книги / Обучение научному диалогу на английском языке

UNIT 4

NEW LOW-COST APPROACH DETECTS BUILDING DEFORMATIONS

WITH EXTREME PRECISION IN REAL TIME

Read the text and do the exercises after the text.

A new camera-based method for measuring building deformations can detect small displacements from 10 meters away. The method could be useful for continuously detecting fast deformations in high-rise buildings, bridges and other large structures with the aim of adapting these structures to external forces.

"Our new approach to detect building deformations could be used to continuously monitor movements. For bridges, the measured deformations could be used to counteract external loads such as a truck traversing the bridge, thereby increasing the lifetime of the bridge," said Flavio Guerra from the University of Stuttgart, a member of the research team. "Because it operates in real time, it could be used to set off an alert the moment any new deformations ‒ which can lead to cracks ‒ were detected."

Researchers led by Tobias Haist describe the new technique in The Optical Society (OSA) journal Applied Optics. The research was conducted as part of a project that aims to develop the technology necessary to create buildings that adapt to environmental conditions such as sunlight, air temperature, wind and earthquakes.

"One day we could have lightweight buildings that change forms in response to complex wind forces and can stay still during an earthquake," said Guerra. "This type of adaptation requires extremely precise building deformation measurement so that the building's current state is estimated and the direction in which it will likely move can be predicted."

A vision-based method

The new method involves fixing a camera on a tripod a small distance away from the front of the building and attaching small light emitters to the building. The camera then detects whether the light sources move relative to each other. A computer-generated hologram is used to create multiple copies of each light source image on the image sensor. Averaging the movement of the multiple copies of the laser spot helps decrease measurement errors, such as noise, yielding measurement uncertainties below a hundredth of a pixel. Using multiple cameras would improve that accuracy even more and enable the technique to be used on very large structures.

Although fiber optic sensors can be used for structural health monitoring, they must be installed when the building is built. The new camera-based system can be attached after construction and uses hardware that is less expensive than fiber optic systems.

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"The multi-point measurement approach we used is based on a relatively simple method developed for the control of coordinate measurement machines," said Guerra. "However, we applied the multi-point method for the first time on large objects outdoors under changing environmental conditions in real-time."

The researchers point out that most camera inspection systems illuminate the object ‒ a building in this case ‒ and then image it with a camera. They took a different approach by attaching light emitters to the building and directing the light directly toward the camera. This setup allows faster and more accurate measurements because the camera receives more light.

Monitoring an adaptive structure prototype

The researchers used their new method to monitor very small movements of an adaptive building prototype frame 9 meters tall. Their measurements matched well with vibrometer and strain gauge sensor data obtained for the prototype.

Next, the researchers plan to use the system to measure movement in real buildings. They also plan to make the software more robust and redundant so that it is reliable for continuous measurement 24 hours a day.

Exercise 1. Use the following words in different types of questions:

A camera-based method, building deformations, detect, displacements, continuously detecting fast deformations, high-rise buildings, external forces, approach, external loads, lifetime of the bridge, to set off an alert, adapt to environmental conditions, lightweight buildings, precise, be predicted, а vision-based method, attaching, light emitters, decrease measurement errors, measurement uncertainties, accuracy, fiber optic sensors, allow, strain gauge sensor data, robust, redundant, reliable.

For example,

What journal describes a new technique?

Why this method can be useful?

Exercise 2.Makeupdifferent typesofquestionsusingthefollowing clichés:

For example,

Could you describe what …?

Do you know that…?

Exercise 3. Agree with your partner using the words given in brackets.

For example, It is written that a new camera-based method could be useful … (building deformations, high-rise buildings, bridges, external forces).

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Exercise 4. Ask your partner questions to get the information on the point. Use speech patterns in your questions (see Appendix 1. Speech Patterns and Clichés for Discussion).

Exercise 5. Answer the questions of your partner expressing disagreement. Use the negative constructions and the words given in brackets:

I don’t agree with you … (building deformations), I disagree with you … (detect, displacements), I think you are wrong … (approach), I consider you are mistaken … (external loads) etc.

Exercise 6. Agree with your partner’s opinion; prove your point of view giving the arguments from the text.

For example,

Student 1: In the article it is said about a new camera-based method for measuring building deformations. This method could be useful for continuously detecting fast deformations in high-rise buildings, bridges and other large structures.

