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In recent years, using aberration-corrected transmission electron microscopy, the authors have achieved precisely detecting the structural evolution of passive film as well as its interface zone at atomic scale. The purpose of this paper aims to make a brief review to show the authors’ new understanding and perspective on the issue of critical factors determining stability of passive film of Fe-Cr alloy.

The introduction of single crystal enabled the authors to obtain a distinct metal/passive film interface and better characterize the structure of the interface region. The authors use aberration-corrected TEM to conduct cross-sectional observation and directly capture the details across the entire film at a high spatial and energy resolution.

Apart from the passive film itself, the interface zone, including metal/film (Me/F) interface and the adjacent metal side, is also the site which is attacked. Accordingly, the nature of the interface zone, such as microstructure, composition and atomic configuration, is one of the critical factors determining the stability of passive film.

Deciphering the critical factors determining the stability of passive film is of great significance and has been a fundamental issue in corrosion science. Great attention has been paid to the nature of the passive film itself. In contrast, the possible role of the interface between the passive film and the metal is rarely taken into account. Based on the advanced analytical tool with high spatial resolution, the authors have specified the significant role of interface structures on the macro-scale stability of passive film.

This book aimed to conceptualise a construction workforce management model suitable for effectively managing workers in construction organisations. To this end, this chapter presents the conceptualised model, which consists of seven workforce management practices with their respective measurement variables. Drawing from existing theories, models, and practices, the chapter concludes that a construction organisation that will attain its strategic objectives in the current fourth industrial revolution era must be willing to promote effective recruitment and selection, compensation and benefits, performance management and appraisal, employee involvement and empowerment, training and development, as well as improving workers emotional intelligence and handling external environment pressure. These practices can promote proactiveness, participation, and improved skills and can lead to effective commitment, better quality, and flexibility within the organisation.

Apprenticeships for higher education institutes (HEIs) at degree and postgraduate levels in the UK have been challenging to provide, requiring increasingly complex collaboration and investment. This questions longer-term viability, creating a new perspective investigating evidence of value and impact for UK HEIs. This integrative literature review examines existing apprenticeship literature and showcases new knowledge for HEIs to update and inform future decision-making. Knowledge created offers a new framework, an “apprenticeship knowledge-based checklist model” and a perspective to explore further.

This integrative literature review examines apprenticeship provision viability for UK HEIs across several disciplines since commencement.

Analysis of selected studies across three research themes critiques potential apprenticeship practice for HEIs: stakeholder collaboration, widening participation and work-integrated learning. Results provided a new integrated perspective via governance levels: strategic, academic department, and teaching team.

The research draws from multiple disciplines representing current literature in the HEI Apprenticeships field. However, the context in which programmes are delivered by HEIs and employers differs significantly, so factors continue to emerge.

Practical implications drawn from these findings aim to cultivate dialogue before embarking/withdrawing from HEI Apprenticeship programmes. It offers employers guidance expectations when partnering with university providers. For global apprenticeship provisions, it offers a checklist for re-valuating practice.

The research identified new knowledge implications from existing literature in a field experiencing rapid growth. It offers valuable contributions: a knowledge-based checklist model constructed for HEIs to evaluate existing and future viability provisions at each governance level. It is a catalyst for new practice approaches and an agenda for further research.

The purpose of this study is to assess the influence of Al and Ag addition on thermal, mechanical and shape memory properties of Cu-Al-Ag alloy.

The material is synthesized in a controlled atmosphere to minimize the reaction of alloying elements with the atmosphere. Cast samples were homogenized, then subjected to hot rolling and further betatized, followed by step quenching. Eight samples were chosen for study among which first four samples varied in Al content, and the next set of four samples varied in Ag composition.

