Information for Mechanics Colloquium speakers
Laboratory for Engineering Mechanics (EM), Mechanical Engineering
Delft University of Technology

Seminar organizer: Arend Schwab a.l.schwab@wbmt.tudelft.nl
Logistics contact:  Corinne du Burck C.P.duBurck@wbmt.tudelft.nl
  Let Corinne know
     * your travel plans, tastes in food and housing, and other logistics issues,
     * your name, title, address and affiliation as you would like it to appear,
     * the title of your talk,
     * a short abstract of your talk accessible to non-specialists to
       advertise your talk (plain text, Word or .pdf) .
     * people, places, or things you would like to visit.

Consult the tentative EM colloquium schedule for the year for scheduling issues.
Information about the EM department: http://www.ocp.tudelft.nl/em

About the seminar:

Audience: Typical attendance is from 10-60 people, mostly EM graduate students from first year (essentially undergraduates) on and faculty from EM with various interests. Often a few faculty and students from other departments interested in your topic will come, and sometimes a few undergraduates. Some of the foreign students do not have good English comprehension. Some students come from math backgrounds with little engineering knowledge, some from engineering with little math. There is also great variation in the student's knowledge of computer related and experimental vocabulary and methods. Some students are interested in differential equations, some in dynamics, some in solids, some in fluids and some in other topics. Ideally the seminar should be interesting and informative to all of these people. That is, most of the audience will not have previous interest or expertise in your subject, so you will have to bring the bulk of the audience in slowly.

The usual tips:
People usually like:
 * a general introduction with the context and motivation of the general subject area and of the
   specific research,
 * photos, demonstrations, videos,
 * not having to remember the meanings of more than 2 or 3 variables,
 * getting the gist of the talk from the visuals (so they find their way back after day dreaming),
   or from what you say (so they miss little while their eyes wander), and
 * a talk complete in about 45 minutes so there is time for questions without going over time.

Technology: The room has computer projection, an overhead projectors and a blackboard. Allow time to debug various inevitable but generally solvable electronics problems. The last row of seats, always too-well occupied (even if attendance is low), is about 10 meters from the screen.

Travel information:
*Schiphol airport is 45 minutes by train from Delft (recommended).
*Schiphol airport is 60 minutes drive from TUDelft (NOT recommended)
*Delft railway station is 15 minutes walk from TUDelft.