Student 2: You are quite right. The new approach to detect building deformations could be used to continuously monitor movements. For bridges, the measured deformations could be used to counteract external loads such as a truck traversing the bridge, thereby increasing the lifetime of the bridge.

Exercise 7. Disagree with the counterarguments of your partner.

For example,

Student 1: Researchers describing the new technique in The Optical Society journal Applied Optics, emphasized that the research was conducted as part of a project that aims to develop the technology necessary to build skyscrapers. to create buildings that adapt to environmental conditions such as sunlight, air temperature, wind and earthquakes.

Student 2: Sorry. I don't agree with you. The research was conducted to develop the technology necessary to create buildings that adapt to environmental conditions such as sunlight, air temperature, wind and earthquakes.

Exercise 8. Disagree with the statements of your partner, giving your vision of the problem using the provements from the text.

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Exercise 9. Discuss the problems using the word combinations and give the arguments and examples from the text:

lifetime of the bridge

adapt to environmental conditions

be predicted

а vision-based method

attaching light emitters

Exercise 10. Act out the dialogue following the sample:

A:I have read that a new camera-based method for measuring building deformations could be useful for continuously detecting fast deformations in highrise buildings, bridges and other large structures.

B:I fully agree with you. The new approach is aimed to detect building deformations. Besides, it could be used to continuously monitor movements.

A:As I'm concerned the measured deformations could be used to counteract external loads such as a truck traversing the bridge, thereby increasing the lifetime of the bridge.

B:Right you are! Because it operates in real time, it could be used to set off an alert the moment any new deformations.

Listen to your partner and give the assessment to the information using such phrases as: As I am concerned..., It is difficult to say, I would like to propose that...

Exercise 11. Discuss the given tips on the bases of the brief information on the problem given in the text:

decrease measurement errors

measurement uncertainties

accuracy

fiber optic sensors

robust, redundant, reliable

Use the following speech patterns (see Appendix 1. Speech Patterns and Clichés for Discussion).

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Exercise 12. Formulate the thesis on the problem about a method for measuring building deformations, act out the fragment of a discussion following the plan given below. Use speech patterns and clichés for discussion.

А – formulation of the thesis and arguments from the text to prove it (items 1–3 from the list of speech patterns and clichés for discussion).

В – expressing the agreement with the partner’s thesis (items 1–6). С – summarizing the information, conclusion (item 2).

Exercise 13. Study the information on the problem, collect the necessary facts to be ready to take part in the discussion following the plan given below:

А – formulating of the thesis and giving the quotation from the text to prove it (items 1–3 from the list of speech patterns and clichés for discussion).

В – expressing the partly agreement with the partner’s thesis and its explanation (items 7–10).

С – stating a self-critical position and expressing approval (agreement) (items 4–6).

Exercise 14. Search for the information necessary for your taking part in the part of the discussion “A New Camera-Based Method for Measuring Building Deformations”. Follow the roles (A, B, С, D) and the plan given bellow.

А – formulating of the thesis and conclusion (items 1–2 from the list of speech patterns and clichés for discussion).

В – expressing doubt in accuracy of the statement, giving your reasons (items 8, 3, 2).

С – stating a self-critical position (items 4)

D – formulating of an antithesis, giving your reasons (items 1, 3, 2).

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UNIT 5

NEW APPROACH TO SUSTAINABLE BUILDING

Read the text and do the exercises after the text.

A new building about to take shape in Boston's Roxbury area could, its designers hope, herald a new way of building residential structures in cities.

Designed by architects from MIT and the design and construction firm Placetailor, the five-story building's structure will be made from cross-laminated timber (CLT), which eliminates most of the greenhouse-gas emissions associated with standard building materials. It will be assembled on site mostly from factorybuilt subunits, and it will be so energy-efficient that its net carbon emissions will be essentially zero.

Most attempts to quantify a building's greenhouse gas contributions focus on the building's operations, especially its heating and cooling systems. But the materials used in a building's construction, especially steel and concrete, are also major sources of carbon emissions and need to be included in any realistic comparison of different types of construction.

Wood construction has tended to be limited to single-family houses or smaller apartment buildings with just a few units, narrowing the impact that it can have in urban areas. But recent developments ‒ involving the production of large-scale wood components, known as mass timber; the use of techniques such as crosslaminated timber; and changes in U.S. building codes ‒ now make it possible to extend wood's reach into much larger buildings, potentially up to 18 stories high.

