civil & environmental engineering university of...

Fall 2007

In This Issue:

From the Chair

From the CEEFA President

Department News

Faculty News

Staff News

Student News

Alumni News

Obituaries

CEEFA

CEEFA Brunch & Football Game

CIVIL & ENVIRONMENTALENGINEERING

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGANNEWSLETTER FOR ALUMNI AND FRIENDS

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CEE Newsletter

FROM THE CHAIR

Professor Roman Hryciw, Intrim Chair

Dear CEE Friends and Colleagues,

This is my fi rst, and possibly only, “From the Chair” opening to our newsletter. With little advance notice, on January 1, 2007, I was appointed the Interim Chair of the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering while the College searches for a permanent Chair from a strong group of candidates external to the University of Michigan. There is reason to believe that a new Chair

may be in the position as soon as January 1, 2008.Professor Katopodes completed his tenure as Chair of

CEE, and I would like to thank him for his dedicated service over the last fi ve years. In part, his legacy will be the vast improvements in our department infrastructure: a refurbished central offi ce space, a new high-tech conference room, centralized student services, and large refurbished offi ces for our Environmental and Water Resources (EWRE) faculty. More importantly, as you will read shortly, Nik’s tenure was also marked by the superb recruitment of young and talented assistant professors to our ranks and the increase of our undergraduate enrollment.

The last academic year was marked by the retirements of Professors Subhash Goel and Antoine Naaman from our Structural Engineering program. In January 2008, CEE will be joined by a new Structures faculty member, Dr. Jason P. McCormick, who earned a PhD from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2006. Jason, whose research focuses on the use of shape memory alloys and earthquake protection, will be coming fresh from a post-doctoral position in Kyoto, Japan. In September 2007, the CEE Hydraulics and Hydrology group will be joined by Dr. Valeriy Ivanov. Valeriy obtained his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2006 and currently is completing a post-doctoral assignment at Harvard University. His expertise is in process-based hydrological modeling.

Jason and Valeriy will join an already exceptionally talented group of assistant professors in CEE. Among other awards, Assistant Professors Vineet Kamat, Russell Green, Jerome Lynch, and Anna Michalak each have received prestigious and highly competitive National Science Foundation Career Awards to launch their research programs. For a single department to have four such awardees is not only highly unusual, it predicts a bright future for CEE at Michigan.

Undergraduate enrollments are rising and have nearly doubled in three years (engineering students may be reading CNNMoney.com which lists Civil Engineering as having one of the top 10 “hottest salaries” in 2007). Indeed, the popular press has been kind to us in 2007—US News and World Report raised our ranking from 10th to 7th for civil engineering; we have maintained a strong 6th position in environmental engineering. Our research volume, in terms of expenditures, has increased to more than $5M in 2006—an increase of 10% from 2005.

One of the highlights of the 2007 winter term was the CEEFA Annual Meeting and Technical Session. This year’s program

focused on the reconstruction and expansion of Michigan Stadium (aka the “Big House”), and featured presentations by Joe Parker, Senior Associate Athletic Director at Michigan, and Neal Morton, Senior Project Manager from Barton Malow, the company providing construction services to the project. Professor James Wight updated the CEEFA membership on new developments and initiatives in CEE’s senior capstone design course. Lastly, Virginia Wait, Executive Director for Resource Planning and Management for the College of Engineering, gave an entertaining overview of the past, present, and future of the College’s facilities on North Campus. Her slides dated back to the 1960s—a time when cows grazed on the nearby fi elds surrounding GG Brown and the Lay Auto Lab. Today, North Campus is home to herds of roaming deer that have been forced into our few remaining tree stands by Ann Arbor’s continuing sprawl to the north and east.

The last year saw many visits of former students to campus. It seemed that every week at least one old friend dropped by. If you were not among them, consider yourself invited for a visit this fall. The University of Michigan Homecoming Weekend will be October 12-13 (Purdue vs Michigan); better still, plan to join us for the annual CEEFA Football Brunch (and victory over Penn State) on September 22. More details on the CEEFA football brunch can be found in this issue of the newsletter.

Finally, I’d like to share a special personal note. In June, Reta Teachout completed her 53rd year of service to the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Michigan. Her tenure surpasses that of our most senior full-time faculty member by a mere 20 years! As Reta begins to contemplate her transition to retirement, our next issue will highlight her career at Michigan and allow her to reminisce with all of you about her years of service at the University of Michigan.

http://www.engin.umich.edu/dept/cee 3

FROM THE CEEFAPRESIDENT

As your Past President, I would like to thank those who have made participation in this organization a great pleasure. Particularly, my job was made very easy by the hard work of staffers Kimberly Bonner and Patricia Mackmiller. Also, it was my great pleasure to

associate with former Department Chair Nik Katapodes, and current Interim Chair Roman Hryciw during my term. In addition, we have a great board, and Walter Alix, as your new president, will guide our organization to new heights.

The fall football brunch will be upon us soon, and again will be held at the O’Neal Construction Company offi ces, for which CEEFA is very grateful. As everyone knows, their hospitality is legendary. This year, the event will be held on Saturday, September 22, 2007, before the U-M vs Penn State game. Mark your calendar and sign up with the form included in this issue, along with your dues.

The Spring Technical Session was a great success!! The nearly 50 attendees heard from Joe Parker, Senior Associate Athletic Director for U-M’s Department of Athletics, Neal Morton, Senior Project Manager for Barton Malow, and Virginia Wait, Executive Director of Resource Planning and Management at the College of Engineering. Joe and Neal gave excellent overviews of the impending expansion of the Big House, with which they are intimately involved, and Virginia gave a very enlightening and delightful talk about the history of North Campus, which she had researched extensively. Obviously, these presentations were on topics that are near and dear to the hearts of the U-M faithful. If you have a favorite topic to suggest, please let us know.

CEEFA continues to do what it can to honor its original mission to “strengthen ties between alumni and the department and to establish means for technical and fi nancial support.” However, our biggest opportunity to serve our department and our membership at the highest levels is to signifi cantly increase the number of members. Consider this: as alumni, we are both contributors to, and benefi ciaries of, the Department’s reputation. An increase in the CEEFA membership rolls will further enhance that reputation. So, if you enjoy the newsletter; are proud of the accomplishments of your fellow alumni, the current students, and the faculty; and want to support the current efforts to maintain the Department’s leadership position; please become a member of CEEFA. Renew your membership, recruit new members, and share your enthusiasm.

In closing, I wish to thank all who have supported the efforts of CEEFA and the Department over the years. If you have ideas you wish to share, or if you wish to add your name to either the potential mentor list or the ballot for Board membership, please contact me at [email protected]. I look forward to hearing from you. Go Blue!!

Gar Hoplamazian, PE, CEEFA Past President

As an incoming President, I was asked to write a brief note to be included in the CEEFA Newsletter.

First of all, I am honored to serve in this position and I look forward to the next two years. As a member of the CEEFA Board for six years, I have enjoyed working with the past three presidents, Dick Beaubien, Charlie Roarty

and Gar Hoplamazian. All three have picked up the baton and run enthusiastically with it. Interim Chair Roman Hryciw and the staff at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, including Kimberly Bonner and Patricia Mackmiller have been a constant support and are responsible for this fi ne publication.

