Designing Method Research Articles

Advancing Donald Schön's Reflective Practitioner: Where to Next?

Abstract In 1983, Donald Schön published his seminal work, The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. The book emerged during the peak of the Design Methods movement, when works like L. Bruce Archer's Systematic Method for Designers and Herbert A. Simon's The Sciences of the Artificial argued for recognizing design processes as scientific inquiries. Coincidentally, Schön posited an alternative view to rationalizing design processes, called professional artistry, which is implicit professional knowledge. Using protocol studies in various disciplines, he demonstrated that professionals reflect-in-action while working and, as a result, learn and produce knowledge through doing (knowing-in-action). Since the 1980s, design theorists, researchers, and professionals have used Schön's work enthusiastically to articulate that designers learn more about their design process and design project as they design. Forty years after publication, The Reflective Practitioner continues to serve many design researchers as a foundation of learning from the experience of their design processes. However, this theory has limitations that must be recognized and addressed to stay relevant today. The Reflective Practitioner was written for individuals, whereas nowadays, designers often work in teams. The next step is to consider how individual reflections are shared and learned with other designers so that the team benefits from its collective reflective practices.

A Method to Identify Different Comb Gaps for MEMS Gyroscope at the Wafer Level Based on Negative Electrostatic Stiffness

For high-accurate micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) gyroscopes, comb gap errors influence the mechanical coupling errors and limit performance. In this study, an in situ method was proposed to identify the gaps of drive combs, drive-sense combs, and sense combs in MEMS gyroscopes that can be applied at the wafer level. Negative electrostatic stiffness of combs was considered in the model construction of the sense mode and the Y-axis in-phase mode, and the frequency change caused by this was applied to characterize the comb gaps. Eight chips in different positions of a wafer were selected for verification of this method. The results shows that errors of drive comb gaps, drive-sense comb gaps, and sense comb gaps in the chip near the wafer center were 0.67 μm, 0.60 μm, and 0.53 μm, respectively, and those in the chip at the wafer edge were 0.96 μm, 0.95 μm, and 0.71 μm, respectively. The variation of comb gaps was 0.08 μm in a single chip near the wafer center, and 0.03 μm in a single chip at the wafer edge. This work provides a method for the fabless designers to explore the effect of wafer process on the structures and reduce it through careful design.

Design Aesthetics Methods: Chinese Graduate Students Using Laundry Bags in the UK as an Example

Proficiency in the application of design research methods is a basic competency that student researchers need to master. During the learning phase, experienced researchers demonstrate various design research methods for student designers to understand and practice. At present, there are a large number of literatures and books that introduce the definition of different design research methods and give relevant practical examples. Moreover, student researchers still have confusion about the process of the research method in the early design, and lack a complete understanding of design research thinking and processes. This article will take the topic of sustainable laundry as an example, based on the core research theme of the impact of the use of laundry bags on environmental sustainability by Chinese graduate students studying in the UK in their daily lives, and demonstrate the complete design research ideas and process from 6 modules. This design form emphasizes authenticity, interactivity, and humanization. In terms of authenticity, experiential design strives to create a scenario as realistic as possible, constructed with as real questions and materials as possible, to maximize the satisfaction of users' real needs. In terms of interactivity, experiential design adheres to the standard of users' spiritual enjoyment and physical pleasure, strengthening interaction with users. In terms of humanization, experiential design focuses more on the fun of furniture products, emphasizes meeting the deep spiritual and cultural needs of users, and endows furniture products with more functional value in a form that is more in line with the human body structure, thus integrating with users.