Several recent buildings in Europe have been pushing these limits, and now a few larger wooden buildings are beginning to take shape in the U.S. as well. The new project in Boston will be one of the largest such residential buildings in the U.S. to date, as well as one of the most innovative, thanks to its construction methods.

Described as a Passive House Demonstration Project, the Boston building will consist of 14 residential units of various sizes, along with a ground-floor coworking space for the community. The building was designed by Generate Architecture and Technologies, a startup company out of MIT and Harvard University, headed by John Klein, in partnership with Placetailor, a design, development, and construction company that has specialized in building net-zero-energy and carbonneutral buildings for more than a decade in the Boston area.

Klein, who has been a principal investigator in MIT's Department of Architecture and now serves as CEO of Generate, says that large buildings made from mass timber and assembled using the kit-of-parts approach he and his colleagues have been developing have a number of potential advantages over conventionally built structures of similar dimensions. For starters, even when factoring in the energy used in felling,

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transporting, assembling, and finishing the structural lumber pieces, the total carbon emissions produced would be less than half that of a comparable building made with conventional steel or concrete. Klein, along with collaborators from engineering firm BuroHappold Engineering and ecological market development firm Olifant, will be presenting a detailed analysis of these lifecycle emissions comparisons later this year at the annual Passive and Low Energy Architecture (PLEA) conference in A Coruña, Spain, whose theme this year is"planning post-carbon cities."

For that study, Klein and his co-authors modeled nine different versions of an eight-story mass-timber building, along with one steel and one concrete version of the building, all with the same overall scale and specifications. Their analysis showed that materials for the steel-based building produced the most greenhouse emissions; the concrete version produced 8 percent less than that; and one version of the mass-timber building produced 53 percent less.

The first question people tend to ask about the idea of building tall structures out of wood is: What about fire? But Klein says this question has been thoroughly studied, and tests have shown that, in fact, a mass-timber building retains its structural strength longer than a comparable steel-framed building. That's because the large timber elements, typically a foot thick or more, are made by gluing together several layers of conventional dimensioned lumber. These will char on the outside when exposed to fire, but the charred layer actually provides good insulation and protects the wood for an extended period. Steel buildings, by contrast, can collapse suddenly when the temperature of the fire approaches steel's melting point and causes it to soften.

The kit-based approach that Generate and Placetailor have developed, which the team calls Model-C, means that in designing a new building, it's possible to use a series of preconfigured modules, assembled in different ways, to create a wide variety of structures of different sizes and for different uses, much like assembling a toy structure out of LEGO blocks. These subunits can be built in factories in a standardized process and then trucked to the site and bolted together. This process can reduce the impact of weather by keeping much of the fabrication process indoors in a controlled environment, while minimizing the construction time on site and thus reducing the construction's impact on the neighborhood.

"It's a way to rapidly deploy these kinds of projects through a standardized system," Klein says. "It's a way to build rapidly in cities, using an aesthetic that embraces offsite industrial construction."

Because the thick wood structural elements are naturally very good insulators, the Roxbury building's energy needs for heating and cooling are reduced compared to conventional construction, Klein says. They also produce very good acoustic insulation for its occupants. In addition, the building is designed to have solar panels on its roof, which will help to offset the building's energy use.

The team won a wood innovation grant in 2018 from the U.S. Forest Service, to develop a mass-timber based system for midscale housing developments.

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The new Boston building will be the first demonstration project for the system they developed.

"It's really a system, not a one-off prototype," Klein says. With the on-site assembly of factory-built modules, which includes fully assembled bathrooms with the plumbing in place, he says the basic structure of the building can be completed in only about one week per floor.

"We're all aware of the need for an immediate transition to a zero-carbon economy, and the building sector is a prime target," says Andres Bernal SM '13, Placetailor's director of architecture. "As a company that has delivered only zerocarbon buildings for over a decade, we're very excited to be working with CLT/mass timber as an option for scaling up our approach and sharing the kit-of- parts and lessons learned with the rest of the Boston community."

With U.S. building codes now allowing for mass timber buildings of up to 18 stories, Klein hopes that this building will mark the beginning of a new boom in wood-based or hybrid construction, which he says could help to provide a market for large-scale sustainable forestry, as well as for sustainable, net-zero energy housing.

