Indian Institute of Technology Palakkad&nbsp;(IIT Palakkad or IIT PKD) is a public autonomous&nbsp;engineering&nbsp;and&nbsp;research&nbsp;institute located in&nbsp;Palakkad,&nbsp;Kerala. It was&nbsp;one of the five new&nbsp;IITs&nbsp;proposed in the&nbsp;2014 Union budget of India. The campus was inaugurated on 3 August 2015. The institute has 94 faculty, 978 students, and 63 non-teaching staffs.

IT Palakkad currently offers four-year Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech) and two years MS programmes in 8 different engineering disciplines including&nbsp;Computer Science, Electrical, Mechanical, Civil among others.

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IIT Palakkad

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is currently being adopted around the world with numerous countries mandating its implementation on public projects through legislation. This process has driven the development of BIM standards and specifications to streamline design data prior to collaboration to meet regulatory requirements. Although BIM technologies globally are similar, many countries have developed context-specific BIM specifications to accommodate differences inter alia; design processes, procurement processes and government policies. The South African AEC (Architecture, Engineering and Construction) sector differs markedly from this top-down regulatory model. The government has taken no position on driving BIM practices and consequently there are no government mandated BIM standards or specifications. Likewise, no trade or professional associations have stepped into this gap to standardise local BIM practice. Thus, individual companies grapple with implementation in isolation and there is little transfer of lessons learnt across projects or between organisations. This paper reports on a proposed study to develop a prescriptive framework for South African BIM specifications by surveying the current strategies, policies, processes and standards utilized internationally by AEC designers. It explores possible reasons as to why the South African government and other industry bodies have not yet started to address the challenges encountered while adopting BIM. A conceptual framework will serve as the basis for future research to test whether global practices are applicable to the South African context and where adaptation and modification will be required. This study proposes a theoretical construct through acquiring knowledge from the current literature, collating the literature, building onto the current knowledge and potentially validating the knowledge with the sector, prior to its implementation.

Department of Civil Engineering

World University root node

Proceedings of the 1st International BIM Academic Forum (BAF) Conference

Building Information Modelling (BIM) standards and specifications around the world and its local applicability to the South African AEC sector: a critical review

12th International Conferencer on Transportation Planning and Implementation {\ldots}

Study on Recovery Behavior of Crumb Rubber Modified Asphalt Binders

2nd International Road Federation Asia Regional Congress \& Exhibition, Kuala {\ldots}

Statistical Evaluation of Crumb Rubber Modification Procedure in Asphalt Binder Modification

The objective of this study was to conceptualize and develop energy-based algorithm to characterize the comprehensive rheological behaviour of different asphalt binders with and without rubber modification. The scope included advanced asphalt binder characterization and analyses using viscoelastic parametric relationships. A total of thirteen different asphalt binders covering over 5000 data points were utilized, including: three virgin binders, one industrially available crumb rubber modified (CRM), and nine laboratory prepared CRM binders with varying dosages. Dissipated energy parameter tanδ was estimated, which helped in assessing the rutting resistance of asphalt binders. CRM binders produced flatter tanδ master curves and with lower magnitudes compared to the virgin binders indicative of higher rutting resistance with reduced energy dissipation-temperature susceptibility. Further, Weibull distribution function modeling on Multiple Stress Creep and Recovery (MSCR) test data quantified the contributions of various viscoelastic components of the asphalt binders. Rheological modeling and dissipated energy methodologies conceptualized as part of the study indicated that rubber inclusions in asphalt binder would aid in the improvement of the materials’ rutting resistance. Overall, it is envisaged that the algorithm developed in this research pertinent to asphalt binders’ advanced rheological characterization would further the state-of-the-art in designing rut-resistant asphalts. © 2016 Elsevier Ltd

Construction and Building Materials

Conceptualization of permanent deformation characteristics of rubber modified asphalt binders: Energy-based algorithm and rheological modeling