Emission impacts of left-turn lane on light-heavy-duty mixed traffic in signalized intersections: Optimization and empirical analysis

Reducing emissions from the transport sector is one of the crucial countermeasures for climate action. This study focuses on the optimization and emission analysis regarding the impacts of left-turn lanes on the emissions of mixed traffic flow (CO, HC, and NOx) with both heavy-duty vehicles (HDV) and light-duty vehicles (LDV) at urban intersections, combining high-resolution field emission data and simulation tools. Based on high-precision field emission data collected by Portable OBEAS-3000, this study first develops instantaneous emission models for HDV and LDV under various operating conditions. Then, a tailored model is formulated to determine the optimal left-lane length for mixed traffic. Afterward, we empirically validate the model and analyze the effect of the left-turn lane (before and after optimization) on the emissions at the intersections using the established emission models and VISSIM simulations. The proposed method can reduce CO, HC, and NOx emissions crossing intersections by around 30% compared to the original scenario. The proposed method significantly reduces average traffic delays after optimization by 16.67% (North), 21.09% (South), 14.61% (West), and 2.68% (East) in different entrance directions. The maximum queue lengths decrease by 79.42%, 39.09%, and 37.02% in different directions. Even though HDVs account for only a minor traffic volume, they contribute the most to CO, HC, and NOx emissions at the intersection. The optimality of the proposed method is validated through an enumeration process. Overall, the method provides useful guidance and design methods for traffic designers to alleviate traffic congestion and emissions at urban intersections by strengthening left-turn lanes and improving traffic efficiency.

Technologies That Replace a “Central Planner”

Contracting possibilities are endogenous to the technologies on which the negotiation and the trading environments are built. Here we review how different technologies allow different implementations of the “central planner” and gradually abstract this centralized role away into the technological environment. We emphasize that the “central planner” construct should no longer remain an abstract invocation in the literature and that it already is concretely deployed to implement optimized solutions to bilateral and multiagent mechanism design problems. We hope to provide methods for economic, business, and policy designers to leverage the right technological tools for the different problems they are facing.

Optimal designs for a non-linear model for the pharmacokinetics of ethanol elimination in the human body

The equation most commonly used to estimate a person’s blood alcohol concentration after consuming alcoholic drinks assumes zero-order kinetics in the ethanol elimination phase. This implies that the elimination process occurs in the body at a uniform rate as a function of the ethyl-oxidation constant. The model, formulated by Widmark, does not consider the phase of increase in concentration, and approximates the phase of elimination in a linear way, which may be insufficient if the tests are carried out in the first phases of alcohol intake. In this paper, a non-linear model that fits the different phases of the pharmacokinetic process of ethanol in the human body (absorption, distribution, metabolism, and elimination) is proposed. Optimal experimental designs methods are used in order to find the most informative observation times for the estimation of the parameters of the model.

Determining the mix design method for normal strength concrete using machine learning

There exist many empirical data-based methods that facilitate the process of concrete mix design. The output of mix design methods are the proportions of concrete constituents that when mixed together produce hardened concrete, taking into account the required strength, workability and durability requirements. Based only on the proportions of the mix, it can be challenging to determine the designing method. Therefore, in this work, computer-generated data was used to train a simple machine learning model to determine the method by which a normal strength concrete mix was designed. The developed machine leaning model only requires knowledge of the mix’s proportions, i.e., the amounts of cement, water, sand, and gravel to accurately determine the method by which the mix was designed. It was found that a simple machine learning model (decision tree) was able to determine the mix design method with high accuracy. Moreover, via principal components analyses, and other similar techniques, it was found that amount of cement is the best predictor of the mix design method. Findings of this work provide a method for determining mix design methods and promote the use of machine learning in the field of civil engineering.

Image Compression Techniques on-Board Small Satellites

Raw satellite images are considered high in resolution, especially multispectral images captured by remote sensing satellites. Hence, choosing the suitable compression technique for such images should be carefully considered, especially on-board small satellites, due to the limited resources. This paper presents an overview and classification of the major and state-of-the-art compression techniques utilized in most space missions launched during the last few decades, such as the Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) and the Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT)-based compression techniques. The pros and cons of the onboard compression methods are presented, giving their specifications and showing the differences among them to provide unified information about these methods for researchers and satellite imaging payload designers. Hence, some of these techniques are implemented, and comparisons are presented in the current work as examples to simulate an image compression system on board a small satellite using the MATLAB software package. This was achieved by employing three LANDSAT8, band6 satellite images. A wavelet selection was also considered for the DWT-based compression method, which gave the best results among the other methods through acquiring high values of compression ratio (CR) while maintaining the important scientific information of the image when reconstructed at the ground station.