"We see it as very competitive with concrete and steel for buildings of between eight and 12 stories," he says. Such buildings, he adds, are likely to have great appeal, especially to younger generations, because "sustainability is very important to them. This provides solutions for developers, that have a real market differentiation."

He adds that Boston has set a goal of building thousands of new units of housing, and also a goal of making the city carbon-neutral. "Here's a solution that does both," he says.

Exercise 1. Use the following words in different types of questions:

Residential structures, cross-laminated timber, to eliminate, the greenhousegas emissions, standard building materials, to assemble, subunits, energy-efficient carbon emissions, essentially, to attempt, to quantify, heating and cooling systems, realistic comparison, to tend, to be limited, impact, large-scale wood components, techniques, to extend, co-working space, net-zero-energy and carbon-neutral buildings, a principal investigator, the kit-of-parts approach, potential advantages, conventionally built structures, similar dimensions, collaborators, thoroughly, to char, preconfigured modules, to reduce the impact, good insulators, to aware of the need, a prime target, competitive, sustainability.

For example,

What are the pluses of cross-laminated timber (CLT)? What does it eliminate?

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Exercise 2.Makeupdifferent typesofquestionsusingthefollowing clichés:

For example,

Could you tell us what …?

Have you head that…?

Exercise 3. Agree with your partner using the words given in brackets.

Forexample,I have read that the new approach to sustainable building is efficient … (competitive, energy-efficient, tend to be limited, large-scale wood components).

Exercise 4. Ask your partner questions to get the information on the point. Use speech patterns in your questions (see Appendix 1. Speech Patterns and Clichés for Discussion).

Exercise 5. Answer the questions of your partner expressing disagreement. Use the negative constructions and the words given in brackets:

I don’t agree with you … (residential structures), I disagree with you … (the greenhouse-gas emissions), I think you are wrong … (standard building materials), I consider you are mistaken … (carbon emissions) etc.

Exercise 6. Agree with your partner’s opinion; prove your point of view giving the arguments from the text.

For example,

Student 1: Talking about a new building about to take shape in Boston's Roxbury area we could suppose it will herald a new way of building residential structures in cities. Designed by architects from MIT and the design and construction firm Placetailor, the five-story building's structure will be made from crosslaminated timber, which eliminates most of the greenhouse-gas emissions associated with standard building materials.

Student 2: I fully agree with you. And it will be so energy-efficient that its net carbon emissions will be essentially zero.

Exercise 7. Disagree with the counterarguments of your partner.

For example,

Student 1: A new building made from cross-laminated timber like most wood construction has tended to be limited to single-family houses or smaller apartment buildings.

Student 2: It is a mistake to think. Recent developments ‒ involving the production of large-scale wood components, known as mass timber; the use of techniques such

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as cross-laminated timber; and changes in U.S. building codes ‒ now make it possible to extend wood's reach into much larger buildings, potentially up to 18 stories high.

Exercise 8. Disagree with the statements of your partner, giving your vision of the problem using the provements from the text.

Exercise 9. Discuss the problems using the word combinations and give the arguments and examples from the text:

heating and cooling systems

a principal investigator

potential advantages

cross-laminated timber

the kit-of-parts approach

Exercise 10. Act out the dialogue following the sample:

A:The fact is that a principal investigator in MIT’s Department of Architecture and now serves as CEO of Generate says that large buildings made from mass timber and assembled using the kit-of-parts approach have a number of potential advantages over conventionally built structures of similar dimensions.

B:It seems to me that it could herald a new way of building residential structures in cities.

A:Right you are. As such structures eliminate most of the greenhouse-gas emissions associated with standard building materials.

B:Yes, also it could be assembled on site mostly from factory-built subunits, and it is so energy-efficient that its net carbon emissions will be essentially zero.

Listen to your partner and give the assessment to the information using such phrases as: As I am concerned..., It is difficult to say, I would like to propose that...

Exercise 11. Discuss the given tips on the bases of the brief information on the problem given in the text:

the use of techniques such as cross-laminated timber

net-zero-energy and carbon-neutral buildings

preconfigured modules

reduce the impact of weather

Use the following speech patterns (see Appendix 1. Speech Patterns and Clichés for Discussion).

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