Biweekly magazine of the Eindhoven University of TechnologyFor news: www.cursor.tue.nl and follow tuecursor on Twitter and Facebook

2September 20, 2012 | year 55

University news10This is not an exit5New internationalstudent association

2

4 | Going out in the lab

2 | For Starters September 20, 2012

ColophonEditor in chief

Han Konings

Executive editor Brigit Span

Editorial staff Judith van Gaal

Tom Jeltes | ScienceFrits van Otterdijk

Norbine SchalijMonique van de Ven

Staff Nicole TesterinkGerard VerhoogtEnith Vlooswijk

Photography Rien Meulman

Bart van Overbeeke

CoverBioArt Laboratories

TranslationAnnemarie van Limpt (pages 2,3,5)

Benjamin Ruijsenaars (page 4)

LayoutNatasha Franc

Editorial boardprof.dr. Cees Midden

prof.dr. Hans NiemantsverdrietAngela Stevens- van Gennip

Thomas ReijnaertsArold Roestenburg

Anneliese Vermeulen-Adolfs

Address editorial officeTU/e, Laplace 0.40

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Flexible

Diederik Samsom was nid-nodding during Queen Beatrix’ speech. Seeing that shot on TV last Tuesday I was reminded of the quarterly University Council meetings in which the Executive Board updates all members on our financial situation.Being the loyal press representative that I am, I’d never doze off, but the fiscal part of those meetings is never the most exhilarating element of the afternoon. With the help of a bulky document Executive Board member Jo van Ham occasionally elucidates certain issues, and the one thing that always strikes me at that first meeting in September: we had not run out of money by the end of June!

Halfway through the year, we still had 2.7 million to spare. However, the Executive Board always warns university that the second half of the year comes with more spending, so we’re not as well-off as we might think. In other words: don’t come knocking for more money!

Sustainable. Green. Environmentally-friendly. Words that used to signify progress, forethought and responsi-bility. Words that, today, years after their first introduction, have become little more than labels used to make products attractive to the market, dodge the inquisitive public eye, or used haphazardly to pass laws and gain supporters. They are becoming this generation’s superlatives and neon colors. It is said that if a word is repeated over and over it ends up losing its meaning, which in this case is very true indeed. It may come across as a rather bleak look into the future of “going green”, but it’s nothing but a minor speed bump.After all, we can take back those words. Their meaning can be restored, amplified even. If companies can’t simply slap an ISO label on their products or services, why shouldn’t these words that convey such a strong message of self-conscience and respect be regulated as well? Granted, there is an ISO standard for sustainable practices, but since it is neither

strongly encouraged nor enforced worldwide, it falls on deaf ears at worst and strikes a chord with the progressive at best.If, say, governments and NGOs were to go after said labels with the ferocity with which Apple goes after every company whose products feature rounded corners, for example, perhaps the market would treat these words with the care they not only deserve, but require. After all, didn’t prefixing an ‘i’ to all Apple’s gadgets work wonders, too?

Emilio Maldonado, student in M.Sc. Automotive Technology from Monterrey, Mexico

In the name of real sustainability

Another thing stated in the document that caught my eye, and was pointed out specifically, is the fact the total number of FTEs has been dropping steadily for the past two years – it may even be considered a trend. Whereas by the end of 2010 we still had 2,950 FTE, by June of this year we could only account for 2,800. The next paragraph reads university did hire more staff through Euflex, our own employment agency. Is that another trend, then: hiring more people on a flexible contract, rather than offering permanent positions? Is this the future for academic staff?

Our Rewwwind feature provides you with snippets of last week’s news. What happened online after the previous Cursor magazine was published?

September 19, 2012 - They’ll be registe-ring at the Chamber of Commere next week, but then Eindhoven will have an international student association. Jacky Janes (24), Thomas Milde (22), Angeliki Sioliou (26) and Rajiv Hemani (25) are the association’s brand new board members. They want to organize events for all kinds of nationalities, and help

out international students and doctoral candidates where needed. Want to get in touch? Visit www.facebook.com/Tue.Common.Room or send an e-mail to commonroom@tue.nl.