Boundary Crossing in Student-Teacher-Scientist-Partnerships: Designer Considerations and Methods to Integrate Citizen Science with School Science

Boundary Crossing in Student-Teacher-Scientist-Partnerships: Designer Considerations and Methods to Integrate Citizen Science with School Science

Assembly precision design for parallel robotic mechanism based on uncertain hybrid tolerance allocation

PurposeThe coupling impact of hybrid uncertain errors on the machine precision is complex, as a result of which the designing method with multiple independent error sources under uncertainties remains a challenge. For the purpose of precision improvement, this paper focuses on the robot design and aims to present an assembly precision design method based on uncertain hybrid tolerance allocation (UHTA), to improve the positioning precision of the mechanized robot, as well as realize high precision positioning within the workspace.Design/methodology/approachThe fundamentals of the parallel mechanism are introduced first to implement concept design of a 3-R(4S) &3-SS parallel robot. The kinematic modeling of the robot is carried out, and the performance indexes of the robot are calculated via Jacobian matrix, on the basis of which, the 3D spatial overall workspace can be quantified and visualized, under the constraints of limited rod, to avoid the singular position. The error of the robot is described, and a probabilistic error model is hereby developed to classify the hybrid error sensitivity of each independent uncertain error source by Monte Carlo stochastic method. Most innovatively, a methodology called UHTA is proposed to optimize the robot precision, and the tolerance allocation approach is conducted to reduce the overall error amplitude and improve the robotized positioning precision, on the premise of not increasing assembly cost.FindingsThe proposed approach is validated by digital simulation of medical puncture robot. The experiment highlights the mathematical findings that the horizontal plane positioning error of the parallel robotic mechanism can be effectively reduced after using UHTA, and the average precision can be improved by up to 39.54%.Originality/valueThe originality lies in UHTA-based precision design method for parallel robots. The proposed method has widely expanding application scenarios in industrial robots, biomedical robots and other assembly automation fields.

Analytical Fractional-Order PID Controller Design With Bode’s Ideal Cutoff Filter for PMSM Speed Servo System

In this article, a speed control scheme based on an analytically designed fractional-order PID with Bode’s ideal cutoff (FOPID-BICO) filter is proposed. The FOPID controller is designed to track the speed references and the BICO suppress is applied to filter the high-frequency noise. Considering the difficulty of parameters tuning of the FOPID controller, a comprehensive analytical design method based on frequency specifications-defined loop-shaping for the FOPID-BICO controller is first proposed for the permanent magnet synchronous motor speed control. The designed speed servo system satisfies five frequency-domain specifications: gain crossover frequency, phase margin, phase crossover frequency, gain margin, and a “flat phase” constraint. Moreover, the influence of phase crossover frequency on control system is fully exposed through the frequency-domain analysis. The proposed designed method ensures that the control system is robust to loop gain variations and guarantees the optimal performance on rejecting noise in high-frequency and disturbance in low-frequency. The effectiveness of the proposed FOPID-BICO controller has been verified by experimental results.

Informing Streetscape Design with Citizen Perceptions of Safety and Place: An Immersive Virtual Environment E-Participation Method.

As our cities grow, it is important to develop policies and streetscape designs that provide pedestrians with safe comfortable walking conditions and acknowledge the challenges involved in making urban places feel liveable and safe while understanding the critical role of streets around busy destinations. To understand these challenges at a nuanced, human level, new methods of citizen engagement are needed. This paper outlines the development and application of a new citizen perception collection method, using immersive virtual environments (IVE), coupled with an interactive emoji affective activation-pleasure grid and digital slider elements, embedded within an online e-participation survey to quantify, and rank the impact of individual (single-variable) urban design elements and safe system treatments on pedestrians' perceptions of safety and place. The results demonstrate the effectiveness of this method for providing detailed, interrogable, scalable citizen perception data of a variety of urban street design elements and safe system treatments, which allows a statistical analysis of responses and prioritization of the most effective pedestrian-oriented interventions for maintaining or enhancing street vibrancy and liveability. Our IVE e-participation approach is an important contribution to forming a better understanding of streetscapes and provides a valuable method for urban designers and transport planners to prioritise different streetscape place and safety approaches.

