Tishk International University and Erbil Polytechnic University hosted the seventh International Engineering Conference (IEC2021) on February 24-25, 2021. IEC2021 is technically sponsored by IEEE and IEEE Iraq Section. The conference was aimed to disseminate research findings and provide a platform for scholars to debate and exchange ideas on the developments in the field of engineering. The accepted papers will be indexed by IEEE Xplore Digital Library Database. Furthermore, the conference provided our graduate students a chance to communicate with experienced researchers to discuss their current work as well as to be engaged in future research topics, and new opportunities.
The program committee members comprised of 45 members, out of which 85.5% of them hold Ph.D. in various fields of engineering, relevant to one or more conference topics mentioned above. The Conference adhered to the international conference standards in accordance with the guidelines agreed upon with our IEEE technical partners and in-line with the regulations specified by the Ministry of Higher Education in Kurdistan. All paper submissions were double-blind peer-reviewed by at least two program committee members to ensure that submissions conform to certain quality measures. The quality measures included several criteria such as Relevance and Timeliness, Novelty and Originality, Technical Content and Correctness, Quality of Presentation, References used in the paper, Written Language, Reviewer Expertise and Overall Recommendation.
This year, the total number of submitted research manuscripts stood at 65, with authors participating from several countries including India, Romania, Iraq, Indonesia, Thailand, China, USA, Turkey, and Malaysia. Seven tracks created at the beginning were later collapsed into 6 tracks, in attempt to engage more experts in the review and evaluation process. The tracks are shown below:
1. Computer Engineering and Information Technology
2. General Engineering and Applications
3. Digital and wireless Communication
4. Construction Engineering
5. Environmental and Hydraulic Engineering
6. Geotechnical and Transportation Engineering
In order of the quantity of papers accepted in each field, the following summary is displayed:
The Computer Engineering & Information Technology received a total of 28 papers out of which 23 got accepted.
In General Engineering and Applications, 11 submissions were recorded, and 7 papers were accepted.
Digital & Wireless Communication 14 papers were submitted and 6 were accepted.
Construction Engineering received a total of 5 papers out of which 5 got accepted. Environmental and Hydraulic Engineering received 3 submissions, out of which 2 were accepted.
Lastly, the Geotechnical and Transportation Engineering track received 4 papers, out of which 3 papers were accepted.
Several papers were either rejected after the review process, or withdrawn due to certain research compliance procedures, such that the paper submitted was unable to pass basic pre-review checks, for example: plagiarism, outside of conference scope and so on.
The rate of acceptance was 80.7%: 46 papers were accepted and presented. Erbil Polytechnic and Tishk International University are grateful to all prospective presenters for their valuable contributions that will bring new perspectives on the developments in Civil and Computer Engineering in the Kurdistan Region.
This year, the conference hosted three distinguished keynote speakers:
1. Dr. Hussain Rabia, Managing Director (MD) of Entrac Petroleum, Reading, UK, who presented a keynote speech on the topic “Preparation of Future Petroleum Engineers”.
2. Prof. Dr. Hamed M. Jassim, a Professor & Specialist in Mining and Tunneling Engineering, discussed “Tunelling Practice: Old Haibat Sultan Tunel in Koya, Kudistan Region-Iraq”.
3. Prof. Dr. Merak Salamak, a Professor at the Silesian University of Technology (SUT) in Gliwice, Poland conferred on the topic entitled “BIM methodology as the first step to the digitization of the construction industry”.
Additionally, three workshops were organized to stimulate academic engagements and exchange knowledge in frontiers of research.
The first workshop entitled “International workshop on modern computer applications” was moderated by Dr. Yasir Hashim (TIU, Computer Engineering department). The workshop was given by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Abdul-Rahman Alsewari (Faculty of Computing, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Malaysia), Assistant Prof. Fuad A. Ghaleb (School of Computing, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia) and Dr. Goran Abdulrahman (Lecturer, Manufacturing Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Koya University, Iraq).
The second workshop was named “Drilling Problems”, which was managed by Assistant Professor. Salar K. Hussein (Erbil Polytechnic University) and presented by Mr. Soran Mohammed M. Ali.
The third workshop was titled “5G Implementation Challenges in Kurdistan & Iraq” and was presented by Dr. Salar Kheder Shaikhah (Erbil Polytechnic University) and Dr. Jamal Hassan (University of Salahaddin).
We are exceptionallgrateful to our sponsor: Clever Scientific Company.