September 13, 2012 - With the help of the Bavaria brewery in Lieshout, close to fifty Eindhoven students of Built Environment have managed to win back the beer crate bridge-building record. With an initial construction of 17.30 meters, which was later extended to 19.55 meters, the old record of TU Delft (15 meters) was crushed.

TU/e students found international student association World record beer crate bridge back in Eindhoven

www.cursor.tue.nlRewwwind

Clmn

Jacky Janes. Photo | Bart van Overbeeke

Student of Industrial Design Jackie Janes (24) will be the new chairwoman of the international student association that will be started officially next week. She’s lived in Germany most of her life, but lived in a number of other countries as well. She and fellow German Thomas Milde (22), Angeliki Sioliou (26) from Greece and Rajiv Hemani (25) from India will form the board.

Why this organization? “The Common Room (the area in the Bunker where international students meet, ed.) is currently run by volunteers mostly, and we wanted to realize a more structured organization. As a board

we’re in a stronger position as well as a body for students to turn to. We plan to organize even more events and let students know we’re here to answer their questions.”

What’s your personal motive for setting up this association? “I came to the Netherlands in August of last year and felt quite lost at first. Only much later did I find out about the Common Room, but I wish I’d known about its existence sooner. It’s important to me that other students and doctoral candidates become more involved, and I’d like to be the one to promote the opportunities for them to do so.”

Looking at the aspect of internatio­nalization, do you feel TU/e is on the right track, or far from it? “My own program is very international. I feel STU has a keen eye for the needs of international faculty. What I’d like to see is for people to get to known other nationalities as well, rather than just stick to their own people. Mixing is good, you can learn a lot from each other.” (JvG)

Want to get in touch? Visit www.facebook.com/Tue.Common. Room or send an e-mail to commonroom@tue.nl.

Jacky Janes: “I want international students to become more involved”

The people behind the news

Han Konings, editor in chief Cursor

For Starters | 3See for more news www.cursor.tue.nl

Vox Academici

Can wind supply the whole world with energy?

Prof.dr. Gerard van Bussel, professor of Wind Energy, Department of mechanical Engineering

Prof.dr. Gerard van Bussel. Photo | Guus Schoonwille

This week, US researchers presented a model from which they concluded we can produce no less than 250 terawatts of wind energy before reaching the so-called ‘saturation point’. From that point onwards it’s no use building any extra wind turbines. By way of illustration: the worldwide energy consumption is currently 15 terawatts, so wind turbines could easily generate that much. However, it looks like the Dutch provinces, Noord-Holland especially, are planning to obstruct any potential plans by threatening to introduce a ban on new windmills. The reason: ‘large, modern windmills don’t fit in with our landscape’. Now should we all switch to wind energy or not?

“No one ever said wind energy wouldn’t be able to meet our energy demands”, says prof.dr. Gerard van Bussel, professor of Wind Energy at TU Delft. In light of the 3TU Master’s program Sustainable Energy Technology he’s also connected to TU/e as a guest professor. “Wubbo Ockels always says there won’t be an energy crisis if we actually use the energy available to us, and I couldn’t agree more. The sun generates such an enormous amount of energy – solar as well as wind – it could fulfill our needs for ages. In my lectures I often refer to a previous study conducted by the same group of Americans. They prove that if wind turbines were placed in all realistic

areas on earth, so excluding areas like jungles, permafrost and cities, those could generate eight times the energy the world needs. The study was heavily criticized because it didn’t look at the potential influence major wind turbine parks could have on the lower layers of the atmosphere. They could be possibly ‘exhausted’, as a result of which there would be less wind. The current study shows these lower layers are ‘replenished’ by the top layers, so there will remain more than enough wind energy to go around. Having said that, it does require building those turbines first.”

“And the greatest dilemma lies in society’s acceptance of wind energy. Countries like Denmark and Germany are working hard to intensify the use of wind energy, because the social resistance has been minimal. In fact, many wind turbine parks were built with the help of citizens’ initiatives. To understand this difference in attitude, I think we have to go back to the seventies. In Denmark and Germany, public utilities encouraged private initiatives, whereas Dutch public utilities were very much against private

cooperative initiatives. Instead of realizing we had to continue in a different direction, we said renewable energy sources would disrupt the entire grid as well as the supply guarantee. We’ve never been able to shake that negativity: 75 percent of the current news on wind energy is off-putting. It’s a trend that needs to change quickly, because wind energy is cheap, the price is fixed for the next twenty years, and it’s reliable at that.”