Impact of vertical ground motion on the statistical analysis of seismic demand for frictional isolated bridge in near-fault regions

Friction isolation bearings are widely used in engineering structures, which exhibit good seismic isolation effects. Peak displacement of friction isolation bearing is crucial to measure the damage degree of frictional isolated bridge, and excessive displacement of the bearing may lead to serious earthquake damage such as beam-falling. However, the studies conducted for the impact of vertical ground motion on the peak displacement of friction isolation bearings were usually deterministic research, and the probabilistic research is insufficient. Therefore, the statistical method is used to explore the probabilistic distribution of the displacement error which is caused by neglecting the vertical ground motions. The error follows Gaussian distribution, and the relationship between the Gaussian function and the intensity of horizontal and vertical ground motions are quantitatively investigated. The results show that the mean value of the error is approximately equal to zero while the standard deviation is increased significantly with the intensity of the ground motions, which indicates that the vertical ground motion has little impact on the mean of the seismic demand, but strongly influences the dispersion. Finally, to facilitate the seismic design, different quantiles of Gaussian function are defined as the increment coefficient. A set of empirical formulas to predict the value of the increment coefficient are proposed, which provide a convenient method for designers and ensure the safety of bridge structures.

Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning Design for Commercial Complex Buildings: Theory and Method Based on Inverse Problem

Scientific and technological progress and innovation help the design industry, which plays an important role in sustainable development. It willimprove the operation efficiency of enterprises and explore a blue sea forenterprise. In essence, design should be the process of deriving the optimalscheme from different schemes or imaginary scenes. Based on this, thispaper proposes an overall optimization method for Heating, Ventilation andAir Conditioning (HVAC) design. Compared with the traditional designmethod, under certain constraints, it can obtain the optimal design schemethat maximizes the value of the designed product. This study provides newinverse problem ideas and methods for HVAC designers, and providessolutions for enhancing the value of HVAC design products.

Urban flooding response to rainstorm scenarios under different return period types

• A new urban rainstorm pattern design method. • Realization of design value of characteristic rainstorm elements in multivariate environment. • The effects of various return period definitions on urban flooding results. Urban flooding research cannot be overemphasized due to its environmental, economic and societal concern. Research on the response of urban flooding under different rainstorm scenarios would be conducive to the design of drainage projects, and helps the government department to master the waterlogging process in advance. Thus, this paper introduces a new rainstorm pattern designing method using Copula theory, Most-Likely design realization method and Monte Carlo simulation based on the rainfall data in a Chinese megacity, Zhengzhou. Furthermore, a coupled one-dimensional and two-dimensional hydrodynamic model, MIKE FLOOD, was used to determine the urban flooding response to various rainstorm scenarios. The results show that more than 75 percent of waterlogging disasters in Zhengzhou city were caused by short duration rainstorms within 3 hours, and the one-hour single-peak rainstorm process plays a main role. The rainstorm volume (RV) under Kendall return period type decreased significantly compared with the radical “Or” return period. And the RV under survival Kendall return period type was improved compared to the conservative “And” return period. Moreover, the rainstorm scenario corresponding to “Or” return period brought about the most serious waterlogging disaster, with the peak inundation volume of 1.8 × 10 5 m³ and the maximum water depth of 1.86 m.