I graduated from the University of Michigan with a Civil Engineering degree, as did my father. He graduated in 1936; I graduated in 1975. Both of my children also are engineers; one is a civil engineer, the other is a mechanical engineer. I would say engineering is in our blood.

In my mind, being an involved engineer is the cornerstone of the profession. Preparing reports, designing projects, overseeing construction, are all part of being an involved engineer. Joining professional associations, such as the Amer ican Water Works Assoc ia t ion, the Amer ican Publ ic Works Assoc ia t ion, the Amer ican Society of Civ i l Engineers, and the Michigan Society of Profess iona l Engineers, is an extension of the profession of engineering and keeps us involved with the profession. Being a member of the Department of Civil Engineering’s CEEFA is just one more commitment that an involved engineer makes for the betterment of the profession.

Being part of the alumni group provides a completely different aspect of the college life we all experienced. It allows us a glimpse into what goes on in the College of Engineering from an administrative aspect. This experience provides assurance for the future as we see how the engineering program has progressed. In short, future engineers are in good hands at the University of Michigan.

Please join us as member of CEEFA. The cost is nominal; the benefi ts are great; and your membership sends a message that civil and environmental engineers not only care about the past, but about the future of their profession as well.

Walter H. Alix, PE, P.S. Incoming CEEFA President

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CEE Newsletter

Snapshots from the Spring Technical Meeting


DEPARTMENT NEWSIntegrating Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Research and Education: A Strategic Call to Action for CEE

By Professor Peter Adriaens

“What can you learn from rock music, insect behavior, foreign business practices, and meteorite patterns? You’ll never know until you step into the Intersection and fi nd out” (Frans Johansson, The Medici Effect)

In May 2006, I attended the Michigan Growth Capital Symposium, a major conference focused on venture capital investment in university-based technologies that was organized by the Samuel Zell-Robert H. Lurie Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies (at the U-M Ross School of Business). With an attendance of more than 400, this two-day conference started more than 25 years ago (when there was no venture capital to speak of in Michigan) and focuses on both the knowledge economy, and on technology-based job creation from startup companies. During one of the sessions, I sat next to a serial entrepreneur in a panel on early technology investment strategies. He leaned over to me and said “if you want to do this, fail fast, fail hard, and learn, and . . . read The Medici Effect”. Thus began my sabbatical leave during which I wanted to focus on entrepreneurship education, research and practice. Based on the subtitle of the suggested book (“Breakthrough Insights at the Intersection of Ideas, Concepts and Cultures”), I knew I was going to be pushed out of my comfort zone. I have since read the book twice.

In the fi nal throes of my sabbatical in entrepreneurship and innovation, I would like to both share some lessons learned and discuss my perspective on the opportunities for integrating entrepreneurship education and research in our strategic positioning of CEE. To be sure, this opportunity would not have been possible if it weren’t for the support of Tim Faley and Tom Kinnaer, managing and executive directors of the Zell-Lurie Institute at the Ross School of Business, and Paul Freedman and his senior management team at LimnoTech (Ann Arbor). These innovative organizations, which funded part of my leave, allowed me to partake freely in all of their activities, supported my direct participation in new market development or outreach efforts, and encouraged my participation in educational program development and action-based learning. the institute was established ten years ago to support business and engineering students with the identifi cation of technology-based business opportunities and business plan competitions, with emphasis on value creation and identifying decision processes in the adoption of technology.

The message of learning from failure—usually driven by a lack of understanding of market needs, an unwillingness by the customer and consumer to take risks, or simply because the market does not yet exist—was consistent, as was the exhilarating joy of success. This is not too different from our research endeavors, and the challenges of getting federal funding. The difference between

university-based research proposals and entrepreneurial market innovations is that the former addresses technological uncertainties and challenges (no requirement of economic value creation); the latter, however, must address

• technological uncertainties (robustness, scalability, cost-effectiveness, existing solutions);

• market uncertainties (value proposition, competing solutions/approaches, distribution network); and

• business uncertainties (start-up vs corporate, fi scal sustainability, models for value capture).

Herein lies one of the fundamental differences between creative inventions and innovations, concepts which all too often are intermixed. Ultimately, society decides whether a creative idea is innovative or valuable. It is not surprising, then, that of all the invention disclosures submitted to the U-M Offi ce of Technology Transfer (OTT), only about 2% (on average) will generate license revenue (at last count: approximately $20M in

2006). Nor is it surprising that venture capital fi rms will invest in only about one out of 150-200 projects that are considered per year (out of the 1000 or so in the total pool). Of these projects invested, one in ten will survive the fi ve-year mark; approximately one in twenty will survive the ten-year mark. Considering such success rates, it may be diffi cult to understand why so much emphasis is placed on (particularly) technology-based entrepreneurship to transform the Michigan economy, and indeed economies worldwide.

Drivers for Entrepreneurship and CleanTech Venture Investment

Venture capital-backed start-ups are an important source of innovation and technological development and serve as a major source of new wealth creation. In fact, initial public offerings from venture-based start-ups have accounted for one-third of the market value of all initial public offerings in the US each year. Despite its successes, however, entrepreneurship, and particularly technology-based entrepreneurship, is highly uncertain as the opportunities tend to occur when markets are in disequilibrium and knowledge is dispersed. Venture investment has traditionally been most active in computing and biotechnology.

In 2006, Clean Tech has become the third-largest recipient of venture investment ($2.9 billion), indicating the potential for economic growth in this technology innovation space, primarily driven by investments in California, Massachusetts, and Texas. Clean technologies have the opportunity to deliver dramatic improvements in resource effi ciency and productivity, thereby creating more economic value with less energy and materials, or less waste and toxicity. These innovations generally deliver equal or superior performance as compared to incumbent technologies. Technologies are clustered in diverse industry sectors, including energy (about 2/3 of total investment), water and wastewater, manufacturing, advanced materials, transportation and agriculture (see the chart in Figure 1). Applications range from energy-effi cient lighting, to wind and solar energy, to water fi ltration, to next-generation batteries, to advanced materials to make products lighter/stronger/cheaper, to non-toxic pesticides. Importantly, the market for these technologies continues to expand, as more and more

It is impossible to assess whether a product, service, or technology is innovative, if it has never been used, seen, or evaluated.

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CEE Newsletter

investors realize how innovative or novel technology can make better use of natural resources in a way that provides economic value.

This trend has resulted in the launching of a Cleantech Index™ on the stock market (ticker CTIUS) to refl ect the surging global demand for Clean Tech products and services. Currently, CTIUS is comprised of 45 companies that are leaders in Clean Tech innovation and commercial deployment across a broad range of industry sectors: from alternative energy and energy effi ciency to advanced materials, from air and water purifi cation, eco-friendly agriculture/nutrition to power transmission, etc. The State of Michigan has recognized the importance of Clean Tech investment (including energy) as indicated by incubator facilities such as NextEnergy.

For a few years now, media attention and strategic discussions at engineering and medical schools across the country have focused on instilling an entrepreneurial culture in education and incorporating value creation from research. For example, the National Research Council (NRC) and the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) have called for a change in the educational training of engineers to instill (paraphrased from the Education for the Engineer of 2020 NAE report):

1. Practical ingenuity: the intersections between technology and social/public policies are becoming increasingly important.

