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This is archived information on the CES EduPack 2009 release. For information on the CES EduPack 2010 release, see here »

2009 Archive—What’s New?

This year's release of CES EduPack owes much to the active community of CES EduPack users. The Eco Audit Tool is a great example of this collaborative approach. It was released last year. Many of you used it, liked it, and provided useful feedback, which has been used to create an improved version. Other enhancements include new information on durability, new selection tools, charting and presentation improvements, and updated lecture notes.

CES EduPack 2009:

Supports and enhances existing teaching—updated teaching materials and new easier-to-use software features make it easier than ever to integrate EduPack into your teaching
Facilitates introductory materials courses—new charting and selection features make it even simpler to illustrate key materials concepts, the Eco Audit Tool is great for introducing eco design ideas, while new data helps to teach durability and corrosion
Provides a powerful tool for advanced teaching and research—enhanced selection tools and new data at Level 3 are particularly valuable for advanced project work and research (Note, for research, see also Granta's industrial products: GRANTA MI for materials information management and CES Selector for rational selection)

CES EduPack 2009 Highlights

Enhanced Eco Audit Tool

This new tool for introducing eco design concepts was released last year and has since been widely applied. The new version includes many enhancements based on user feedback, improving its practicality and value:

'End of life' is now considered in the audit, giving a more complete picture of the product lifecycle
New data for electronic subassemblies makes it much easier to perform audits for products containing electronics
A series of minor changes enhance usability—for example, making it simple to localize the CO₂ footprint calculations based on the electricity mix of different countries

Durability information

Durability information has been significantly enhanced at level 2 of the EduPack Materials and Processes Database (the level designed for intermediate-level students). Information is now provided on performance in 55 different environments.

This helps to introduce students to durability and corrosion—issues of special importance in product design, manufacturing, civil, chemical, marine, and mechanical engineering, and in materials science.

A white paper describing this information is available in the Information Pack »

Example of durability data

New guidance charts during selection

A new software feature improves the interactivity of the materials selection process. When setting constraints on a materials property during selection you can now view a 'guidance chart' that provides a quick visual indication of the range of possible values. This is particularly valuable to new students, helping them to gain confidence and to get a better feel for materials property space.

Create custom subsets

You can quickly and easily specify a custom subset of materials from the database for use during a selection project. The subset can be defined and changed interactively during selection, greatly aiding the process of narrowing down material or processing options.

Subsets can also be saved and then re-loaded and applied to a project. This makes it simple to quickly create charts displaying only the materials covered in your course, and to set up specific student exercises or lecture demonstrations.

Selecting a custom subset

Charting improvements

Presentation enhancements on materials charts include the ability to customize the color of materials or groups of materials and to interactively click and on a 'family envelope' to create and edit a label for that family.

These features help to make the EduPack property charts even more informative. These charts can be cut-and-pasted directly to reports and presentations. The new capabilities help teachers to identify and present key features of materials space.

Supporting textbooks

The CES EduPack information resources include references to leading materials texts. At the end of each Science Note is a 'Further Reading' section providing references relating to the property being discussed. References to Introduction to Materials Science for Engineers by Shackelford have now been included.

A new book by Professor Mike Ashby, Materials and the Environment: Eco-Informed Material Choice, is a response to increasing eco-concerns. It introduces methods for thinking about and designing with materials when one of the objectives is to minimize environmental impact. The text includes exercises using CES EduPack and works alongside EduPack to create a powerful integrated teaching resource for sustainable engineering.

Updated PowerPoint lecture

Updated versions of 15 PowerPoint lectures, authored by Professor Mike Ashby are available for download from the CES EduPack Teaching Resources site. These include a new lecture on Bio Engineering, building on last year's release of the Bio Materials database. Use these slide sets, or parts of them, to enhance or support your own lectures.

See the complete list of lectures »

New and updated level 3 data

The advanced property data at level 3 of the Materials and Process Database has been updated and extended in areas including:

Enhanced data on energy and CO₂ footprint
New data on transparent plastics and elastomers

In addition, new versions of a number of the databases available with specialist EduPack Editions have been released. These include CAMPUS and MMPDS-03.

Miscellaneous

Other new features include:

The Architecture & the Built Environment Edition has been enhanced with additional eco properties and access to the Eco Audit Tool
Design notes have now been added to all level 3 attributes to help project students and reduce common selection mistakes
The Eco Design Edition now includes materials from the Architecture Edition offering increased consistency for those using EduPack as a campus-wide resource, particularly in faculties focused on architecture and the built environment

Data in the architecture edition has been improved (image shows a section of the State Center, MIT—architect Frank O. Gehry)

Past versions: See what was new in: CES EduPack 2008 | 2007 | 2006

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