The education system in METU requires the students to study regularly and consistently, but with a good planned schedule, it is possible for the students to take part in social, cultural and sports activities.

STUDENT COMMUNITIES

80 student unions in METU organize more than 1000 intensive activities annually in various fields of sciences and arts, both occupational and intellectual. In these activities, the students get a chance to enhance their organizational capacities while developing socially at the same time. Now well-established activities of the clubs with their more interesting and entertaining music and art organizations, The METU Spring Festival, Turkish Folklore Festival, Rock Festival, Contemporary Dance Days and Drama Festival attract all from METU and Ankara. In addition to being the most popular radio station in Ankara and Turkey, METU Radio (FM 103.1), which introduced the first podcast in Turkish language, is also the first radio in Turkey to have a website dedicated to the radio. Music and entertainment broadcasts put into air by the contributions from the students have made METU Radio one of the best radio stations both in Ankara and in Turkey as well. According to the results of a scientific research published in Newsweek Turkey’s 91^st issue, METU is the first among the Turkish universities with respect to the student satisfaction in connection with the social facilities that the universities provide.

SPORTS ACTIVITIES

At METU, we have 30 sports teams and 16 sports clubs which have successful sportsmen that hold world records and have accomplishments both nationwide and worldwide. The campus includes indoor and outdoor swimming pools, indoor sports facilities, a stadium (13.000 capacity), football and American football fields, a hockey pitch and a cricket field, tennis courts, running tracks and a boathouse in Lake Eymir. METU offers these sports activities in an indoors area of 5000 m2 and an outdoors area of 40000 m2.

Sports Accomplishments of Year 2012

• METU-SAS sportsmen Devrim Cenk Ulusoy broke two world records in constant weight apnea and free immersion apnea areas and Şahika Ercümen broke two world records in constant weight apnea and constant wight apnea without fins areas.
• METU sportsmen won a gold medal at the International Akdeniz Oyunları Rowing Competition in “A” Junior Women's Single Scull area.
• 174 competitors from 20 different nations were present at one of the most important dancing organizations of Turkey, National Republic Cup that is organized by METU Dance Sport Club.
• METU Bridge Team placed first in Turkey.
• Women's Volleyball Team placed first in university 2^nd League and Men's Volleyball team placed second in 2^nd League.
• METU Rugby Team placed first in Turkey League.

The students and the personnel are able to participate in many different sports branches at our university. With the start of the Academic Calendar, many sports courses and tournaments are organized. METU's Men's and Women's teams represent the university in intercollegiate tournaments. The students have the opportunity to join the sports team of the branch of their desire by participating in the yearly tryouts.

Sports Facilities

• Outdoors Swimming Pool
• Olympic Swimming Pool
• 3 Indoors Sports Facilities
• Gymnasium (Basketball Field, Climbing Wall, Mirror Room)
• Baraka Gym (Basketball Field, Combat Sports Hall, Fitness Center)
• Sports Center (Basketball Field, Sauna, Table Tennis Hall, Fitness Center, Boxing Hall, Meeting Room, Archery Range, Jacuzzi, Steam Room and Sauna, Cold Shower)
• Grass Football Stadium (13.000 capacity and running track)
• 5 football fields of varying sizes
• Tennis Courts (16 outdoors – 2 indoors) The courts at the Gymnasium are to be used either by daily reservation or monthly subscription.
• Outdoors Basketball Fields
• Outdoors Volleyball Fields
• Table Tennis Tables (in Gymnasium and various departments)
• Yalıncak(6 km) and Çamlık(2 km) running tracks
• Cricket Field
• American Football Field
• Strength Enhancement Halls
• Synthetic Football Fields (to be used either by daily reservation or monthly subscription.)