2. Creativity: requiring the synthesis of a broader range of interdisciplinary knowledge and a greater focus on systemic constructs and outcomes.

3. Communication: increasingly involve interdisciplinary teams, globally diverse team members, public offi cials, and a global customer base.

4. Business and management principles: growing interdependence between technology and the economic and social foundations of modern society.

5. Dynamism, agility, resilience, and fl exibility: the ability to learn new things quickly and the ability to apply knowledge to new problems and new contexts.

ASCE’s vision for civil engineering in 2025 lists “creativity and entrepreneurship that leads to proactive identifi cation of possibilities and opportunities and taking action to develop them” as

the fi rst attribute required for effective professional practice. During the last few years, organizers for the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) conferences have planned sessions focused on entrepreneurship in education. Stanford University (through its Technology Ventures Program), in cooperation with universities in Asia, Europe and Latin America, has rotated a Roundtable in Entrepreneurship Education for the last half decade. At the College of Engineering, Dean David Munson and Vice President for Research Stephen Forrest have made entrepreneurship and research of societal importance a cornerstone of their administrations—not only to help remake the CoE and U-M, but to drive Michigan’s conversion to a knowledge-based economy as well.

[Clearly, there are drivers to become proactive and defi ne a role for CEE in this emerging trend.]

At the faculty and student levels, the buzz on entrepreneurship has largely translated into the narrow perception that “we need to spin off more companies from research”. Clearly, this has become a priority for the State of Michigan, the City of Ann Arbor, and the U-M Offi ce of Technology Transfer, driven by the loss of jobs from the automotive sector, Pfi zer Pharmaceutical’s closing of its Michigan facilities, and the launch of SPARK as a hub for entrepreneurial startup companies. The launch of successful new companies from university R&D is a dividend from the marriage of programmatic efforts within the university and capital investment from the fi nancial sector in the startup realm, but this is only the end of a long road.

[There is an urgent need to start a broader discussion (i) on the opportunities to engage faculty and students in this cultural change of start-up ventures through research and education efforts, and (ii) on the implications for strategic positioning of CEE in the College of Engineering and beyond. There is no one strategy to address this paradigm shift, and many of the assumptions may be wrong; however, I think that the opportunities presented outweigh the risks.]

Entrepreneurship in Education

For a program in entrepreneurship to be successful, there must be an educational component that integrates value creation in engineering endeavors. At the institute, I was supported by the Williamson Initiative, an educational program funded by a U-M alumnus who made his fortune in radio transmission towers for cell phones. Co-signed by Business School Dean Bob Dolan, and former CoE Dean Steve Director, the Initiative aspires to achieve four specifi c objectives:

1. To provide an entrepreneurial business foundation for engineering students;

2. To provide advanced knowledge in emerging engineering sciences to business students (e.g. nanotechnology, optics, advanced networking, etc.);

3. To foster interdisciplinary education and collaboration between engineering and business students at the University of Michigan; and

4. To establish the Warren P. Williamson, III Award to encourage and recognize business and engineering student collaboration on business plans.

Integral to this initiative is the development of new course offerings. I had the opportunity to help develop and co-teach a course on “Entrepreneurial Business Fundamentals for Scientists and

Figure 1


Engineers”. The course’s premise is to make engineers understand a business framework of science and technology beyond “cost” both to (i) create value for the organization—from small entrepreneurial to large corporate organization; and (ii) have that organization understand the value of one’s efforts. Transcending from a “cost” to a “value” proposition requires understanding and quantifying how the elements of an individual’s efforts impact revenue and strategic positioning. Accomplishing this requires a broader understanding of innovation, strategy, fi nance, and marketing. This is illustrated in the innovation process pyramid (Figure 2).

The students learn that the initial idea or solution to a technical problem in a given opportunity space is rarely the ultimate product that is valued by the market (hence, the 2% success rate in licensing disclosures). To attempt to increase the likelihood that a solution will be valuable in an economic sense, the students are provided the tools to work at the bottom of the pyramid, to assess the “who”, “how”, and “why’ anyone (community) should care about the solution, or how this solution should be modifi ed (technology map) to address a compelling need (persona). In part, this involves looking at alternate or current solutions available in the technology opportunity space.

[I tested this premise during a one-week Green Entrepreneurship Academy (sponsored by the Kauffmann Foundation, organized by UC Davis) that my student Corrie Clark and I participated in near Lake Tahoe. We were asked to bring one of our research projects—in my case heavy metal biorecognition technology—and take it through the fi lters of entrepreneurial venture creation. The regulatory driver for my technology is the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) which requires testing of contaminated sites for eight metals (Ag, As, Ba, Cd, Cr, Hg, Pb, Se). These analyses are currently done off-line. Our proposed technical solution is to use nanosensors based on biomolecular recognition, because they have better specifi city and have faster turnaround times. The question from an entrepreneurial perspective is to fi nd out whether this solution makes strategic, fi nancial, and market sense before too many resources are committed. By assessing the value of current solutions, the value that end-users place on speed of analysis, and the complementary assets that need to be in place to develop robust sensing technology, the original solution changed. Speed was not necessarily an attribute that the market wanted to pay more for; robustness and specifi city, however, were. The product offering was simpler in design and compatible with

current hand-held detection platforms, such that it could be marketed akin to the “printer and ink cartridge” business model.]

As we took the ENG 599 students through the semester-long project in two innovation spaces (cyberinfrastructure and water-for-energy), the result of the course is that many successful new business opportunities tend to be based on an evolutionary, rather than on a revolutionary technical solution to a current or future market need. Based on the student demand, this course will now be taught on an annual basis, and will be complemented by a course in CleanTech Entrepreneurship in Fall 2007. A collaborative effort with Stanford and UC-Davis, this course will focus on innovation drivers and business models for, among others: clean energy, emissions reduction, water reuse, conservation, pollution prevention, and biodiversity.

[What I have come to appreciate is that, if we want University R&D to play a greater role in economic value creation, we have to (i) expose our students to the fundamentals that aid them in arguing the creation of value from research; (ii) help them understand strategies and markets to translate ideas into innovations; and (iii) teach them the skills to assess opportunities in the value chain of our profession.]

Entrepreneurship in Research

If the premise of the innovation pyramid for value creation is, indeed, to increase the potential for success of research translation into practice, it has the possibility to inform how we focus our research efforts. The University of Michigan is a research university, and at least in theory, has not been driven by economics or markets. Yet, as we attempt to address the expectation that universities take a greater role in value and job creation, we cannot continue “business as usual”. Just recently, for example, there was a report from the offi ce of the Vice President for Research that encouraged the strong engagement of industry in research. Valuation of our research by current and future markets then must become an explicit expectation—as it already is for NSF engineering research centers, defense (e.g. DARPA), IT and computing, and biomedical device areas of research. The challenge is to transcend the challenge that CEE products are not necessarily aimed at consumers, but rather benefi t public or corporate clients.