The testing yielded a result that the increase in binary alloying element decreased transformation temperature range but increased entropy and elastic energy values. It also improved the shape memory effect and mechanical properties (UTS and hardness). An increase in ternary alloying element increased transformation temperature range, entropy and elastic energy values. The shape memory effect and mechanical properties are enhanced by the increase in ternary alloying element. The study revealed that compositional variation of Al should be limited to a range of 8 to 14 Wt.% and Ag from 2 to 8 Wt.%. Microstructural and diffraction studies identified the ß’1 martensite as a desirable phase for enhancing shape memory properties.

Numerous studies have been made in exploring the transformation temperature and phase formation for similar Cu-Al-Ag shape memory alloys, but their influence on shape memory effect was not extensively studied. In the present work, the influence of Al and Ag content on shape memory characteristics is carried out to increase the design choice for engineering applications of shape memory alloy. These materials exhibit mechanical and shape memory properties within operating ranges similar to other copper-based shape memory alloys.

This study aims to investigate the potential of the decorated boron nitride nanocage (BNNc) with transition metals for capturing carbon monoxide (CO) as a toxic gas in the air.

BNNc was modeled in the presence of doping atoms of titanium (Ti), vanadium (V), chromium (Cr), cobalt (Co), copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) which can increase the gas sensing ability of BNNc. In this research, the calculations have been accomplished by CAM–B3LYP–D3/EPR–3, LANL2DZ level of theory. The trapping of CO molecules by (Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn)–BNNc has been successfully incorporated because of binding formation consisting of C → Ti, C → V, C → Cr, C → Co, C → Cu, C → Zn.

Nuclear quadrupole resonance data has indicated that Cu-doped or Co-doped on pristine BNNc has high fluctuations between Bader charge versus electric potential, which can be appropriate options with the highest tendency for electron accepting in the gas adsorption process. Furthermore, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy has explored that the yield of electron accepting for doping atoms on the (Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn)–BNNc in CO molecules adsorption can be ordered as follows: Cu > Co >> Cr > Zn ˜ V> Ti that exhibits the strength of the covalent bond between Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn and CO. In fact, the adsorption of CO gas molecules can introduce spin polarization on the (Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn)–BNNc which specifies that these surfaces may be used as magnetic-scavenging surface as a gas detector. Gibbs free energy based on IR spectroscopy for adsorption of CO molecules adsorption on the (Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn)–BNNc have exhibited that for a given number of carbon donor sites in CO, the stabilities of complexes owing to doping atoms of Ti, V, Cr, Co, Cu, Zn can be considered as: CO →Cu–BNNc >> CO → Co–BNNc > CO → Cr–BNNc > CO → V–BNNc > CO → Zn–BNNc > CO → Ti–BNNc.

This study by using materials modeling approaches and decorating of nanomaterials with transition metals is supposed to introduce new efficient nanosensors in applications for selective sensing of carbon monoxide.

The primary goal of university education globally is to promote research, knowledge, and innovations instrumental for national development and societal transformation. In line with this goal, East African countries, namely Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania have invested heavily in university education in the last 60 years since independence. The evidence of this is the increasing number of both private and public universities, and the number of students joining the institutions. While the expansion of university education is to be celebrated, it should not be taken for granted that this expansion indicates development. The purpose of this research was to assess the impact of university education on regional development in the three East African countries, that is, Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. Data were collected through historical analyses, database searches on electronic and printed sources, and interviews. The study found out that the three African countries have formulated the goals of education toward the achievement of development and that large budgets have been committed to educational expansion in the university in recent years. However, the impact of the universities in the development of the region expected through research and innovation is minimal because of major challenges that include expansion of access without adequate government funding; compromises quality; graduate unemployability and political interference; students’ unrest and strikes; weaknesses in earlier levels of education; regional, gender, and class inequalities; and misalignment of education, development, and contextual strengths. Proposed future strategies included the calls for governments to enhance regional consultations on development and education, the need for specialization in programs rather than duplication, enhancement of international collaborations and networking, rethinking the role of education in development within given contextual and environmental realities, and good governance and adequate funding of education.