Sports Teams

• American Football Team (Men's)
• Badminton Team (Men's – Women's)
• Basketball Team (Men's – Women's)
• Billiards Team (Men's – Women's)
• Bridge Team (Men's – Women's)
• Ice Hockey Team (Men's – Women's)
• Gymnastics Team (Men's – Women's)
• Mountain Biking Team (Men's)
• Fencing Team (Men's – Women's)
• Frisbee Team (Men's – Women's)
• Football Team (Men's – Women's)
• Wrestling Team (Men's – Women's)
• Handball Team (Men's – Women's)
• Judo Team (Men's – Women's)
• Karate-Do Team (Men's – Women's)
• Skiing Team (Men's – Women's)
• Cricket Team (Men's)
• Rowing and Water Sports Team (Men's – Women's)
• Table Tennis Team (Men's – Women's)
• Archery Team (Men's – Women's)
• Orienteering Team (Men's – Women's)
• Rugby Team (Men's – Women's)
• Chess Team (Men's – Women's)
• Free-Diving Team (Men's – Women's)
• Snowboard Team (Men's – Women's)
• Underwater Hockey Team (Men's – Women's)
• Underwater Rugby Team (Men's)
• Water Polo Team (Men's)
• Taekwon-Do Team (Men's – Women's)
• Tennis Team (Men's – Women's)
• Volleyball Team (Men's – Women's)
• Swimming Team (Men's – Women's)

Middle East Technical University is among the “Top 100 Universities by Reputation” which was recently announced by Times Higher Education (THE) on 15 March 2012. METU is the first and the only Turkish university that is included in this list.

"THE World Reputation Rankings 2012" includes universities that are identified as “excellent” in research and education by academics from various countries. It is declared that the ratings are based on the evaluations of more than 17,000 academics from 6,000 universities in almost 150 countries selected by THE. The academics are selected on the basis of their experience (average of 16 years) and number of publications (average of 50 publications). The academics chosen for the survey are asked questions such as “Which university would you send your most successful graduates to for the best graduate education?”

As in the previous years, universities from the developed countries such as United States, United Kingdom, Japan and Germany have the highest representation in the 2012 list. METU’s inclusion in the “Top 100 Universities by Reputation” list is seen as a major source of prestige for Turkey as well as METU, because universities from only 19 countries are represented in the 2012 rankings.  Many countries such as Russia, India, Spain, Austria, Italy and Ireland do not have universities in the top 100 list.  

The success of METU can be attributed to the success of our graduates in leading world universities, to the significant rise in research collaborations, scientific publications and citations of our faculty, as well as to the positive impressions of academics worldwide who have visited METU.

We congratulate and express our sincere thanks to our faculty members, administrative staff, students and graduates for their contribution to this well-deserved recognition.

METU Informatics Institute has been chosen as a "CUDA Research Center" by NVIDIA. After receiving the title of "the first CUDA Teaching Center in Turkey" in 2010, METU has built on its position as one of the prestigious institutions around the world.

Institutions that are designated as CUDA Research Centers are engaged in the most advanced research using CUDA and NVIDIA GPUs. Among the benefits of the program are the free availability of research and education related hardware such as GPUs (Graphics Processing Unit) that are compatible with NVIDIA CUDA architecture, and the opportunity to access the latest GPU’s and education about them.

Related web pages can be accessed using the following links:

http://research.nvidia.com/content/metu-crc-summary
http://research.nvidia.com/content/cuda-research-centers

Üniversitemiz Mimarlık Fakültesi, Endüstri Ürünleri Tasarımı Bölümü öğretim görevlisi Dr. Hakan Gürsu ve ekibi, tasarımda “çevre oscarları” olarak anılan Green Dot Awards 2011 yarışmasında;

• katlanır solar katamaran “Foscat32” ile GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Ulaşım Kategorisi, 2.lik ve Mansiyon Ödülü;
• alüminyum teneke ambalajın yeniden kullanımına yönelik “Cans'n Caps” ile GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Ürün Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü ve GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Konsept Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü;
• tükettiği enerjiyi üreten kendine yeterli konut sistemi “Villa Sera” ile GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Yapı Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü

olmak üzere beş ayrı ödül almıştır.

2008 yılından bu yana Amerika Birleşik Devletleri'nde düzenlenmekte olan Green Dot Ödülleri, ulaşım, mimarlık, ürün ve hizmet alanlarında yılın en sıra dışı çevreci proje ve çalışmalarını ödüllendiriyor. Bu yıl açıklanan yarışma sonuçları itibarıyla, küresel kurum ve şirketlerin yarıştığı tasarım ve mimarlık projeleri arasından, Designnobis üç farklı projeyle toplamda beş ödül alarak farklı kategorilerde en çok ödül toplayan tasarım markası olarak bu sene de ülkemizi Amerika Çevre Ödüllerinde temsil ediyor. MIT(Massachutes Institute of Technology)'nin birincilik ödülü aldığı yarışmada, Dr.Gürsu ve ekibinin bir yıla yakın bir çalışması ile ortaya çıkan katlanır solar katamaran Foscat32 ile ODTÜ ikinci sırada yer alıyor. Ödüle doymayan tasarım ekibinin ödüllü projeleri şu şekilde;