Enter the role and opportunity for engaging engineering

Figure 3: PhD Candidate Corrie Clark practices her ‘elevator pitch’ on a green roof design simulator to an investor from Sierra Angels

Figure 2

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CEE Newsletter

consulting companies to help frame research needs and opportunities to address technological challenges in a context of market and business uncertainties (driven by regulation). At LimnoTech, I was engaged to help develop inroads in new markets, including emerging contaminants in wastewater effl uents, environmental observatories, sediment remediation, and uncertainty-based decision-making. This experience taught me an appreciation of the innovative nature (i.e. putting new ideas into practice) of environmental engineering consulting, an understanding of the impact of providing value-added service to clients, and the dependence on partnerships to ‘win the contract’ with creative solutions at the right cost. As the result of my interactions at the company, a number of proposals (NSF, NIEHS) were developed that integrate research opportunities with client needs, and future growth markets.

[For example, in collaboration with the Zell-Lurie Institute and LimnoTech, Associate Professor Christian Lastoskie and I are putting together a program that addresses technology development for reduced water use in power plants. The impetus was driven by two developments: (i) outcomes of an EPRI-funded project at LimnoTech, focused on understanding the needs of electric utility managers to address water consumption; and (ii) the Department of Energy’s water-energy nexus strategy which defi ned the objectives of the technology opportunity space for 2015. The regulatory-driven market opportunities for these enabling technologies require strategic positioning of innovations in this space. It is not clear at this time which technology solutions will best serve the needs of the utilities sector, what the market demand will be as the power-generating capacity changes (est. additional 150 power pants by 2020), nor what the price point will be to trigger investment. By directly engaging practitioners and business development programs, water conservation technologies will be identifi ed commensurate with business incentivation strategies (e.g. nutrient and emissions trading) for technology adoption, and consumer behavior modifi cation strategies to change energy consumption.]

This project would not have emerged, or would have been framed differently (i.e. primarily technology focused) if it weren’t for the understanding of (i) the economics of energy production, and the role (cost) water plays in this equation, and (ii) consumer behavior. Another project (NIEHS) focuses on alternative contaminated sediment management strategies (aside from capping, dredging, or natural recovery)—again driven by demand, side economics, and identifi cation of need, as the result of consulting projects for corporate clients. Finally, we have incorporated the value-driven research approach in an NSF engineering research center

(ERC) proposal (Vehicles Interfacing Grids, Optimizing Resources or VIGOR) led by Professor Ann Marie Sastry (U-Mechanical Engineering) and Harold Schock (Michigan State University). The thrust on “Technology Assessment for Business Development and Sustainability” aims to: (i) develop techno-economic drivers for entrepreneurial business opportunities based on inventions in plug-in hybrids and ‘green’ grid design; and (ii) implement these drivers as boundary conditions for research emphasis during the ten-year life of the proposed center.

[There clearly exists an underutilized opportunity to engage engineering consulting fi rms to help tailor high-quality research endeavors to market needs or address future market developments.]

Globally, this trend is happening already. For example, European universities are establishing innovation centers by blending the consulting process with laboratory incubators—specifi cally to catalyze research programs with the ultimate focus on new business development. In mainland China, universities are setting up new environmental engineering incubators that are co-funded by government and industry. Their focus is on water reuse and recycling and sustainable building designs. Industrial sponsors receive exclusive intellectual property licenses to bring research products to market or to otherwise monetize inventions.

[The implication is that the explicit requirement of value generation yields different outcomes from those guided by addressing technological needs only. Understanding, communicating, and anticipating market needs in research will produce engineering graduates both educated for success in technological and consulting innovation, and armed with the know-how for transformative leadership opportunities.]

The Future of (CleanTech) Entrepreneurship at U-MFast forward one year, and I am on my way home from

an environmental nanotechnology conference in Taiwan. During my one-week stay, I had the opportunity to explore how Clean Tech entrepreneurship is pursued at three national universities (Taipei, Taichung, and Tainan). Largely an economic backwater two decades ago, Taiwan has created one “silicon valley” focused on the semiconductor industry and computing; it is on its way to replicate this success in the biotech sector, with emphasis on drug

Figure 4

Figure 5


design, alternative energy, and nanotechnology for environmental applications. Its success is refl ected in evidence that Taiwan is bringing in engineers from Japan to sustain their growth model. As part of their strategy, universities commit upwards of 10% of their operating budget in technology incubator infrastructure, and provide student fellowships to work at these facilities, equally sustained by industry and government. At a meeting with the Provost and the President of National Chung Hsing University in Taichung, I learned of their commitment to translational research, and the accepted cost of failure of lab-based ventures to achieve the few innovative successes.

As the State of Michigan ponders and works toward seeing entrepreneurial activity transform its economy, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and the University will need to step “outside the box”, embrace risk, and promote translational research. A great start in the CoE is the recent formation of a student entrepreneurship organization (MPowered), and the upcoming start-up/small company job fairs in Fall ’07 and Winter ’08, which will become an annual event. A certifi cate program in entrepreneurship was proposed to the CoE Dean and the External Advisory Committee at the Committee’s Spring ’07 meeting. The national—and indeed global—interest in Clean Tech, together with the environmental and energy know-how at U-M (within the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Energy Institute, the Graham Environmental Sustainability Institute, and the Environmental and Water Resource Engineering program) has become the catalyst for an emerging effort to put together a center for Clean Tech Entrepreneurship. The efforts integrate engineering, entrepreneurial studies, regulatory and business incentives (Erb), the Offi ce of Technology Transfer, and a handful of entrepreneurial business entities in Ann Arbor (CleanTech Venture Network, Shepard Advisors, and LimnoTech).

The objective is to help put U-M on the map in Clean Tech Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Looking back at my fi rst Michigan Growth Capital Symposium, my one-year sabbatical immersion in entrepreneurship has not only been transformational to my career, but it has initiated an exciting new track that is gathering momentum.

Figure 6: Our group following a remediation workshop in Tainan. Former PhD student Shu-Chi Chang (top row right) is now an assistant professor at National Chung Hsing University in Taichung.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to seek and develop strategic opportunities for CEE.

Application of Wireless Sensor Networks to Real-Time Control of Seismically Excited Structures

By PhD Pre-candidate R. Andrew Swartz andAssistant Professor Jerome P. Lynch

Strong earthquakes can cause severe damage to structures; in some instances, such events can even induce global collapse resulting in the deaths of inhabitants. In recent years, “smart” structure technologies have emerged to enhance the safety and robustness of civil structures. For example, low-cost wireless sensors densely instrumented in civil structures have been shown capable of autonomously identifying the onset of structural damage. However, to further enhance the safety of civil structures, a means of controlling the response of the structure during seismic loading is needed.

Structural control has gained popularity over the past decade as one method of improving the dynamic performance of buildings, bridges, and other complex civil engineering structures. A structural control system consists of actuators that can apply control forces to the structure, based on real-time response data recorded using a monitoring system. While it has been shown that structural control systems can be effective in mitigating the response of large-scale structures (Spencer and Nagarajaiah, 2003), system costs and long-term reliability concerns still remain as barriers to widespread commercial adoption. Semi-active structural control devices have been developed to address these cost and reliability concerns. Compared to large actuators, semi-active structural control devices, such as magnetrorheological (MR) dampers (Figure 1), are relatively inexpensive to fabricate, use minimal electrical power to operate, and can be conveniently powered by battery power supplies. In addition, they have been successfully demonstrated in various seismic control applications (Dyke, et al., 1998). The forces achievable with these semi-active devices, however, are smaller in magnitude than those achievable by an active device. Hence, a large number of semi-active devices generally are needed to accomplish typical control goals. Recently completed structures that employ semi-active control devices include the 54-story Mori Tower (356 semi-active hydraulic dampers (SHD) devices) and the 38-story Shiodome Tower (88 SHD devices), both in Tokyo, Japan. Large numbers of semi-active devices provide greater reliability to the control system; as the number of

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CEE Newsletter

actuators increase, the impact of failure of a single-control device on the overall system is minimized.

