Drones: Advanced Mapping and Scanning Capacities for

More Accurate Visualizations

Civil engineering is ripe with applications for unmanned aerial vehicles, which can aid in
scanning and mapping work sites as well as capturing photos and videos for promotional
purposes. UAVs often represent a cost-saving measure for businesses that need aerial mapping,
as a drone doesn't require a pilot, but rather, a programmer. UAVs are also easy to program to fly
multiple times around the same worksite, which means in the future, firms will be able to capture
a variety of images and videos while the project is being completed and that will enable firms
to better manage project progress.
The list of materials that can be produced by 3-D printing has grown to include not just plastics
but also metal, glass, and even food. Now, MIT researchers are expanding the list further, with
the design of a system that can 3-D print the basic structure of an entire building.

Structures built with this system could be produced faster and less expensively than traditional
construction methods allow, the researchers say. A building could also be completely customized
to the needs of a particular site and the desires of its maker. Even the internal structure could be
modified in new ways; different materials could be incorporated as the process goes along, and
material density could be varied to provide optimum combinations of strength, insulation, or
other properties.

Ultimately, the researchers say, this approach could enable the design and construction of new
kinds of buildings that would not be feasible with traditional building methods.

The robotic system is described this week in the journal Science Robotics, in a paper by Steven
Keating PhD '16, a mechanical engineering graduate and former research affiliate in the
Mediated Matter group at the MIT Media Lab; Julian Leland and Levi Cai, both research
assistants in the Mediated Matter group; and Neri Oxman, group director and associate professor
of media arts and sciences.
The system consists of a tracked vehicle that carries a large, industrial robotic arm, which has a
smaller, precision-motion robotic arm at its end. This highly controllable arm can then be used to
direct any conventional (or unconventional) construction nozzle, such as those used for pouring
concrete or spraying insulation material, as well as additional digital fabrication end effectors,
such as a milling head.

Unlike typical 3-D printing systems, most of which use some kind of an enclosed, fixed structure
to support their nozzles and are limited to building objects that can fit within their overall
enclosure, this free-moving system can construct an object of any size. As a proof of concept, the
researchers used a prototype to build the basic structure of the walls of a 50-foot-diameter, 12-
foot-high dome -- a project that was completed in less than 14 hours of "printing" time.
A recipe for concrete that can withstand road salt deterioration

Recycled materials used to make a better concrete mix

Date:

May 18, 2017

Source:

Drexel University

Summary:

Engineers have known for some time that calcium chloride salt, commonly used as deicer, reacts
with the calcium hydroxide in concrete to form a chemical byproduct that causes roadways to
crumble. A civil engineer is working on a new recipe for concrete, using cast-off products from
furnaces, that can hold its own against the forces of chemical erosion.

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In the lab of Drexel University assistant professor Yaghoob Farnam, researchers are using recycled
materials, like slag, silica fume and fly ash to make concrete that can withstand the chemical
deterioration caused by concrete's reaction with road salt.

Credit: Drexel University

Road salt, used in copious helpings each winter to protect them from ice and preserve safe
driving conditions, is slowly degrading the concrete they're made of. Engineers have known for
some time that calcium chloride salt, commonly used as deicer, reacts with the calcium
hydroxide in concrete to form a chemical byproduct that causes roadways to crumble. A civil
engineer from Drexel University is working on a new recipe for concrete, using cast-off products
from furnaces, that can hold its own against the forces of chemical erosion.

More than 900,000 tons of deicing salt is used each winter in Pennsylvania alone. While winters
in the Northeast put pressure on departments of transportation to keep roads clear and deicer is
an effective part of that process, it also contributes to the thousands of miles of roads that need to
be patched and repaired each year.

Yaghoob Farnam, PhD, an assistant professor in Drexel's College of Engineering and director of
the Advanced and Sustainable Infrastructure Materials Research Group, is looking for a solution
to this problem in the recipe for concrete. Farnam created a method for using fly ash, slag and
silica fume -- leftovers from coal furnaces and the smelting process -- in a new concrete mix that
is more durable because it doesn't react with road salt. He recently published his findings in the
journal of Cement and Concrete Composites.
"Many departments of transportation have reduced the amount of calcium chloride they use to
melt ice and snow, even though it is very efficient at doing so -- because it has also been found to
be very destructive," Farnam said. "This research proves that by using alternate cementitious
materials to make concrete, they can avoid the destructive chemical reaction and continue to use
calcium chloride."

The goal of Farnam's work is to pro