 4.
Location: Leonard Davis Auditorium (GER 124)
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Eric Mankin