“We can keep saying wind turbines are ruining ‘our’ landscape, but we’d be talking about ‘our’ landscape of last millennium. We’ve entered a new millennium and there’s a new landscape to go with it, including modern infrastructure and local, sustainable energy supply. The Netherlands could easily generate 25 percent of their annual electricity consumption through wind energy. For now, all we can do is wait for a government that dares to innovate and is willing to warm citizens to the idea. Until then, I’ll just keep screaming from the top of my lungs: wind energy has the future!” (NT)

“Wind energy has the future”

Photo | Rien Meulman

The opening stunt heralding

the 11th luster year of study

association Japie (ST) was a

laser game for students and

staff.

243 unique players signed

up, who were divided into 13

groups that were unleashed

into a darkened De Hal for 12

minutes and 40 seconds.

For the occasion, De Hal was

equipped with 70 meters of

construction fence, 200

meters of tinfoil, and 75

fluorescent rods.

In total, 95,732 shots

were fired. The best shooter

scored 5,425 points, the

worst scored -550.

87.5% of the participants

were students. (TJ)

Hotfooting it in De Hal

4 | Zoom in September 20, 2012

Going out in the lab

The roots of the event lie in Amsterdam, where the Discovery Festival has been a household word for the past six years, drawing some fifteen hundred interested visitors on average. The organization was eager to expand, without detracting from the intimate feel of the event. Hence it made sense it would spread its wings to some other cities. This year, on the same night as in Amsterdam, there will for the first time be Discovery Festivals in Eindhoven and Rotterdam, too; although Nijmegen and Groningen were also interested, they could not arrange the organization and funding for the festival in time to link up this year, as Marieke Kruithof, who helped set up the Eindhoven version, informs us.

The Discovery Festival in Eindhoven is organized by STRP – its full name is ‘STRP meets… Discovery Festival’- in close cooperation with TU/e and its Studium Generale office (SG). Each of the three cities will have their own themes on September 28, which also happens to be the European Research-ers Night: ‘Do-It-Yourself’ is the stepping stone for the Amsterdam program, while ‘2012 and beyond’ is the central feature in Rotterdam. ‘Smart Science’ will be the thread for the night in the Eindhoven Klokgebouw, where all kinds of smart technologies and designs can be seen and visitors can discover what and who are behind them. According to Kruithof it

makes absolute sense that there should now be an Eindhoven version of the Discovery Festival as well: “Eindhoven is a city where many new things are taking place and where there’s a lot happening at the interface of art and science”.

What really makes the Discovery Festival totally different from other initiatives on the interface of art and science, the program maker finds, is “that visitors can here experience experiments themselves, and can even be part of them”. By way of example she mentions

experiments to be conducted by Gert-Jan van Heijst (Applied Physics), Mark de Graaf and Berry Eggen (both from Industrial Design) in the Klokgebouw in the area of swarm dynamics, whereby it is investigated how groups of people move in a certain environment and situation. Moreover, she adds: “At this festival you can talk to scientists, much in the way in which you start talking to someone in a café. ‘What does the research involve? ‘Why are you doing this research?’ ‘I

don’t get it.’ It is not a conference, but a real night out along with music and a beer – but full of substance and meaning”.

Apart from various experiments that may be seen and experienced by festivalgoers, there are ‘Microtalks’: short presentations about ‘unusual subjects’ by artists and scientists. Speakers from TU/e are Carlo van de Weijer (about smart cars), Kees van Overveld (about visual language), Masi Mohammadi (domotics), Gerrit Kroesen (about the possibilities of plasmas in medicine), Remco van de Hofstad (about probability and statistics and influencing via social media) and Roos van Berkel (film presentation about the dancing humanoid robot TUlip).

Most experiments can be seen and experienced until around midnight, while the festival continues into the early hours, until five a.m. to be precise. In addition to the experiments and presentations there will be music by the Eindhoven Broke Crew, singer, producer and DJ BrEaCh and DJs Rustie and Martyn, among others. Meanwhile you can order your drink at the bar, which, thanks to a home-designed light installation of study association Lucid (Industrial Design), reacts to your presence.