• Foscat32 katlanır solar katamaran, 2010 yılı Avrupa Birliği Platin Tasarım ödülüne, Çevre Oscarını da ekledi. Temiz enerji kullanan katamaran, marina bağımlılığını da ortadan kaldırıyor.
• Cans'n Caps, alüminyum teneke ambalajları günlük yaşamda kullanılabilir objeler haline getirirken, sosyal sorumluluk ve çevre bilincini artırıyor. İki dalda birden ödüllendirilen proje, alüminyum ambalajın yeniden kullanımına yönelik yapılmış en kapsamlı çalışmalardan biri olarak değerlendiriliyor.
• Tükettiği enerjiyi üreten kendine yeterli konut sistemi Villa Sera, güneş panelleri ile elektrik ihtiyacını karşılarken, su arıtımı ve ısı döngüsü ile de pek çok yeniliği bir arada barındıran bir mimari tasarım olarak yapı ödülünün sahibi oluyor.

ODTÜ Öğretim Üyesi Dr.Hakan Gürsu liderliğindeki Designnobis ekibi, çevreci tekne Volitan ve susuz orman yangını söndürme aracı FireKnight'ın da aralarında bulunduğu dünya sorunlarına çözümler ürettikleri projelerle 11 Çevre Oskarını elinde bulunduran tek ekip olma özelliğini hala koruyor.

Ödül alan tasarımlara Green Dot Awards sitesinden ve aşağıdaki linklerden ulaşılabilirken, projelerin video animasyonları da aşağıdaki bağlantılardan izlenebiliyor:

http://www.greendotawards.com/winners/zoom2.php?eid=3-487-11&uid=2225438&cat=Transportation

http://www.greendotawards.com/winners/zoom2.php?eid=3-489-11&uid=2225438&cat=Concept

http://www.greendotawards.com/winners/zoom2.php?eid=3-489-11&uid=2225438&cat=Product

http://www.greendotawards.com/winners/zoom2.php?eid=3-488-11&uid=2225438&cat=Build

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tb1TPpKnZ-k

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KBO-222j3s

GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Ulaşım Kategorisi, 2.lik Ödülü
GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Ulaşım Kategorisi, Mansiyon

GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Ürün Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü
GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Konsept Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü

GREEN DOT AWARDS 2011 Yapı Kategorisi, Mansiyon Ödülü

One of the faculty members in the Department of Engineering Sciences at the Middle East Technical University, Prof.Dr. Murat Dicleli, has invented a device named as "Seismic Damper" which has been converted into a commercial product, being the university's first research commercialization of an invention. Both the METU Technopolis Technology Transfer Office and Prof. Dicleli had put intensive efforts in the commercialization process of the device. For this invention, a licensing agreement has been signed with Maurer Söhne GmbH & Co. KG, which is the leading firm in the field of building materials, seismic devices and expansion joints.

Detailed information about the device is given below.

MULTI-DIRECTIONAL TORSIONAL HYSTERETIC DAMPER WITH RECENTERING CAPABILITY (MRSD)
A New Anti-Seismic Device for seismic protection of buildings and bridges

MRSD is a recently developed mechanical hysteretic damper with improved performance compared to the available isolation systems. The system is composed of two main parts, the rail system at top and the base device underneath, as depicted in Fig. 1. The rail system which is essentially a guiding system will be attached to the top anchoring point, ie., the building or bridge deck, and the base device will be anchored to the bottom anchoring point, ie., the foundation or bridge pier, as illustrated in Fig. 3. Any relative movement between the two, as a result of a seismic activity, will induce displacements in the device and causes the engagement of the energy dissipaters. The energy dissipaters of MRSD are eight cylindrical steel sections, as shown if Fig. 2, each attached at top to an arm. As the device deforms, the arms rotate, as depicted in Fig. 1-a, and induce torsion, yielding and energy dissipation in the cylinders.  

Notably, the device shows a geometric stiffening behavior in an adaptive manner (depending on displacement level), as shown in Fig. 4, which is an outcome of its special working mechanism. Geometric properties of MRSD can be easily adjusted to obtain different levels of hardening, as depicted in Fig. 4. 