In the present study, a low molecular heterocyclic aminopyrazine (Apy)-reduced graphene oxide (r-GO) hybrid coated carbon cloth (r-GO-Apy-CC) was employed as an active and stable bio-electro catalyst in a microbial fuel cell (MFC). The presence of imine (-NH-) and pyridinic (-NC-) functional groups on the r-GO-Apy-CC electrode plays a critical role in the formation of bacterial colonization and enhanced extracellular electron transfer (EET) over a considerable period. The bacterial colonization over the r-GO-Apy-CC electrode was investigated in a Sacrificial Electrode Mode Reactor (SEMR) in which attached bacterial density with extracellular polysaccharides was monitored over a period. Simultaneously, cyclic voltammetry (CV) was performed in a bioelectrochemical system (BES) reactor, resulting in an increased current density-voltage response from 0.27 mA cm-2 to 1.84 mA cm-2 over a period of time. In addition, when r-GO-Apy-CC was employed as an anode in MFC, the power density was nearly two times (1253 mW m-2) than that of the MFC employed with plain carbon cloth (PCC) (663.7 mW m-2) at a steady state condition. It was proposed that the combined effect of Apy hybridized with nanostructured r-GO provides a large surface area for bacterial colonization. Moreover, the high bioelectrocatalytic activity was attributed to the low molecular nature of the Apy, which incorporated well into the EET pathway of the exoelectrogens by a redox mechanism. © 2016 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Fulltext

RSC Advances

Heterocyclic aminopyrazine-reduced graphene oxide coated carbon cloth electrode as an active bio-electrocatalyst for extracellular electron transfer in microbial fuel cells

Small particles in suspension in a turbulent fluid have trajectories that do not follow the pathlines of the flow exactly. We investigate the statistics of the angle of deviation φ between the particle and fluid velocities. We show that, when the effects of particle inertia are small, the probability distribution function (PDF) Pφ of this deviation angle shows a power-law region in which Pφ∼φ-4. We also find that the PDFs of the trajectory curvature κ and modulus θ of the torsion have power-law tails that scale, respectively, as Pκ∼κ-5/2, as κ→∞, and Pθ∼θ-3, as θ→∞: These exponents are in agreement with those previously observed for fluid pathlines. We propose a way to measure the complexity of heavy-particle trajectories by the number NI(t,St) of points (up until time t) at which the torsion changes sign. We present numerical evidence that nI(St)≡limt→∞NI(t,St)t∼St-Δ for large St, with Δ≃0.5. © 2016 American Physical Society.

Department of Physics

Physical Review E

Deviation-angle and trajectory statistics for inertial particles in turbulence

We obtain the probability distribution functions (PDFs) of the time that a Lagrangian tracer or a heavy inertial particle spends in vortical or strain-dominated regions of a turbulent flow, by carrying out direct numerical simulations of such particles advected by statistically steady, homogeneous, and isotropic turbulence in the forced, three-dimensional, incompressible Navier-Stokes equation. We use the two invariants, Q and R, of the velocity-gradient tensor to distinguish between vortical and strain-dominated regions of the flow and partition the Q-R plane into four different regions depending on the topology of the flow; out of these four regions two correspond to vorticity-dominated regions of the flow and two correspond to strain-dominated ones. We obtain Q and R along the trajectories of tracers and heavy inertial particles and find out the time tpers for which they remain in one of the four regions of the Q-R plane. We find that the PDFs of tpers display exponentially decaying tails for all four regions for tracers and heavy inertial particles. From these PDFs we extract characteristic time scales, which help us to quantify the time that such particles spend in vortical or strain-dominated regions of the flow. © 2016 American Physical Society.

How long do particles spend in vortical regions in turbulent flows?

This paper proposes two dynamic modelling approaches for a planar parallel manipulator with a 3-PPR configuration. The planar configuration has three legs each with a Prismatic-Prismatic-Revolute [PPR] configuration where the first joint is actuated. These three legs are joined by an end-effector which is in the form of an equilateral triangle. The dynamics of the manipulator was derived using an energy based Euler-Lagrangian approach and the DeNOC (Decoupled Natural Orthogonal Complement) matrices. Both the formulations are elucidated and the resulting formulation are compared under similar conditions to validate them. © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2016.

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Communications in Computer and Information Science

Dynamic modelling approaches for a 3-PPR planar parallel manipulator

Regulatory T cell (Treg) therapy has shown promises in experimental models of type 1 diabetes (T1D) and other autoimmune diseases. Now, Bluestone et al. (2015) report in a phase 1, dose-escalation study that ex vivo-expanded autologous polyclonal Treg therapy is safe and well tolerated in adult patients with recent-onset T1D. © 2016 Elsevier Inc.

Biological Sciences and Engineering

Cell Metabolism

Regulatory T cell immunotherapy for type 1 diabetes: A step closer to success?

The recent spread of community-acquired methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has brought increasing concerns of heightened disease severity and persistence following invasive disease. In line with the need for new treatment paradigms, two recent reports have shown that antibody-based therapies can restrict acute S. aureus infection and persistence and improve pathological symptoms. © 2016 Elsevier Inc.