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The IET SG Young Professional Committees 2015/16 had dinner with Winnie Lee, the IET Community Relationship Manager on last Friday The IET SG Main Committees 2015/16 had dinner with Winnie Lee, the IET Community Relationship Manager on last Thursday
Don Brown, IET Connect Representative on Coventry and Warwickshire Committee has been a full member of the IEE/IET since 1974 and before that a student member. In addition to being a Trustee of IET Connect (the Benevolent Fund of the IET), he is the Chairman of the Local Representative Assembly (LRA). However, alongside volunteering for the IET, Don also gives up his valuable time to volunteer for the RNIB. Here is his story: Many years ago Don saw an advert in a technical magazine. It was asking for volunteers to help maintain Talking Book machines for the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB). The machines were massive 8-track tape players that used tapes that had recordings by well-known people reading from popular books. The reliability was not that great and volunteers were…
Functional Safety Made Easy Ron Pierce sits on the Executive Committee of the IET Functional Safety TPN and sits on the IET Health and Safety Policy Panel Ron introduced us to the definitions of a Hazard, Accident and Risk. The differences between a safety risk and a financial risk for example. The design processes associated with identifying passive and active controls to mitigate the safety risks. We then delved into Hazard Identification, the basic sources of hazard and requirement to control the hazards. He provided an example of a falling hammer (Hazard), the accident trigger (Person underneath falling hammer) and emphasised the importance of focusing on the entire system. We finished off the hazards discussion by exploring the different methods used to identify hazards (e.g. Check lists…
An interesting & stimulating workshop on Business Ethics on Tuesday 15th. Hopefully Michael Wilcockson will agree to hold a 'part 2' next year ... This is part of our Local:SKILLS portfolio; a chance to enhance your skills, network with fellow engineers ... and you get CPD points as well.
The ISA and the ISA working group provide information on independent safety assurance and promote and assist the role of the independent safety assessor. The working group meets up to 4 times a year. Its work includes organising seminars and producing guidance on the topic of ISA work. The panel is affiliated to the IET, the BCS and the Safety & Reliability Society. The ISA Working Group is made up of representatives from many parts of the safety critical industry. What is ISA? Independent safety assessment is the formation of a judgement, separate and independent from any system design, development or operational personnel, that the safety requirements for the system are appropriate and adequate for the planned application and that the system satisfies those safety requirements. A person who…
Did you miss last year’s #futureofmed event? Our Techbite and presentations are available. Do not miss this years’ “The future of medicine - the role of doctors in 2025” event – Register for your place today. ******Call for Abstracts****** Open to: All professionals working in the healthcare and related fields with younger members of the community particularly encouraged to submit their work. Calling for abstracts for authors wishing to present their work in poster form. For further details: www.rsm.ac.uk/events/teg04 Submission deadline: 29 March 2016 Event date: 19 May 2016 To keep up with our latest news, v isit our website www.theiet.org . Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn . Register for the #futureofmed
The IET and leading innovation and knowledge centre, SynbiCITE have teamed up to organise a free IET / SynbiCITE workshop on Engineering Biology. Find out how synthetic biology is quickly evolving and accelerating towards amazing new frontiers in the field of life sciences and the potential applications extending broadly to span a range of sectors: Manufacturing Many companies work with synthetic biology (engineered biology) to create novel materials for the flavours and fragrances and fine chemicals industry, agriculture, nutrition and personal care industries. Many of these are routes to solvent-free reactions that are faster, more efficient and environmentally friendly routes compared with current industrial chemical processes. Healthcare The possibilities for using synthetic biology to…
Recently it was my four year anniversary at the IET and it made me reflect on one of my favourite aspects of working here - getting to learn about exciting developments around engineering and technology that are yet to hit the mainstream news but will inevitably affect me and my family in the future. The IET benefits from having around 100 Local Networks around the world, run by volunteers, that aim to inform and inspire non-engineers to perhaps take an interest or potentially choose it as a future career. One area that I feel IET Local Networks excel in is highlighting future challenges for society and looking at the engineering and technology solutions to solve them. Or to put it another way they are looking at how engineering and technology will effect real people’s lives in the future.…
STEM Scotland 2016 is a unique opportunity to explore the current STEM education landscape and discuss how best to address the current challenges . By bringing together a variety of stakeholders from primary and secondary education, industry, and local and national government, this event will allow delegates to explore the latest education developments, share knowledge and expertise, and champion best practice. One of the Scotland Policy Panel and IET Scotland committee members, Paul McKenna, was a Panellist at this event. Paul holds a Master’s degree from Strathclyde University in Communications, Control & Digital Signal Processing and a BSc. with Hons. in Physics from the University of Glasgow. He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a Member of the Institute of Learning & Teaching…
The Scotland South East Local Network are looking for a volunteer to join the committee as their online community administrator . The role involves maintaining the community pages on the Engineering Communities platform, ensuring that all the core information is kept up-to-date This involved using the IET custom tools to add events to the calendar page, create online registration pages, update the highlights section of the community page, add committee list to a blog at the start of each session, and keep the page as up to date as possible to attract interested people. Training will be provided and more information can be found here . If you are interested in this role, please contact Lynsay Callaghan (lcallaghan@theiet.org).