 The advantages of MRSD in comparison to other available seismic isolation devices can be summarized as follows:
1- No dependence on environmental or outside physical effects (see Table 1)
2- Restoring force capability is mostly geometrical with low dependence on material hardening
3- Adaptive stiffness results in smaller displacements compared to conventional systems
4- More suitable for performance-based design, thanks to the adaptive stiffness property
5- Longer service life compared to other systems
6- Larger energy dissipation capacity due to the fatter shape of the hysteresis loops
7- Capable of large force and/or displacement capacity compared to the available multi-directional dampers
8- Not affected by vertical component of ground motion/structure response
9- Easily reusable after a damaging earthquake by replacement of internal energy dissipaters
10- More controllable characteristic strength and post-elastic stiffness
11- Adaptive stiffness of the device minimizes torsional effects in buildings as larger torsional rotation induced displacements will be resisted by a greater force

Verification tests of MRSD have been recently performed in Academy of armed forces in Munich, Germany, under the sponsorship of MAURER SÖHNE. Prototype MRSD is shown in Fig. 5 at un-displaced and displaced conditions. The plots in Fig. 6 show the cyclic response of the device. 

The damper could also be applied to highrise buildings.  In such applications, the damper is placed within the bays of the building frame using steel braces (Figure 9). Due to the adaptive post elastic stiffnes off the damper, energy dissipation is uniformly distributed along the full height of the building. 

Presentation video of "Seismic Damper" by the producer company:

Product animation-1:

Product animation-2:

ODTÜ Afet Yönetimi Uygulama ve Araştırma Merkezi, 23 Ekim 2011'de Van-Tabanlı ve 9 Kasım 2011'de Van-Edremit'te meydana gelen depremler ile ilgili olarak bir inceleme raporu hazırlamıştır. Rapora aşağıdaki bağlantıdan erişilebilir:

"ODTÜ Afet Yönetimi Uygulama ve Araştırma Merkezi Van Depremleri İnceleme Raporu"

ODTÜ, Öğretim Üyesi Yetiştirme Programı’ndan 2011 yılı Kasım ayı itibariyle 250. mezununu vermenin gururunu yaşıyor.

Rakamlarla ÖYP

• 2001 yılında 4 üniversitenin işbirliğiyle ve Kalkınma Bakanlığı’nın (2001 yılında Devlet Planlama Teşkilatı) desteğiyle başlayan ÖYP, 67 üniversitenin katılımıyla güçlenerek sürmektedir.
• 64 farklı üniversiteden 510 öğrenci, ÖYP araştırma görevlisi olarak ODTÜ’de eğitimine devam etmektedir.
• 2011 yılı Kasım ayı itibariyle 264 mezunumuz 25 üniversite için öğretim elemanı olarak yetiştirilmiştir.
• Kalkınma Bakanlığı tarafından desteklenen 433 ÖYP öğrencisi, 42 üniversitede görev yapmak üzere ODTÜ’de eğitimine devam etmektedir.
• YÖK koordinasyonu ile 149 öğrenci ODTÜ’de ilgili lisansüstü programlara yerleştirilmiş, 77’si üniversiteleri tarafından ODTÜ’de görevlendirilmiştir.    
• 2002-2010 yılları arasında 920 kısa süreli yurtdışı kongre katılımı, 2003-2010 yılları arasında ise 275 uzun süreli yurtdışı eğitim/araştırma faaliyeti gerçekleştirilmiştir.
• ÖYP mezunları tarafından yayınlanan uluslararası makale sayısı 772’yi bulurken, ÖYP mezunlarının ortalama uluslararası makale sayısı 3.2 olarak hesaplanmaktadır.
• En fazla ortak yayın yapılan üniversiteler 127 yayınla Atatürk Üniversitesi, 125 yayınla Yüzüncü Yıl Üniversitesi ve 108 yayınla Selçuk Üniversitesi’dir.
• 12 ÖYP araştırma görevlisi başarılı tez çalışmaları nedeniyle ODTÜ Prof.Dr. Mustafa Parlar Tez Ödülü’nü kazanmıştır.

Akademik yöneticilerimizin katılımıyla 30 Kasım 2011 günü yapılan toplantıda,  Mart - Kasım 2011 döneminin önemli gelişmeleri ile 2011 - 2012 ders yılında gündemimizde yer alacak konular tartışılmıştır.

Toplantıda kullanılan sunum dosyasına "30 Kasım 2011 Yöneticiler Toplantısı Sunum Dosyası" bağlantısından erişilebilir.

ODTÜ Rektörlüğü