Use of semi-active control devices in a centralized control system is not a complete solution to the cost and reliability problems often associated with structural control. As the size of the control system grows (as defi ned by the number of control devices), cost savings realized by use of semi-active devices are eroded by the high costs of installing extensive lengths of wiring between sensors and actuators. Despite the distribution of actuation, centralized computation of command forces requires a central computer which can be a potential single point of failure. Safely improving the performance of distributed actuation is possible when they are provided with redundant means of coordination. Wireless sensors currently under development at the University of Michigan (Figure 2), may be installed without the expense of cable installation, thus providing a low-cost link between distributed controllers. Wireless sensors with embedded computational power also are able to perform on-board data interrogation, thereby eliminating the need to transmit raw data to centralized servers. Recent work by Lynch et al. (2007) has demonstrated the ability of wireless sensors to execute structural control applications for civil structures when wireless sensors collect sensor data, calculate control actions using centralized and decentralized (Wang et al. 2006) control algorithms, and command actuators.

Wireless control systems however, have inherent limitations that prevent them from functioning as perfect replacements for traditional wired systems. For example, wireless data transmission introduces latency issues that reduce sampling rates. Low sample rates can decrease the effectiveness of the control system. Limitations on the availability of communication bandwidth between wireless sensors also present problems for centralized control. A dense network of hundreds of controllers and wireless sensors will be unable to wirelessly communicate raw sensor data between units at an effective rate using the fi xed bandwidth available. Finally, energy constraints further limit the activities of wireless sensors in the fi eld. Wireless sensors are typically powered by internal battery packs with limited life expectancies. This requires control algorithms that are designed to limit the units’ reliance on energy-intensive operations, particularly communication using wireless modems.

To overcome the previously mentioned challenges of using wireless sensors for structural control, a partially-distributed control scheme tolerant of data loss and in which the available wireless bandwidth is strategically utilized is adopted. In such a system, wireless sensors responsible for collecting sensor outputs and supplying actuator commands are each embedded with identical static Kalman estimators. The resulting state estimates are compared to locally available measured data and used to compute the feedback control forces when errors between measured and estimated state data are small. Only when the error exceeds a threshold value specifi ed by the designer are the measured values wirelessly transmitted to the network of sensors and used for feedback control. Based on a previous proposal for wireless control (Yook, et al. 2002), wireless bandwidth is strategically leveraged so as to improve the performance of the global control system, as well as reduce network energy consumption.

To validate the performance of a real-time structural control system based on the University of Michigan wireless sensor platform, a network of wireless sensors has been installed on a three-story (10m tall) steel structure constructed at the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering (NCREE) in Taipei, Taiwan (Figures 3a & 3b). A unique feature of the NCREE facility is the availability of a 5-by-5-m2, six-degree-of-freedom shaking table that can be used to apply realistic ground motions to test structures mounted to the table surface. In close collaboration with Professors C. H. Loh (NTU), Yang Wang (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Kincho Law (Stanford University), our wireless sensors are shown capable of attaining an outstanding level of control performance during seismic excitation of the test structure. In our study, a wireless sensor is installed upon each fl oor of the structure to record its velocity response and to command a 20 kN MR damper. Each wireless sensor is programmed to measure the local fl oor velocity and to use that measurement to estimate the state vector for the entire structure using a static Kalman estimator. Comparisons to the measured velocity and that of the state vector are used to keep the estimate accurate within a predefi ned error threshold. Estimates that are in error beyond that threshold are replaced with the measured value both locally and throughout the network so that only the most critical measured data points are transmitted by the wireless sensors. Updated state data is wirelessly communicated, as needed, by each wireless sensor to the entire network. The improved state vector estimate assembled by each wireless sensor is then used to calculate feedback control forces using a linear quadratic regulation (LQR) algorithm. To apply these control forces, the wireless sensors issue command voltages to the MR dampers.

Figure 1: Magnetorheological (MR) damper for structural control.

Figure 2: NARADA wireless sensor platform capable of real-time structural control.


As shown in Figure 4, the wireless control system is able to drastically reduce the inter-story drift of the three-story structure excited using the El Centro (1940 North-South Imperial Valley) ground motion record. Inter-story drift is the primary response measurement considered since damage to the structure is directly correlated to the drift of each story. In this study, drift profi les corresponding to the partially decentralized control solution implemented on the wireless sensor network are compared to the structure using no control and using the MR dampers in their passive state. During testing, the wireless sensor network proved to be reliable with no data loss. Furthermore, the multi-functionality of the wireless sensor platform (sense, communicate, compute, and actuate) has been successfully illustrated. In August 2007, a new six-story test structure equipped with six MR-dampers is planned for further testing of the wireless control system. These tests are to be an extension of the three-story control tests performed by Swartz and Lynch (2007).

Figure 3a: A three-story steel structure mounted to the shaking table at NCREE.

Figure 3b: The location of wireless sensors, velocity meters, and MR dampers in the test structure.

Figure 4: Maximum inter-story drift response of the three-story structure to the El Centrol ground motion record. The partially decentralized control solution with various error thresholds are compared to a “passive” control solution as well as to one with no control (i.e. bare structure).

References:

Dyke, S. J., Spencer, B. F., Jr., Sain, M. K., and Carlson, J. D. (1998). “An experimental study of MR dampers for seismic protection.” Smart Materials and Structures, 7(5):693-703.

Lynch, J. P., Wang, Y., Swartz, R. A., Lu, K. C., Loh, C. H. (2007). “Implementation of a closed-loop structural control system using wireless sensor networks.” Journal of Structural Control and Health Monitoring, Wiley, accepted and in press.

Spencer, B. F. and Nagarajaiah, S. (2003). “State of the Art of Structural Control,” Journal of Structural Engineering, 129(7):845-856.

Swartz, R. A. and Lynch, J. P. (2007). “Partial decentralized wireless control through distributed computing for seismically excited civil structures: theory and validation.” Proceedings of the 2007 American Controls Conference, New York City, NY.

Wang, Y., Swartz, R. A., Lynch, J. P., Law, K. H., Lu K.-C., and Loh C.-H. (2006). “Decentralized civil structural control using a real-time wireless sensing and control system,” Proceedings of the 4th World Conference on Structural Control and Monitoring (4WCSCM), San Diego, California.

Yook, J. K., Tilbury D. M., and Soparkar, N. R. (2002). “Trading computation for bandwidth: reducing communication in distributed control systems using state estimators.” IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, 10(4):503-518.