Hear from four cyber security engineers who talk about their experience of publishing their work with IET Engineering & Technology Reference and the benefits they have gained personally and professionally. Interested in writing an article? Send your ideas to ETR@theiet.org
The main events for the Cambridge 2016 Science Festival were held over the weekend of 19 and 20 March. The IET Cambridge Network mounted a stand in the Guildhall and were overwhelmed by children and parents keen to learn about Engineering and play with the exhibits on show. As always, build a torch was well received and this year this activity was complemented by an opportunity to power a train using a hand wind generator, and a Pepper's Ghost display. Thoroughly exhausting for the stand members but a great opportunity to showcase Engineering to future gnerations.
A core engineering group within Shell in Trinidad & Tobago (formerly BG Trinidad & Tobago) has eagerly continued their drive to become internationally professional registered engineers and as the LN in Trinidad, we were pleased to lend our assistance. The main theme of the seminar, on Monday 14th March, was the use of the IET's Career Manager in its application in the registration process as well as recording and monitoring CPDs. The eight engineers present ranged from persons within their EIT programme to those with 20 years experience, highlighting the importance of this development to all. After a brief introduction into the LN, Gerald Mendes, one of the local IPRAs provided an important overview of the registration process in which one can attain CEng, IEng, CMgr and other registraion…
Germany Network members living in or near Munich might be interested in the MFI's regular monthly Stammtisch . Here is Athol's e-mail with the details of the next meeting: Dear MFI-Stammtischers, The next MFI-Stammtisch will take place on Friday 1st April at 19:00. [This is not an April Fools joke since in my cultural area April Fools day finishes at noon, i.e. half a day, which I guess is part of the fooling!] NB: changed location! The location this time will be: Unions Bräu Einsteinstr. 42, 81675 München [U-Bahn station: Max-Weber-Platz, exit: "Einsteinstrasse". Use the platform exit at the east end, i.e. farthest from the Hauptbahnhof. If you get it right you will get to street level immediately in front of the Unions Bräu.] And the reservation is under the name "Faraday". We will…
Dr Carol Marsh, Electronics Design Process Manager, Finmeccanica Airbourne & Space Systems Division has won the FDM Everywoman Inspirational Award. Carol is also the Chair of the IET Scotland South East Local Network where her role is to lead and guide the leadership team, ensuring all activities are appropriate and aligned to the IET strategy. The 2016 FDM everywoman in Technology Awards ceremony and dinner took place on 23 February 2016 at the London Hilton on Park Lane and were preceded by the everywoman Technology Forum - the largest UK forum for women in technology, a day of inspiration, learning and development, bringing together over 600 women who are aspiring to advance their careers or become future leaders. The awards were launched to uncover the women doing amazing things in technology…
IET/ACostE Project Controls Network Presentation to Association of Cost Engineers, South West Region The presentation was given at the offices of the Atkins Group in Almondsbury, Bristol and attendees heard from Alec Ray on the subject of Project Disasters. This included: • The impact of Project Disasters • A facilitated discussion to understand the cause of failures that lead to Project Disasters • A presentation on the reasons why Project Disasters occur • An overview of how to achieve success and avoid Project Disasters For further information contact Alec Ray
Thanks to QinetiQ at Farnborough we recently had an opportunity to go along and film some short videos to showcase on our community channel. The Human Centrifuge video shows what happens to a human body at 9Gs. There are only 20 of these human centrifuges in the world and the one at Farnborough has been operating for 60 year now. The Thruster video showcases the four flight thrusters that QinetiQ are developing for the Mercury mission. Our Exo Mars Rover video shows how they test the equipment in their clean room environment The Satellite Systems & Applications Network would like to record their thanks to all the staff at QinetiQ who made it possible for us to collect this excellent content. I really like the human centrifuge video and I wonder if the question on most people’s minds…
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship, worth £3,000 per year, has been made possible as a result of a generous donation by an IET member of more than 50 years, Graham Tubbs and his wife, Kathleen. The IET Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship winner will receive a scholarship of £3,000 per year for the duration of the course, up to a maximum of £9,000 for BEng students and £12,000 for MEng students. The winner will also receive free student membership of the IET for the duration of their course. All applicants for the IET Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship must be about to commence studying on an IET accredited undergraduate degree programme at Cardiff University. A list of the eligible programmes can be found here and include the…
