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The shape of the Eiffel Tower

Submitted by Mike Ciavarella on
education
optimal design
eiffel tower
shape

I've got interested, since I am going with about 10 of my students to Paris for the Euromech conference I am coorganizing in July, by the design of the Eiffel Tower.  Eiffel was a great engineer, and indeed his shape of the tower apparently comes from his ingenious idea of  balancing weigth and wind pressure so that there is little need of foundations.  WIKIPEDIA has an account of this design idea, and the resulting integro-differential equation.

Suresh's group Fighting Malaria: Understanding the Biomechanical Properties of Red Blood Cells

Submitted by Mike Ciavarella on
research
biomechanics
suresh
malaria
red blood cells
Suresh's group Fighting Malaria: Understanding the Biomechanical Properties of Red Blood Cells

MIT Dean of Engineering Subra
Suresh with graduate

student David Quinn. Photo: L. Barry Hetherington

 

statistics about students in world universities

Submitted by Mike Ciavarella on
education
education

dear Friend



I am comparing italian universities with Russian ones with US and with Cuban ones. Then I need some figures.



I have been able for example to find that there are about 50% of students-workers in Russia, what about US?

I mean full time workers, not just part time.



But I need to know more about these questions:-

1) how did the number of students in the last 10 years vary?  Increased?

2) how many students are doing economics or management - related subjects?

Promotion at random is better! Tenure makes you more "incompetent" -- Peter's principle proved by two italian scientists!

Submitted by Mike Ciavarella on
research
promotion
peter principle
hierarchy

If you are upset about promotion system, look at what two italian friends proved recently, which was immediately popular before the paper publication, also because they proved random promotion is more efficient!

Euromech workshop on Multiscale effects in Fatigue, July 7-9, 2010 at the Ecole Polytechnique

Submitted by Mike Ciavarella on
conference
Fatigue
multiscale
nano
micro
macro

Dear Collegue



We are organising in July 7-9, 2010 an Euromech workshop on Multiscale

effects in Fatigue, at the Ecole Polytechnique, near Paris in France.

Outcomes and topics are detailed on the following web site:



http://www.lms.polytechnique.fr/Euromech



We would be honoured if you could contribute to this workshop to present

some of your recent research results.  The workshop is thought as a small

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