12 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

The 2008 Edition of the ACI Building CodeBy Professor James K. Wight, FE Richart, Jr. Collegiate Professor

James K. Wight, FE Richart, Jr. Collegiate Professor of Civil Engineering, is fi nishing a six-year term as the Chairman of the ACI Building Code Committee. During his tenure as committee chair, Professor Wight has overseen both technical changes in the Code, as well as changes in the code-development process.

One of the most signifi cant changes has been an increase in the direct involvement in the code-

development process by different countries. The ACI Building Code is used in all Central and South American countries, with the exception of Brazil. In recognition of this fact, Professor Wight selected seven members from fi ve different countries to serve on the code committee. This was, however, only the beginning of direct involvement from Latin American countries. A subcommittee was created and charged with developing an offi cial Spanish version of the ACI Code. That subcommittee successfully created a 2005 edition of the Spanish ACI Code and currently is working to complete a Spanish version of the 2008 Code—to be released shortly after the English version is unveiled.

To get more direct input on technical topics, an International Liaison Subcommittee was created in 2005. This subcommittee is composed of international members (currently only from Latin America); its primary task is to suggest methods for modifying the ACI Code so that it can accommodate differences in construction practices in various Latin American countries. Future plans are to create a more diverse membership for this subcommittee by including members from some of the Middle Eastern and Western Pacifi c countries that use the ACI Code as the basis for concrete building codes in their countries.

At the beginning of his six-year term as the committee chair, Professor Wight also created a subcommittee whose sole purpose was to examine new materials and products either being used currently or proposed for use in the construction of concrete building structures. This subcommittee was created in response to prior complaints that the Code Committee was unwilling to consider and evaluate new products. Although this subcommittee was less busy than anticipated, it did help in the development of code sections that will permit and regulate the fi rst structural uses of steel fi ber-reinforced concrete (FRC). (This effort, led by Associate Professor Gustavo Parra-Montesinos, is described in another article in this newsletter.) This signifi cant fi rst step should open up the ACI Code for other possible uses of FRC in concrete structures. In particular, the series of research projects at the University of Michigan that have addressed the use of high-performance FRC for earthquake resistant design of concrete structures should impact future editions of the ACI Code.

One noteworthy technical change is a limitation on the depth of a concrete beam that can be designed without a minimum amount of shear reinforcement. Considerable experimental evidence has shown that the shear strength of a concrete beam without minimum shear reinforcement decreases with an increase in the depth of the member. Although this experimental trend will not

be refl ected directly in the Code shear strength equations, there will be more restrictions on the depth of concrete beams that can be designed without minimum shear reinforcement. A new option offered to designers, as noted above, is to use deformed steel fi bers in the concrete mix in lieu of using the minimum amount of bar-type reinforcement for shear. Minimum performance criteria are specifi ed for the steel FRC mixes that can be used in concrete beams as a replacement for bar-type shear reinforcement.

The ACI Code will now permit and regulate the use of steel-stud shear reinforcement in slabs near connections to columns. The shear strength of slabs at slab-to-column connections is a very critical region for concrete buildings constructed using slab-column framing. Punching shear failures at these connections have led to some dramatic collapses—either during construction or during strong shaking due to an earthquake. The use of steel studs gives the designer an effi cient and effective method to enhance the slab shear strength at these critical connections. Associate Professor Parra-Montesinos currently is studying the use of a high-performance FRC mix to enhance the shear strength of the slab in regions adjacent to the column. If this project is successful it will remove the need for either steel shear studs or any form of extra shear reinforcement.

Finally, a new reinforcement detail will be permitted in shear wall coupling beams. As the name implies, these are beams that normally run above elevator or other door openings and “couple” together the walls on both sides of the opening. The force and deformation demands on these coupling beams during an earthquake are severe; earlier research resulted in code requirements for a complex reinforcing scheme that is almost impossible to construct. Based on recent experiments, the ACI Code will now permit a relaxation of the confi nement reinforcement requirements for these coupling beams. Current research in CEE, directed by Professor Wight and Associate Professor Parra-Montesinos, has demonstrated that a much more dramatic simplifi cation in coupling beam reinforcement can be achieved through the use of a high-performance FRC mix. If successful, this research study could lead to design modifi cations for coupling beams in future editions of the ACI Code.

“Building Bridges”By Assistant Professor Russell A. Green, Assistant Professor Ioannis K. Brilakis, and Assistant Professor Jerome P. Lynch

Engineering has been called “the most unrecognized occupation in the world” (Petroski, 2007)— despite the fact that our society’s entire infrastructure (roads, bridges, waterworks, power lines, communication systems, schools, hospitals, and so on) are designed and built by engineers. As a result, many children in the United States never even consider engineering as a career option. To combat this unfortunate situation, at least at the local level, three years ago Assistant Professors Russell Green and Jerome Lynch initiated an engineering educational outreach program with Mrs. Cecchini’s 2nd grade class at Bates Elementary School, in Dexter, Michigan. The goal of the program: to inform the elementary school children about what engineers do and to show them, in a fun way, how engineers use math and science to benefi t society. To date, the program has focused on the design and construction of bridges, and consequently, has become to be known as the “Building Bridges” program.


This year the program was conducted on May 24th, and in addition to Assistant Professor Green, Assistant Professor Ioannis Brilakis and University of Michigan graduate students Dave Saftner, Kate Gunberg, Andy Zimmerman, Andrew Schwartz, Tsung-Chin Hou, Mantia Athanasopoulou, Remy Lequesne, and Niki Fanouraki participated in the program. (Due to research-related travel, Professor Lynch was unable to participate in the program this year but assisted in its planning.) The program consisted of a lecture on the various types of bridges, a video on how bridges are constructed, and a student design competition. For the design competition, the students worked in groups of 2 or 3 with Professors Green or Brilakis or one of the graduate students. Using bridge design software West Point Bridge Designer 2006, each group designed their own truss bridge. The competition allowed the students the opportunity to both apply the knowledge that they learned from the lecture and video and use their own creativity and artistic expressions. The West Point Bridge Designer 2006 software is very user friendly and can be freely downloaded from http://www-personal.umich.edu/~rugreen/fi les/ (fi le name: setup6x.exe). The software tests bridges by allowing a truck to drive over them. Poorly designed bridges collapse as the truck drives across—particularly fun for the 2nd grade group. After the initial simulation, students were charged with modifying designs until their bridges were “safe”. The winning model—the most economical and safe bridge—was designed by the student team led by Andy Zimmerman.

In the future, it is planned that the Building Bridge Program will be expanded to allow students to build popsicle-stick bridges and test them with weights, as well as providing exposure to additional topics of civil and environmental engineering.

Acknowledgements:Financial support for the Building Bridges Program came from the National Science Foundation grants CMMI 0530378 and CMMI 0644580

References:Petroski, H. (2007). “Speaking Up for Engineers,” Prism, ASEE, Summer 2007, 26.

Figure 1: Class photo - In addition to Assistant Professors Brilakis and Green (seated left to right), CEE graduate students Dave Saftner, Kate Gunberg, Andy Zimmerman, Andrew Schwartz, Tsung-Chin Hou, Mantia Athanasopoulou, Remy Lequesne, and Niki Fanouraki volunteered their time to work with the 2nd graders.