“Night out with music and beer as well as substance”

Discovery Festival | Monique van de Ven

The rush of discovering new things. In the view of the organizers that is the essence of the Discovery Festival: a night full of exciting experiments, performances and works of art,

a first for Eindhoven on September 28 and bearing a prominent TU/e stamp.

Photo | Bas Haring

An exciting first during the Discovery Festival, Kruithof thinks, is ‘Composing Life’. Artist Jalila Essaïdi from BioArt Laboratories will try -in collaboration with TU/e professor Carlijn Bouten- to find out whether you can compose life by means of music. Does music affect the way in which cell tissue develops? For this purpose, music by DJ Jameszoo will be converted into pulsing laser beams that are let loose on a Petri dish containing cells. The experiments will be carried out at BioArt Laboratories; TU/e’s main contribution will be in the form of knowledge and cells, says Bouten about her share.

During the Discovery Festival the Tesla Coil from the TU/e Department of Electrical Engineering will also give a few demonstrations, for instance during the opening of the event at 20.30 hours. A few lucky visitors (winners of a contest) can ‘take up arms’ with the musical lightning installation, just like presenter Rob van Hattum of the National Science Quiz did on TV last December.

TU/e professor Gerrit Kroesen will demonstrate the healing effect of plasmas in the Klokgebouw. “I’ll be showing exotic gas discharges: a

collection of antique glass tubes with fantastic plasma phenomena in them, which are not only beautiful to behold, but will also serve to explain a few things about physics. In addition, I’ll be giving demonstrations with plasmas for wound healing whereby people will be shown something and can hold a plasma on their skin themselves.” Kroesen is looking forward to the festival: “Trying to arouse the interest of the general public in physics has always been one of my passions”.

Also, the Nanosupermarket will open its doors in the Klokgebouw on September 28. This mobile super-market of the future (disguised as a converted milk float) will sell ‘speculative products’ that could creep into our lives thanks to nanotechnology. Two things that may be seen are a ‘nanostick’ that enables you to Photoshop your own face and a paint of which you can still adjust the color once it has been applied. Creative director of the Nanosupermarket is Koert van Mensvoort, researcher and lecturer at Industrial Design.

At STRP meets Discovery Festival visitors can participate as part of the ‘swarm’ in three TU/e experiments in

this area. Thus, you can experience how a sudden, instantaneous traffic jam arises and how ‘adaptive cruise control’ works, how ‘Mexican waves’ that are formed in the bleachers during sports matches behave and how self-organization works. The experiments are the outcome of collaboration between the Applied Physics and Industrial Design Departments.

Two TU/e students of Industrial Design can demonstrate prototypes of their designs during the Discovery Festival. “They have both made awesome designs, which are quite advanced and with which visitors can experiment themselves”, as Kruithof explains why these two were selected. Rhys Duindam developed a new version of a very familiar toy: the board containing thin metal pins in which you can leave an impression of your hand or your face, for instance. However, Duindam’s ‘Tingle’ has turned into a musical instrument; by playing with the ‘Tingle’ you produce sound. ID fellow student Thomas van Lankveld will also be showing a special musical instrument. His ‘Kasmin’ is a wooden instrument with one electronic string, which holds far more musical potential than its minimalist appearance might lead us to suspect.

TU/e stuff at Discovery Festival

‘Composing Life’. BioArt Laboratories.

Roos van Berkel dancing with TUlip.

Win two free tickets!

Cursor can please one student or staff member of TU/e with a set of two

free tickets for the Discovery Festival. Send us a mail (cursor@tue.nl) stating

‘prijsvraag Discovery’. Submissions are possible up to and including Monday

September 24; the winner will be informed as soon as possible.

