Faculty of Technology, Design & Environment

Since the early 1990s, Social Innovation (SI) has developed as a field of research, with advancements being applied to management, entrepreneurship and policy-making. In exploring SI processes, we realise that aspects of them have much in common with the architectural design process, but there is little awareness of these processes in architectural practice or in architectural schools. One of the weaknesses of architects as a result of their training is a lack of skills and tools to manage effectively the social aspects of their projects. Architectural education typically focuses on the final product as a built form or a spatial design. This essay analyses the potential role of SI in user-centred architectural projects through a case study of the workshop 'From Territory to Detail', which was realised in rural Colombia. The workshop was aligned with Live Project's educational model, which emphasises the importance of the social aspects of a project. The aim of the essay is to identify theories and models which will be of mutual benefit to architecture and SI, and to suggest a way forward for SI processes to be incorporated within architectural schools.

Latin America (LA) can count some strong research centers with a tradition of research excellence in certain disciplines such as medicine and biology, nuclear technology,  metallurgy and materials, among others. Latin American countries have generated networks of researchers across disciplines, centers, etc. within a country, and linking two or more countries in the region (e.g., Argentina-Brazil Bi-National Center for Nanoscience & Nanotechnology, CABN). Additionally, collaborations have extended beyond LA, mainly to the EU and the USA. In general, these programs have been quite successful in the generation of interdisciplinary nanoscience and nanotechnology (N & N) research. The relation between academia and industry has been improving in the last few years, but it is still weak. In particular, funding incentives for N&N efforts have encouraged joint efforts and contributed to new dimensions in collaborations. This chapter reviews the state of nanoscience and nanotechnology in Chile, Brazil, Argentina and Mexico.

Spray forming with co-injection of a solid particulate phase to form a homogeneous distribution within the final spray formed billet has been studied as a new route to manufacturing metal–metal composites at large scale with negligible oxide. 12wt%Ti particles were co-injected into an atomised Al alloy droplet spray and co-deposited to form a ∼300kg billet at Peak Werkstoff GmbH, Germany.

We report a study of the structure-processing-property relationships in a high strength Al 93 Fe 3 Cr 2 Ti 2 nano-quasicrystalline alloy and composites containing 10 and 20 vol% ductilising pure Al fibres. The superimposed contributions of several different strengthening mechanisms have been modelled analytically using data obtained from systematic characterisation of the monolithic alloy bar. An observed yield strength of 544 MPa has been substantiated from a combination of solid solution strengthening, work hardening, precipitation hardening and Hall-Petch grain size dependent effects. These materials have been shown by other authors in previous published work to be highly sensitive to the size distribution of particles in the powder from which they are made, and the subsequent thermomechanical processing conditions. The processing condition employed in this study provided micron-sized grains with a strong [111] preferential orientation along the extrusion direction and a bimodal size distribution of the icosahedral nano-quasicrystalline precipitates. Both were deemed to be a significant contributor to the high yield strength observed. The addition of pure Al fibres was found to decrease the yield strength linearly with increasing Al content, and to augment the ductility of the composites.