Figure 2: Assistant Professor Green presents a lecture on truss bridges. University of Michigan Technician Rick Burch made a simple truss out of wood that was used as a demonstration.

Figure 3: 2nd graders tested the bridge they designed using the West Point Bridge Designer 2006 software.

Figure 4: Sample certifi cate awarded to the 2nd graders after the bridge lecture and design competition.

14 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

Location-Aware Contextual Information Retrieval on Construction Sites

By PhD Candidate Hiam M. Khoury, and Assistant Professor Vineet R. Kamat

Introduction

Field construction tasks such as inspection, progress monitoring, and so on, require access to a wide range of project information (both visual and textual). Currently, site engineers, inspectors, and other site personnel working on construction sites must spend time searching manually through detailed drawings and other paper-based media to access the information needed for important decision making. Such lost time amounts to lost productivity, and thus lost money.

As a possible alternative to this tedious manual-retrieval task, research being conducted at the University of Michigan is investigating a new methodology that can allow rapid on-site identifi cation and retrieval of contextual information from project databases.

The presented research attempts to achieve this by designing and implementing a dynamic user-viewpoint tracking scheme that can allow real-time identifi cation of construction entities visible in a user’s fi eld of view at any given time and location. Within this scheme, outdoor positioning technologies together with location-based wireless technologies are being integrated.

Motivation

The motivation of this research is to design a new methodology that can allow rapid identifi cation and retrieval of contextual project information for important decision-making tasks of site personnel (engineers, managers, inspectors, and others). The merit of the technical approach lies mainly in taking advantage of the latest developments in outdoor and indoor positioning technologies in order to track users and provide them with real-time automated access to project information. The overarching goal is to minimize the time and effort needed for search and retrieval of contextual project information—thus reducing the time, cost, and effort currently needed for this process.

Proposed Location-Aware Methodology

Location-aware technologies have evolved over the last several years and are aimed at providing mobile users ubiquitous access to the right information at the right time. The challenge in the proposed research project is to accurately and continuously track users on jobsites using location-aware technologies—specifi cally to identify relevant entities and retrieve contextual information. Figure

1 summarizes the proposed methodology. The position where the user is located on the jobsite (whether indoors or outdoors), and the direction in which the user is looking are continuously monitored to interpret the construction entities that might be visible to the user (i.e. in the user’s fi eld of view) at a given instant. Once the entities in context at the particular location are identifi ed, the back-end project databases and information resources can be queried for information pertaining to those entities; such information can then be presented to the user interactively.

Figure 1: Proposed Georeferenced Information Retrieval Methodology

GPS-based User Position Tracking for Outdoor Applications

For outdoor applications, positioning techniques have been investigated and validated in recent work by our research group (Behzadan and Kamat 2005, 2006). The outdoor positioning technologies were integrated within an outdoor AR platform (UM-AR-GPS-ROVER). The hardware confi guration consists of a geo-referencing-based algorithm developed using Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers and magnetic orientation tracking devices to track user’s dynamic viewpoint. A mobile user equipped with UM-AR-GPS-ROVER hardware is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Outdoor Hardware Prototype


Using the aforementioned outdoor-positioning tools, a preliminary proof of concept experiment was performed to validate the proposed georeferenced information retrieval methodology. Conducted at the GG Brown (GGB) building at the University of Michigan, the objective was to identify the different zones of the building (i.e. the Civil and Environmental, Mechanical, and Dow sections) as the user navigates around the building and observes the different segments. The position where the user is located on the jobsite and the direction in which he or she is looking are obtained from the GPS and orientation tracker. Additionally, given the near and far distances as well as the fi eld of view angles, the eight coordinates of the truncated pyramid (i.e. viewing frustum) are computed (Shreiner et al. 2005). Then the viewing frustum is aligned with computer representations of objects (i.e. building structure) that exist in the space through which the user is navigating. In this case, a 3-D VRML model of GGB’s external shell is registered at the known outdoor location. In order to interpret which entities in the environment are visible to an on-site user at a given instant, an interference analysis technique known as “raycasting” (Foley 1990) is used. Raycasting was implemented, using a simple method to determine the intersection between a ray (virtual line segment originating from the user) and a polygon in 3-D (the building model in this case). Each time the user moves on the site, the intersection between the rays and the object of interest (designed entity) is computed and interference detection is reported. As a matter of fact, the user in this experiment was moving around the building; based on his position obtained from the GPS and the orientation provided by the tracker, the computer was interpreting which building segment was in the view at each time instant. Figure 3 shows both virtual and real camera views of snapshots taken during the conducted experiment.

Figure 3: Virtual (i.e. Computer-Interpreted) and Corresponding Real Views of the GG Brown Laboratory Building

WLAN-based User Position Tracking for Indoor Applications

For indoor applications, GPS technology is not suitable, because it becomes less accurate when there is no continuous straight signal path between the satellite and the receiver. There is a need, therefore,

to investigate feasible techniques of user position and orientation tracking in indoor, enclosed environments. Indoor positioning technologies are mainly dependent on a set of technologies used for transmitting wireless data in closed environments. Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) in particular, have been studied in recent research for their applicability in both indoor positioning and identifi cation of objects and persons in indoor areas.M Drawing great attention in recent years (Hightower and Borriello, 2001), WLAN has distinct advantages over all other wireless systems, such as Bluetooth, dedicated spectrum, or RFID-based indoor positioning. First, it is an economical solution because the WLAN system usually exists already as part of the communications infrastructure. For WLAN mobile devices, the positioning system can be implemented simply in software. Second, the WLAN-based positioning system covers a large area and may work across many buildings. Third, it is a stable system given its robust Radio Frequency signal propagation (Xiang, et al., 2004).

For the many reasons stated above, WLAN technologies are being studied as a possible indoor location-based technique to be integrated in the proposed methodology (Figure 4).

Figure 4: WLAN-based Approach

In this research, the experimentation with technology to obtain location information will be based on a WLAN-based position system called the Ekahau Positioning Engine (EPE) from the Finnish company Ekahau Inc. (Ekahau, 2004). The Ekahau Positioning Engine (EPE) is a WLAN-based positioning system made for indoor and campus areas where GPS does not perform adequately. The engine tracks the real-time position of a WLAN-enabled mobile device (Figure 5); it discovers all the WLAN-enabled devices using their IP addresses; and it makes use of the signal strength measurements as detected by the access points to determine the actual position (Aziz et.al., 2005).

16 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

Figure 5: Ekahau Positioning Engine Mechanism

Based on this system, another preliminary experiment was also conducted indoors at GGB in the Construction Laboratory. The objective in this case was to identify both the position (X, Y, and fl oor level) and the viewing direction (roll, pitch, and yaw) of a mobile user as he is walking inside the lab (Figures 6,7, and 8).

