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The Industrial Engineering undergraduate program offered at the University of Brasília was structured on Project Based Learning (PBL) methodology. This innovative educational proposal allows the students to deploy their technical competencies through real problem solving situations. The methodology also stimulates the development of the students' soft skills, by exposing them to a challenging environment. At the end of each project, the results are presented to an external agent, and are subsequently implemented. The objective of this paper is to present the evolution of the PSP courses, which adopt as guidelines both the PMBOK project management framework, as well as content from specific technical courses related to the project's subject. One other relevant aspect of the PSP courses is their involvement of both undergraduate and graduate students from different Engineering areas, such as Industrial, Mechanical and Civil Engineering, which serves to foster a more holistic and integrated problem-solving skillset. KeywordsEngineering education. Industrial engineering. Production System Project (PSP). approach are intrinsically linked to the acquisition of knowledge that can be applied in a professional environment, in improving existing skills, and for problem solving as a whole.Project Based Learning utilizes continuous questioning as a teaching and learning technique. This particular strategy has been adopted by the University of Brasilia (UnB) in its Industrial Engineering course. The use of this approach encourages the student to seek knowledge by proposing solutions to real problems, introduced by external agents. The student becomes the subject of the learning process, as his or her learning depends on the constant search for new knowledge, technologies, methods, techniques and tools that can be used in carrying out activities that will permit them to arrive at feasible solutions.The PBL approach provides the student with a deeper understanding of the studied content, as it puts into practice the theoretical concepts and strategies for problem solving. At the same time, it fosters the development of multidisciplinary capabilities related to communication, leadership, management, and the development of a reasoned critical thinking (Witt et al., 2006;De los Ríos-Carmenado et al., 2015;Miranda, 2004). According to Barell (2007), there is an effective increase in students' performance, due to both the greater retention of information available, and to the motivation and interest that is fostered by resolving real-life issues.

This work compared the mechanisms of adsorption of carotenes from hybrid palm oil onto two kinds of bleaching earths widely used by industrial refiners (acid-activated and neutral). First, it was performed a deep characterization of adsorbent surfaces: acid activated adsorbent showed micropore volumes twice larger than the neutral. FTIR analysis of adsorbent after adsorption demonstrated that active site was Si-O-Si for both adsorbents. However, comparison of peak shapes suggested distinctive interactions between adsorbent/adsorbate for each adsorbent. Latterly, an extensive kinetic and equilibrium study was performed. Kinetic data were in accordance with pseudo-first and pseudo-second-order models. Adjusting to the intra-particle diffusion model evidenced more than one mechanism controlling the adsorption process. Equilibrium data demonstrated adsorption is only favorable at low carotene concentration at liquid phase for acid adsorbent (lower than 1 mg/ mL). For neutral adsorbent, it was not clearly observed a favorable region with the studied conditions. The acid adsorbent could adsorb more carotenes per adsorbent weight than neutral. Finally, neutral adsorbent showed higher heterogeneity of interaction between adsorbate and adsorbent than the acid, especially at low adsorbent coverages.

Interspecific hybridization of oil palms (E. guineensis × E. oleifera) was initially exploited to provide disease resistance and, consequently, increased oleic acid content. Besides the growing importance of this cultivar to the market, there is little information about this oil’s properties. In this context, this study aimed to determine a comprehensive physicochemical and thermal characterization of hybrid palm oil (HOPO) compared with the better-known African palm oil (APO). Differences in the distribution of fatty acids, carotenoids, and tocols were observed. Minor differences in density and viscosity were found between the oils, with no relevance for the materials’ processing design. Nevertheless, HOPO showed unique crystallization behavior, which potentially can affect industrial operations, such as fractionation. HOPO did not present the two thermal characteristic regions of APO, attributed to olein and stearin fractions. The HOPO demonstrated a decrease in the melting point of more than 3 °C in relation to APO, and a reduction in the crystallization point of more than 6 °C. Furthermore, besides the higher content of unsaturated fatty acids, HOPO was more stable than APO due to a higher antioxidant content. These results could be useful to establish operation conditions for processes using palm oil from hybrid oil palm.

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