On Wednesday 9 May, the Faculty of Engineering & the Built Environment held its’ Annual Awards evening to acknowledge, not only the top academic students, but also the students who have shown a strong commitment to social responsiveness. This year the guest speaker was Mokena Makeka, a UCT alumnus from the School of Architecture, Planning and Geomatics.

Vertical studio is an annual event which sees students of UCT’s School of Architecture; participate in a week long team building exercise. Each year a specific focus area is defined, and this year it was “Towards 2014”. The idea was to produce a series of works which would begin to reimagine spaces within the city looking towards 2014 World Design Capital.

Two UCT students have been awarded Google Anita Borg Memorial Scholarships for 2012. Joyce Mwangama, a doctoral candidate in electrical engineering, and Maletsabisa Molapo, a master's student in computer science, were named among the 70 students from universities in Africa, Canada, the Middle East and the US to win the scholarships. Read more...

To say that UCT’s Erik de Ridder has the world at his feet would hardly be an exaggeration. After a tough international – and open – selection process, the final-year engineering student has been appointed as the secretary-general of a simulated chamber of the United Nations (UN) that will participate in the 2012 G8/G20 Youth Summits in Washington DC in June. Read more...

The UCT chapter of Engineers Without Borders (EWB) submitted a paper to the Domestic Use of Energy Conference held at Cape Peninsula Univeristy of Technology in Cape Town from 2 to 4 April. The paper was titled "The Township Caterer’s Project : experiences from the student chapter of Engineers without Borders.”

Dr Denis Kalumba from the Department of Civil Engineering hosted the 2012 Jennings Memorial Lecture where Professor John Burland presented a paper on “Interaction between Geotechnical and Structural Engineers.” John Burland is an Emeritus Professor and Senior Research Investigator at Imperial College London. He is a Fellow of both the UK Royal Academy of Engineering and the Royal Society of London and was appointed Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 2005.

A state-of-the art Gleeble 3800 has been installed in the Centre for Materials Engineering thanks to a NRF special equipment award. The Gleeble 3800, worth R10 million is a fully integrated digital closed-loop control thermal and mechanical testing system which is able to very closely simulate actual industrial metal processes including hot rolling, forging and extrusion.

A first-of-its-kind convention dedicated to synthesis gas conversion - one of the key industrial technologies underpinning the South African economy - took place in Cape Town this April. The event was hosted by c*change, the Department of Science and Technology and the National Research Foundation's Centre of Excellence in Catalysis at UCT, in association with Sasol, PetroSA and other sponsors. Read more...

‘Zero Harm’ is the approach the Faculty of Engineering & the Built Environment has towards safety, health and the environment. With this in mind, the Association of Built Environment Students (ABES), the student society within the department of Construction Economics and Management, secured support from a number of industry partners for protective equipment for the first-year construction students.