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SUNMONTUEWEDTHUFRISAT
Events for April 30, 2008
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Meet USC
Wed, Apr 30, 2008
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/events/meet_usc/ 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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Meet USC
Wed, Apr 30, 2008
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/events/meet_usc/ 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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Studies in System Architecture
Wed, Apr 30, 2008 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
University Calendar
Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering SeminarSTUDIES IN SYSTEM ARCHITECTUREPart 1: An Engineering Systems Design Case ApplicationPart 2: An Algorithmic Approach to System Architecting Using Shape Grammar-Cellular Automata"Dr. Thomas H. Speller, Jr.Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems DivisionABSTRACT: This talk begins by briefly reviewing as a case study a product development effort and organizational change within the presenter's past company that incorporated lessons learned in systems engineering and system architecture. It is quite a remarkable and nontrivial occurrence in the history of this corporation, an automatic fastening system producer for aerostructure assemblies, that a product family should be created with extensibility, encompassing new technologies for competitive advantage and covering anticipated automatic fastening requirements for commercial airplanes over the foreseeable next ten years. Heretofore, the products developed appeared similar from a distance, but in fact were not related products; instead they were individual prototypes bearing certain similarities. In an extensible product family, world economic influences, competing technological trajectories, the customer supply chain, competition, and organizational structure and policies are seen as critical components that must be considered when shaping the system architecture of these products.This talk then moves on to the recent doctoral research, which was in a broad sense intended to expand upon the understanding of the fundamentals of system architecting in order to more effectively apply this process to engineering systems. A universal concern about the system architecting process is that the needs and wants of the stakeholders are not being fully satisfied, primarily because too few design alternatives are created and ambiguity exists in the information required. At the same time, it is noted that nature offers a superb example of system architecting and therefore might be considered as a guide for the engineering of systems. Key features of nature's architecting processes include self-generation, diversity, emergence, least action (balance of kinetic and potential energy), system-of-systems organization, and selection for stability. Currently, no human-friendly method appears to exist that addresses the problems in the field of system architecture while at the same time emulating nature's processes.By adapting nature's self-generative approach, a systematic means is offered to more rigorously conduct system architecting and better satisfy stakeholders. This algorithmic methodology was developed to generate a space of architectural solutions satisfying a given specification, local constraints, and physical laws. The approach combines a visually oriented human design interface (shape grammar) that provides an intuitive design language with a machine (cellular automata) to execute the system architecture's production set (algorithm). The manual output of the flexible shape grammar, the set of design rules, is transcribed into cellular automata neighborhoods as a sequenced production set that may include other simple programs (such as combinatoric instructions). The resulting catalog of system architectures can be unmanageably large, so selection criteria (e.g., stability, matching interfaces, least action) can be defined by the architect to narrow the solution space for stakeholder review. The shape grammar-cellular automata algorithmic approach was demonstrated across several domains of study, with an example on generating graphene presented here. This algorithmic methodology improves on a design's clarification and the number of design alternatives produced, which should result in greater stakeholder satisfaction. Of additional significance, this approach has shown value both in the study of the system architecting process, leading to the proposal of normative principles for system architecture, and in the modeling of systems for better understanding.WEDNESDAY, APRIL 30, 2008, GERONTOLOGY BUILDING (GER) ROOM 309, 2:00 – 3:00 PMBIO: Thomas Speller recently received his doctorate from the Engineering Systems Division of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Previously, he had worked for 27 years at Gemcor Systems Corporation, an aerospace industry end-to-end engineering-manufacturing company, where he was the Chief Executive Officer for over 12 years. He received an MBA (finance and marketing) from the University of Chicago and A.B. in Economics (with concentrations in psychology and chemistry) from Ohio University. In addition, he received an MS Degree in Engineering and Management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research interests are focused on system architecture, new product development, system dynamics, sustainability and growth, and automated design and assembly, and he has published on topics in system architecture, system dynamics, organizational systems, systems engineering, and complex systems.
Location: Ethel Percy Andrus Gerontology Center (GER) - 309
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Georgia Lum
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Environmental Engineering for Los Angeles County
Wed, Apr 30, 2008 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Alex Mena & Mike Sullivan- Los Angeles County Sanitation DistrictsAbstract:
The Sanitation Districts of Los Angeles County (Districts) lead a regional movement towards environmental sustainability in California by converting waste to vital resources such as water and energy. The Districts have been providing wastewater and solid waste management since the late 1920's, and have been expanding renewable energy recovery options at every opportunity. The Districts currently provide these services for over five million people, and have an average annual budget that exceeds $1 Billion. Facilities include: over 1,300 miles of sanitary sewers; eleven wastewater treatment plants treating over 500 MGD; a reclaimed water reuse program serving over 500 sites directly, as well as replenishing groundwater; three active sanitary landfills handling a total of approximately 20,000 tons per day, including the largest landfill in the nation; three materials recovery facilities/transfer stations; and multiple energy production facilities, generating over 127 Megawatts. Energy recovery operations provide enough renewable energy to power 150,000 homes. The Districts are consistently nationally ranked in the top 3 of the "Top 10 Local Government" Green Power Partners selected by the EPA and are the 20th largest producer of electrical power in California.
If you have more space....Innovative projects in progress include design and construction of a regional 2,800 acre landfill that will accept 100 years of solid waste via rail transport, and the largest indoor and outdoor biosolids composting facilities in the country. The Districts are currently investigating the environmental benefits of constructing a new ocean outfall. If constructed, the $1-2 Billion outfall project would represent one of the most challenging and high profile public works projects in the nation. Engineers are involved in all phases of our work, from conception to operation. Almost all engineering is performed in-house, and the majority of Districts engineers have graduate degrees in civil/environmental engineering. Over 250 Districts engineers work in areas such as: research, air and water quality monitoring, design, geotechnical engineering, hydrogeology, planning, construction, operations, industrial waste, and financial management as well as the specialty areas of electrical, instrumentation, mechanical, and structural engineering.Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - 209
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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Towards Dislocation Dynamics in Carbon Nanotubes and Graphene
Wed, Apr 30, 2008 @ 03:30 PM - 04:30 AM
Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
This seminar, the last in the Spring AME Seminar Series, will be presented by Elif Ertekin from UC Berkeley.For more information including an abstract, go to http://ame-www.usc.edu/seminars/4-30-08-ertekin.shtml
Location: Seaver Science Library, Room 150 (SSL 150)
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Dennis Plocher
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Semester Project: Final Review
Wed, Apr 30, 2008 @ 07:00 PM - 10:00 PM
Viterbi School of Engineering Student Organizations
Student Activity
Semester Project:Final ReviewJoin us for the Semester Project: Final ReviewWhen and Where: 7:00 PM, SGM 124,April 30th25 Viterbi students led by engineers from Google, Amgen, and NASA have
spent 12 weeks developing innovative software projects that empower
persons with physical and mental disabilities. Join us and a panel of
guest judges for a final review of their work this semester. Food will
be served.For more information about the Semester Project, visit:
http://www.projectpossibility.org/semesterProject.phpThis event is organized and sponsored by USC Engineering Graduate
Student Association, USC International Students' Assembly, and USC
Association for Computing Machinery in partnership with Project:Possibility.Location: Seeley G. Mudd Building (SGM) - 124
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: EGSA
