Bøger udgivet af Presses Polytechniques et Universitaires Romandes

A guide to both risk management and insurance. Risk management is becoming increasingly important to companies and society in general, and Risk Management & Introduction to Insurance offers an accessible guide for anyone trying to understand it. Divided into two parts, the book first offers an introduction that examines the concept of risk and its historical context while defining the key terminology. In addition, the tools necessary for risk assessment are reviewed and the different steps of the risk management process are discussed. The second part of the book focuses on the economics of insurance, social insurance, and the private insurance market. The different branches and products of private insurance are analyzed, and an overview of the basics of calculating insurance premiums based on contractual benefits and the practice of an actuary is provided. Numerous practical applications (such as cyber risk management), examples, and illustrations complete the book. As a whole, the book is an essential reference for business school students, professionals, and anyone interested in risk management and insurance.

An analysis of dormitories as an architectural type. Concepts of type and typology are not specific to architecture. Rather they represent an interdisciplinary approach to ordering knowledge and gaining insight. In the field of architecture, the study of types and typology offers a didactic perspective that allows us to see the complex network of interconnections between theory and practice as an inseparable material and social construct. This book is the result of a research project focused on dormitories as an architectural type, conducted at Laboratory EAST. Through a structured analysis, it unveils how architecture has offered solutions to the challenges of creating buildings designed for sleeping collectively.

A study of the forces that shape postcolonial landscapes and built environments. Archival power, silences, and absences profoundly shape and structure postcolonial landscapes, spaces, and urban environments by controlling bodies, histories, and interactions. This book explores how to dismantle these imperial entanglements by developing an interdisciplinary dialogue that brings together history, memory politics, critical theory, and archival practice along with the built environment, landscape, urban studies, architecture, and the arts. Unearthing Traces catalyzes critical discussions that not only challenge the objectivity and dismantle the neutrality surrounding current archival practices and archival institutions but also question what constitutes the archive itself. The book unearths potential histories and minor narratives buried by the imperial production of pasts and silences. It provides a critical resource for scholars, architects, artists, activists, and archivists who want to engage with landscapes and built environments using a critical and postcolonial perspective.

A whimsical examination of math in the Middle Ages. This book brings together many unusual and entertaining examples of Medieval mathematical exercises. Medieval treatises on arithmetic and algebra frequently include along with the usual commercial and daily life applications, mathematical games, and recreational problems. The latter, while still on the subject of trade or daily life, involve conditions that are quite unrealistic if not totally absurd. As this book demonstrates, the authors of these problem sets hoped to show that mathematics could both be fun and useful.

This book reveals the origin, definition, and evolution of New Brutalism in architecture. The New Brutalism movement in architecture addressed a new way of understanding the urban dimension in the post-war period, and in particular the role of the architect in an insecure society. But the original definition was manipulated, diluted, and fragmented as the concept spread from Europe to the United States, Japan, and South America. New Brutalism follows its contributions on a global scale, as it challenged the ambivalent collaboration between critics and architects and opened a controversial debate over a new "international style." Disruptive, revolutionary, and at times even Dadaist, New Brutalism steered the cultural trajectory of the Modern Movement. A corrective to the many myths and misinterpretations of the style, this book reasserts the foundations of New Brutalism and offers a close examination of its international influence and variations.

A study of the equilibrium properties of Coulomb systems in physics that is the first of its kind. This book studies the equilibrium properties of Coulomb systems, i.e. classical or quantum systems of charged particles interacting exclusively with the Coulomb force, drawing on results that are mathematically rigorous or derived from formal perturbation series, without ad hoc modeling or intermediate approximations. Two main themes form the essential purpose of Statistical Mechanics of Coulomb Systems: the simplified description of the proofs of four fundamental theorems on the existence of Coulomb matter on the one hand and the development of a formalism based on diagrammatic expansions adapted to the treatment of classical and quantum screening phenomena on the other hand. The result is an authoritative analysis of Coulomb systems that will be essential for any physicist working in this area.