Research | 5See for more news www.cursor.tue.nl

This is not an exit

You’re nervous and running late for an interview. Or worse: the fire alarm is sounding and this time it’s not a drill. Because of the smoke it’s hard to read the signs pointing to the nearest fire exit. You haven’t been to this office very often and haven’t been able to familiarize yourself with its floor plan. While passing through hallways and opening doors, you’re relying on your intuition mostly: take the first door on your right, then that wide corridor on the other side of the room, and then it’s hoping the architect thought to connect the offices in a way that makes sense.Well, very often they didn’t, says Qunli Chen. “Architects want to create a building with a unique identity, often at the expense of logic. They forget people expect a certain structure: a door usually opens up to an enclosed office space, but a hallway tends to lead somewhere.”As an example, Chen mentions Vertigo, the buildings he’s been frequenting the past four years. “Stepping out of the elevator, you see two identical doors - one to your left, one to your right. There’s no floor plan in sight and there’s no way of knowing the door on the right leads to the department’s reception; that can only be deduced from the signs, which you only notice upon closer inspection. However, looking straight ahead you do see the toilets and the staircase. It’s pretty weird to me, to be honest.”

The consequences of being late to an interview, let alone those of a fire, can be bad enough in their own right. You’d think some basic knowledge about people’s expectations of the layout of a building is important, then. Still, Chen found out that in the past, people have been researching signposting mostly: where should signs be located, what size should they be and what color works best? “The architectural structure of a building is often considered a given, although studies show rushed people have trouble locating these signposts and are guided by architectural pointers just as well.”

It was a reason for Chen to set up a number of meticulous experiments to test whether people’s navigational behavior in (relatively) unknown buildings can be captured in fixed patterns. Do they often go for the first door on the right, or rather opt for the widest hallway they see? “We were looking for results that have nothing to do with cultural background. Reactions to certain colors can be highly culturally-dependant, for example. Mailboxes in the Netherlands are orange, but in China, they’re blue. Orange will have a positive connotation for many Dutch people, but not for Chinese, who will feel that way about red and gold. For that reason I decided to create simulations using grey tones, distinguishing between light and dark only.”The doctoral candidate of Built Environment designed a fictitious office building with eighteen connected rooms. Each room has two or three doors or hallways leading to another room. Subjects were asked to navigate through the office building like it was some sort of computer game. Goal of the experiments was to predict, given a certain configuration, the possibility a subject would choose a certain exit. Architects should take that information into account in their designing process.The Chinese doctoral candidate used different angles, distances and width as well as variations in background contrast for the various exits from each room, and analyzed the effects these variations had on the subjects’ decisions. Subjects were given assignments such as: you’re on your way to an interview and are looking for the room you need to be. You’re running late, so you have to make quick decisions.Being pressed for time is important: although Chen doesn’t deny the benefit of fire drills in the Netherlands, he does have an issue with them. “Last year I participated in a fire drill myself, but everyone was extremely relaxed. If pressured, people make other decisions, so drills like that are not representative.”In another experiment, each subject was allowed to repeat the exercise three times. “That’s enough to get an idea of the building, but not enough to create a mental map of the way all areas are connected. There’s still a high level of intuition involved.” Still, subjects were much faster at reaching their destination

the second and third time around. “One thing that should always be taken into account is that people tend to notice things that are within forty degrees of their line of vision.” Another thing that clearly shows from the experiments is that women are more likely to opt for lighter and wider hallways. “Although some female subjects were a bit more adventurous and chose darker corridors”, Chen laughs.One of the subjects had served in the army and always chose the first door he saw. Apparently he didn’t want to

stay in open spaces. The experiments showed the exit right in front of a subject is generally the most popular.

Another common strategy was to pick the first door on the right (or left) every time, which is a good way to find your way out of a maze.

He hasn’t visited the new MetaForum yet, Chen says upon hearing undersigned hasn’t exactly familiarized himself with the building yet. “From what you’re telling me I gather the building relies heavily on its signposting. And if those signs are not up yet, that’s a problem. And another thing: signs always seem to be put up in dark corners. Paying attention to details like that professionally never ceases to amaze.” (TJ)

In some buildings it’s easier to find your way than in others, and that’s not just a matter of following signs. The architectural

structure of a building -how hallways and doors connect spaces- plays an important part in this, especially in stressful situations. Next week, Qunli Chen from China will receive his

doctorate degree at Design Systems of the Department of Built Environment for his dissertation on the subject.

People make other choices when under pressure

Uniqueness often at the expense of logic

Qunli Chen in MetaForum. Photo | Bart van Overbeeke