The paper discusses ethical issues related to the adaptive reuse of ruin heritage on the example of the so-called ruin bars in Budapest's District VII. It explores how heritage discourse can contribute to the sustainable development of urban neighborhoods. The authors address the question by focusing on how a processual approach can be instrumental in identifying responsible and socially sustainable ways to reuse dilapidated heritage in a residential area.

The problem is analyzed through a case study based on field observation, participant observation, stakeholder interviews, policy analysis and media and social media content analysis.

The authors argue that ethical reuse of ruin heritage must take into consideration the values and interests of multiple stakeholders and the broadest range of consequences at the level of neighborhood and city. An integrated heritage and planning policy should consider and involve as active participants all the heritage communities concerned. Importantly, these groups, comprising both new and longtime residents, must include the vulnerable and marginalized.

The findings can be used by heritage managers for identifying and addressing ethical issues in their adaptive heritage reuse practices and by policymakers for integrating heritage management in urban development and making cities more inclusive (SDG #11).

The paper explores how ethical it is for business enterprises to build on the ruin esthetics in a residential district and what the ethical implications of this reuse process are for various stakeholders.

This paper aims to trace Tata Group’s role in responding to disability in the decades immediately following India’s independence until the preliberalization period of the Indian economy, i.e. from the 1950s to the 1990s.

This study’s methodology entailed a historiographical approach and archival engagement at Tata Archives (Pune, India) of the company documents. Materials and records of the Tata Company between 1942 and 1992.

Adopting the corporate culture lens, the study findings show that Tata Group demonstrated an active prosocial corporate approach toward disability. In a period governed by the ideology of a state-dominated developmental approach, Tata Group’s initiatives were related to medical interventions for a wide spectrum of disabilities, rehabilitation and efforts to ensure persons with disabilities (PWDS)’ livelihood.

Disability, in the neoliberalized economic landscape of India, is an emergent business issue for companies espousing workplace diversity. The historical understanding of business engagement with disability from postindependence to liberalization in India remains, however, limited. In postindependence India, the passive business response to disability emerged within an ethical and discretionary framework, with charity and philanthropy as the main modes of engagement. In this background, this paper explores Tata’s response to disability and PWDs, which was distinct.

The extant literature underlines the inadequacies of legal and policy frameworks addressing the safety and health concerns of sandstone mineworkers in India. Notably, Rajasthan, a state renowned for its extractive industries, mirrors these concerns. Against this backdrop, this paper aims to critically evaluate the relevant legal and policy landscape, with an emphasis on the recent central statute: the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code of 2020 (OSHWCC). Given that the Code subsumes the key legislation pertaining to the safety and health of mineworkers, an in-depth critical analysis is essential to forge suitable policy interventions to address continued gross violations of human rights.

The critical analysis of legal and policy frameworks on silicosis in sandstone mineworkers is based on a comprehensive reading of existing literature. The literature includes relevant laws, case law, reports of the Rajasthan State Human Rights Commission and National Human Rights Commission, publicly available data and key scholarly contributions in the field.

Although the OSHWCC has made some changes to the existing regulatory architecture of mines in India, it has failed to safeguard the safety and health of mineworkers. Notably, the vast majority of mines in India – constituting approximately 90%, which are informal, seasonal and small-scale – remain beyond the jurisdiction of this Code. In Rajasthan, there are specific policies on silicosis, but these policies are poorly implemented. There is a serious shortage of doctors to diagnose silicosis cases, leading to under-diagnosis. The compensation for silicosis victims is insufficient; the distribution mechanism is complex and often delayed.

The central and many state governments have not established the regulatory institutions envisaged under the OSHWCC 2020; therefore, the working of the regulatory institutions could not be critically examined.

The paper critically evaluates laws and policies pertaining to silicosis in sandstone mineworkers, with a special emphasis on the state of Rajasthan. It offers a comprehensive critique of the OSHWCC of 2020, which has not received much attention from previous studies.