A book that brings awareness to preservation in architecture. This third TSAM volume presents content from teaching courses that have been developed at the EPFL for fifteen years. The aim is to promote preservation as a discipline, one of the main branches in the emerging field of socioecological transition. This book also demonstrates how the educational potential of preservation can be harnessed, uniting many social and scientific disciplines, the history of architecture and architects, materiality and its constructed expression, the theory of architecture and design, and the examination‿both abstract and concrete‿of what surrounds us in every sense, from the teaspoon to the territory. In short, what a minority of responsible architects has always concerned itself with: a silent and sometimes fragile architecture. These qualities should enable preservation to reform and reconstruct a new design process for architecture, which will in turn lead to a new kind of practice. Â

A book that fills a niche in academic analysis of the Tour de France. The Tour de France is an event known worldwide by both fans of cycling and the general public as a distinguished and extreme physical challenge. Since the 1990s, however, the Tour has also become notorious as a testing ground for performance enhancement and a proving ground for anti-doping measures. The Tour has long been the focus of books that concentrate on racing, the personalities, the scandals, and gossip. Racing Time, instead, offers a serious study of the event, analyzed within its political, social, cultural, and economic context. Racing Time presents expert analyses of a range of topics and issues which the recent history of the Tour has shown to be of contemporary significance, including several studies that examine issues around doping from a range of perspectives.

A new translation of a leading architect‿s magnum opus.  Housing Copenhagen is primarily the translation of leading Danish modern architect Kay Fisker‿s Kobenhavske Bolygtyper, maintaining the original layout along with drawings and diagrams. The text illustrates the main features of Fisker‿s architecture and describes the cultural context within which the exploration of housing types was conducted. The systematic approach, the richness of selected examples, as well as the analytic content, make this book valuable beyond its historic and geographic limits. Due to a renewed interest in the field of housing, the translation will provide students and professionals with a clear and useful instrument for housing design from an architectural and urban perspective. Â

A groundbreaking and interdisciplinary work on architectural collage.  Design Strategies in Architecture collects wide-ranging reflections on the use of architectural collage, which has become a popular way of sharing a project's design because collages can be faster and more approachable than traditional detailed renderings. This book brings together contributions from architectural historians, theoreticians, and architects to look at the role of collage. The essays gathered here reconstruct the role of representation in the evolution of architecture and offer a large selection of relevant case studies in the use of collage, incorporating critical historical analysis of the technical aspects and significance of the case studies within their cultural and political contexts. Together they also provide a critical and historical framework for architectural offices engaged in research related to representation. Groundbreaking and thought-provoking Design Strategies in Architecture is vital reading for understanding architectural collage.

A clear and enriching examination of the basic design and dimensioning principles that govern dam engineering.   Dams are one of the largest and most complex civil engineering projects and have always been an important element in development and economic prosperity. Their major role is to store water supplies to meet the vital and energy needs of the populations, to protect people and landscapes from the destructive effects of water, and to serve as a recourse in the event of water shortages. Dams clearly articulates the basic design and dimensioning principles that govern dam engineering. It also details a three-pillar safety concept, the different types of concrete and embankment dams as well as their impact on the environment, foundation design, and monitoring and maintenance. The material is enriched with numerous examples that reflect the internationally recognized competence of Swiss engineering in dam design. Clear and thorough, Dams enriches readers' understanding of dam engineering.

An up-to-date book about art through the lens of neuroscience and psychology. In Creativity & Art, Andreas and Barbara Steck use an interdisciplinary approach to discuss creative processes from a neuroscientific and psychoanalytic perspective. By referring to the current knowledge of brain sciences, the authors explore the understanding of the neural bases innate to the creation of art. Beginning with historical aspects of aesthetic experience and creation in ancient and modern times, the authors go on to present numerous artists in various fields, with an emphasis on how their subjective lived experiences are expressed and reflected in their artwork. Finally, the Stecks describe the building blocks of creativity in early childhood development discuss the psychoanalytic understanding of human aesthetic experience and creativity. Insightful and thought-provoking, Creativity & Art examines art through the lens of neuroscience and psychology.

The definitive guide on non-destructive testing. Non-Destructive Testing and Testability of Materials and Structures encompasses a wide range of methods for inspecting an object without modifying it. Analysis must be unambiguous, particularly in sensitive industrial sectors such as nuclear and aeronautics. This book provides an exhaustive presentation of the parameters for carrying out this sort of evaluation, the conditions under which it can occur, and the characteristics of potential defects. Additionally, it explores the physical principles, technology, and current methods of non-destructive testing (NDT), both common and specific. This manual also describes methods for identifying factors that can deteriorate measurements and distort analysis. In this way, it introduces and defines the concepts of structural noise and environmental parameters. The book also proposes solutions to these challenges, notably based on progress made in phenomena modeling and inversion methods. Finally, it deals with information post-processing (both of signals and images) and presents a new approach called Recommandations de Conception basées sur des règles de Contrôle Non-Destructif (RC-CND). Aimed at both experienced professionals and students of NDT, this book will constitute a precious and lasting reference.