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship, worth £3,000 per year, has been made possible as a result of a generous donation by an IET member of more than 50 years, Graham Tubbs and his wife, Kathleen. The IET Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship winner will receive a scholarship of £3,000 per year for the duration of the course, up to a maximum of £9,000 for BEng students and £12,000 for MEng students. The winner will also receive free student membership of the IET for the duration of their course. All applicants for the IET Tubbs Family Blaenau Gwent Scholarship must be about to commence studying on an IET accredited undergraduate degree programme at Cardiff University. A list of the eligible programmes can be found here and include the…
The IET Tribology Network committee met on Tuesday 15th March in the IET headquarters at Savoy Place, London. It was our first meeting at this venue for a few years due to the refurbishment project. We took the chance to work off the generous lunch with a tour of the building kindly led by our Community Manager, Rob Allen. The consensus was clear: we were all very impressed with the renovated facility. The building seemed to be heavily in use, with a number of events running and capacity for more, and it looks likely to generate a good revenue stream to support the activities of the institution. We took the opportunity to inspect the view from the roof terrace and line up for a photo. From left to right: Dr Saurav Goel (Queens University Belfast), Dr Rich Baker (PCS Instruments), Dr Nathalie…
Today, the 16th March 2016, the Wales North LN held the annual PATW competition at Bangor University. The competitors were from Bangor and Glyndwr Universities, all presented interesting topics, we heard about uses of graphene in sensors for liquid and gas, how to detect moisture in sealed phials and the setting up of a company to produce SMART watches that would integrate with the electronics in a vehicle. The winner was Paul Anfray from Glyndwr who presented about the SMART watches. Well done to all our competitors and many thanks to our judges and staff from Bangor University who provide excellent facilities in the School of Electronic Engineering.
I was honoured recently to represent the IET Tribology Network at the reception hosted by HRH The Duke of Edinburgh at Buckingham Palace in recognition of the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of the Jost Report : the event that publicly launched the new discipline of Tribology on 9th March 1966. The reception followed on from the technical seminar at the IMechE headquarters, which our Community Manager Rob Allen reported on , and at which Rob and I represented the IET Tribology Network together with fellow committee member Rich Baker. That event combined a rich technical overview given by leaders in the field, and a moving acknowledgement to the team of committee members and civil servants who created it - most notably with eloquent contributions by Professor Jost and Professor Dowson…
Women Engineers in the Great War and After 23 April 2016 Public event at the Director’s Suite, Science Museum, London Women’s professional participation in UK engineering began in earnest during the First World War and The Women’s Engineering Society was set up in 1919 to sustain this initiative during peacetime. Through sharing knowledge of how these women worked together, we hope to raise awareness of their crucial role during wartime. This free event will include lunch, open discussions, and an opportunity to plan for events to mark the Women’s Engineering Society centenary in 2019. It will also highlight historical resources available in the archives of the Institution of Engineering & Technology and other collections. This event is sponsored by the University of Kent Gateways to…
A review by Prof. Lik-Kwan Shark on the Vision & Imaging Float Glass Inspection in the 21 Century talk. Can you imagine a life without perfect glass? I know I can’t, and that is why I attended a special event on “Float Glass Inspection in the 21 Century”, so as to find out what the glass manufacturing industry does to deliver flawless glass for my car, house, touch screen, … , just to name a few of my indispensable possessions. The event was held at the University of Central Lancashire, Preston on 2nd March 2016, and organised by the IET Vision and Imaging Technical and Professional Network. With Simon Aldred as the speaker who is from a world leading glass manufacturer (NSG, formerly Pilkington), and who has a lifelong interest and industrial expertise in light and glass, the talk was highly…