State‐tracking iterative learning control in frequency domain design for improved intersample behavior

AbstractIterative learning control (ILC) yields perfect output‐tracking performance at sampling instances for systems that perform repetitive tasks. The aim of this article is to develop a framework for a state‐tracking ILC that mitigates oscillatory intersample behavior, which is often encountered in output tracking ILC. As a framework for the analysis, the stability of the iterative domain including the robustness filter and the asymptotic signal is formulated. In addition, as a framework for the design, the design method using frequency response data to reduce the modeling effort, the learning filter design based on inversion, and the specific design procedure of the robustness filter are presented. The designed method is successfully applied to a motion system and it is shown that the presented state‐tracking ILC provides better intersample behavior than the standard output‐tracking ILC.

TESTING DESIGNER METHODS RELEVANCE IN THE 21ST CENTURY TEACHING IN MOROCCAN SECONDARY EDUCATION

The current study investigates the relevance and viability of five teaching methods in the 21st-century teaching context. They are usually referred to as ‘Designer Methods’, and those are Suggestopedia, The Silent Way, Community Language Learning, Total Physical Response, and The Natural Approach. These methods are relics from the recent past that witnessed the proliferation of different teaching approaches and methods. They have left a plethora of practices that promised, according to advocators, impressive results. The goal here is not to resurrect them but to show that maybe they have never been put to rest. The current study is therefore intended to find out whether these practices are still in use in English language classrooms and, once confirmed, to measure the frequency of their use. After conducting a survey questionnaire that targeted high school teachers of English language in the city of Marrakesh in Morocco, the relevance and viability of these methods through their inherent practices, based on the collected data, proved undeniable. The study has shown that teachers still use some teaching techniques that originate from these five methods.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0452/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

Incremental Innovation: Long-Term Impetus for Design Business Creativity

In business, innovation thinking is expanding beyond product innovation, and it is being marketed as a catalyst for unique user experiences, businesses, and organizational and cultural change. Product design and design-driven business operations require an innovative mindset. In this study, we examined how progressive innovation thinking can be applied to three aspects using a combination of case studies: idea genesis, process, and decision making. We also examined thinking studies from relevant companies to investigate how to create user-pleasing experiences and details in products and to develop a framework for progressive innovation thinking strategies and implementation methods for designers. Our findings will help designers and corporate design teams find a steady flow direction in the execution of their design business, capture the first moments of brilliance and replicate ideas, generate a constant stream of creative ideas, maintain a constant flow of innovation in their design business, and enhance the overall business capability of the design team. This framework has academic and business ramifications: it can provide guidance and ideas to other design teams looking to execute their design business and act as a reference for adopting progressive, original thinking work and creative businesses.

The Bellows Designing Method of Divided Working Conditions for Launch Vehicle

The working environment of the pipeline system of the launch vehicle is very complex. Bellows in piping system should endure high temperature, corrosive medium, vibration and other conditions, which require for high reliability. However, due to the restrictions of fixed location, weight reduce requirement, the number and location of bellows are strictly required. There is a great difference for the bellows design method between the launch vehicle and the ground pipeline. In this paper, a bellows designing method for launch vehicle is introduced in detail. The method calculates the compensation amount of bellows under divided working conditions, and checks the fatigue damage coefficient as the main failure judgement basis. It has been proved by practice that the designing method of divided working conditions can solve the design problems of the bellows of launch vehicles effectively.

Meta-Optics-Empowered Switchable Integrated Mode Converter Based on the Adjoint Method.

Monolithic integrated mode converters with high integration are essential to photonic integrated circuits (PICs), and they are widely used in next-generation optical communications and complex quantum systems. It is expected that PICs will become more miniaturized, multifunctional, and intelligent with the development of micro/nano-technology. The increase in design space makes it difficult to realize high-performance device design based on traditional parameter sweeping or heuristic design, especially in the optimal design of reconfigurable PIC devices. Combining the mode coupling theory and adjoint calculation method, we proposed a design method for a switchable mode converter. The device could realize the transmission of TE0 mode and the conversion from TE0 to TE1 mode with a footprint of 0.9 × 7.5 μm2 based on the phase change materials (PCMs). We also found that the mode purity could reach 78.2% in both states at the working wavelength of 1.55 μm. The designed method will provide a new impetus for programmable photonic integrated devices and find broad application prospects in communication, optical neural networks, and sensing.