Figure 6: Ekahau Calibration in GGB (Construction Lab, Room 1340)

Figure 7: C++ Ekahau Application Position and Orientation Results

Figure 8: Virtual Representation for Different User’s Positions and Orientations inside the Lab

Conclusion

Designing and implementing a dynamic user-viewpoint tracking scheme that will allow the identifi cation of construction entities visible in a user’s fi eld of view at a given time is one of the primary objectives of this ongoing research work. In order to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed research, proof-of-concept experiments were conducted in outdoor and indoor environments. As an outdoor application, a user equipped with a GPS receiver and magnetic orientation tracker inspected the segments of the GG Brown Laboratory building at the University of Michigan. At all times during the experiment, the user’s position and orientation were tracked by the GPS and magnetic tracker, and the designed algorithm was executed to automatically interpret which portion of the building the user was inspecting at a particular time. As an indoor application, a mobile user was walking inside a laboratory and using both a WLAN-based Ekahau system and the same tracker used in the


U-M Plays Leading Role in Introducing Fiber-Reinforced Concrete into The ACI Building Code

By Associate Profesor Gustavo J. Parra-Montesinos

Steel fi bers have long been recognized to provide post-cracking resistance and increased ductility to concrete. As a result, their use as shear reinforcement in reinforced-concrete (RC) fl exural elements has been the focus of several research projects in the past few decades. In addition to transferring tension across diagonal cracks, fi bers enhance cracking distribution and control crack width, which in turn increases shear resistance through aggregate interlock. This enhancement in cracking distribution

also has major implications in the design of large (deep) reinforced concrete members without transverse reinforcement, where the so-called “size effect”—generally attributed to the increase in diagonal crack spacing and width with an increase in depth—may seriously compromise structural safety.

Although the advantages of adding steel fi bers to concrete have not been in dispute, the lack of design provisions in building

outdoor experiment,. In this execution, the user was able to determine his real-time position as well as his head orientation. The obtained results highlighted the potential of using location-aware technologies for rapidly identifying and retrieving contextual information for on-site decision-making tasks in construction and other fi elds.

References

Aziz, Z., Anumba, C.J., Ruikar, D., Carrillo., P.M., Bouchlaghem.,D.N. (2005). “Contextaware information delivery for on-site construction operations,” 22nd CIB-W78 Conference on Information Technology in Construction, Institute for Construction Informatics, CBI Publication (304), 321-32.

Behzadan, A. H., and Kamat, V. R. (2005). “Visualization of Construction Graphics in Outdoor Augmented Reality”, Proceedings of the 2005 Winter Simulation Conference, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), Piscataway, NJ.

Ekahau.< http://www.ekahau.com>. (August 26, 2006).

Hightower, J., and G. Borriello. (2001). “Location Systems for Ubiquitous Computing”, IEEE Computer, 34(8), 57-66.

Kamat, V. R., and Behzadan A. H. (2006). “GPS and 3DOF Angular Tracking for Georeferenced Registration of Construction Graphics in Outdoor Augmented Reality”, 13th EG-ICE Workshop on Intelligent Computing in Engineering and Architecture, Ascona, Switzerland.

Xiang,Z., Song,S., Chen,J., Wang,H., Huang,J., and Gao,X. (2004). “A wireless LAN-based indoor positioning technology”, IBM journal of research and development, 48 (5-6), 617-626.

codes has seriously limited such application in RC structures. This is about to change, however. For the fi rst time, design provisions for fi ber-reinforced concrete will be incorporated into the ACI Building Code. To the writer’s knowledge, this is also the fi rst time design provisions for fi ber-reinforced concrete are included in a building code worldwide. The development of the ACI Code design provisions for fi ber-reinforced concrete came as a result of an effort led by the author within ACI Building Code Sub-Committee 318-F, New Materials Products, and Ideas.

The 2008 ACI Code provisions for fi ber-reinforced concrete will allow the use of deformed steel fi bers as minimum shear reinforcement in reinforced concrete beams. Currently, RC beams subjected to shear forces between 50% and 100% of the design shear resistance attributed to the concrete must be designed with minimum transverse reinforcement, given the catastrophic consequence a shear failure may have. These new provisions offer the alternative to replace this minimum transverse reinforcement by an “additive” to the concrete in the form of steel fi bers, with the potential for reductions in construction costs. It should be noted that because fi ber-reinforced concrete was not recognized as a structural material in earlier editions of the ACI Code, it was necessary to include provisions related to material quality control and performance criteria as well.

Now that the door is open, the development of broader design provisions for fi ber-reinforced concrete structures will likely follow, which could have enormous impact on the future of concrete construction. It is a great honor for the author to have taken a leadership role in this development, and it is especially signifi cant that the University of Michigan’s name is linked to an effort that could favorably impact the construction industry in the years to come.

Multifunctional Nanocomposites for Structural Monitoring Applications

By PhD Candidate Kenneth J. Loh and Assistant Professor Jerome P. Lynch

Around the world, civil infrastructures, such as buildings, bridges, lifelines, and others, undergo constant deterioration due to extreme loading events (e.g. earthquakes, overweight vehicles) and harsh environmental condition (e.g. corrosion). While structural monitoring systems have been employed to record global structural vibrations, only severe damage can be accurately identifi ed from global vibration characteristics. After all, structural deterioration is inherently a local phenomenon that is typically characterized by

18 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

localized deformation or regional deposition of corrosion byproducts. As a result, future structural health monitoring (SHM) systems will require a large number of low-cost sensors that can be distributed throughout the structure so that the structure can be monitored at the component-level for signs of deterioration and damage.

Recent developments in the nascent fi eld of nanotechnology have brought forth revolutionary materials and fabrication techniques that can be used to custom-design—at the molecular-level—new civil engineering materials that achieve desired macro-scale mechanical, chemical, and electrical properties. In particular, nanotechnology allows engineers to develop multifunctional materials that are defi ned by the ability to support mechanical load simultaneous to being able to sense and/or actuate. At the forefront of the nanotechnology revolution are single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNT) (Figure 1).

SWNT exhibit an impressive array of mechanical, e l e c t r i c a l , and physical properties; for example, the doub l e - c a rbon bond between carbon atoms renders SWNT one of the

strongest materials known to man. While individual nanotubes are impressive, it is extremely diffi cult to transfer their material properties to the macro-scale. In this study, a layer-by-layer (LbL) fabrication methodology is employed to fabricate multifunctional thin fi lms using SWNT embedded in a polymeric matrix (Figure 2) (Loh et al. 2007a, 2007b). LbL thin fi lms are produced by sequentially d e p o s i t i n g oppositely charged polyanionic and p o l y c a t i o n i c species one m o n o l a y e r at a time. By depositing nano-scale structures (e.g. SWNTs) and po lye l ec t ro l y te (PE) species at the molecular-scale, LbL preserves SWNT properties and yields homogenous multilayer thin fi lms with macro-scale properties strongly infl uenced by the SWNT properties.

Embedment of electro-mechanical (i.e. piezoresistivity) and electro-chemical (i.e. conductivity sensitivity to pH) sensing mechanisms within LbL SWNT-PE thin fi lms can be accomplished by utilizing a variety of PE species. First, carbon nanotubes are steric stabilized in a poly(sodium 4-styrene sulfonate) (PSS) solution to fully utilize their inherent electrical and mechanical properties. Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) is elected as the LbL counterpart, such that the two LbL ingredients yield piezoresistive SWNT-PSS/PVA thin fi lms whose conductivity changes in linear proportion to mechanical strain;

hence, the resulting thin fi lm can be used as a strain sensor. As shown in Figure 3, the scanning electron microscope (SEM) image reveals that only individually dispersed SWNTs are deposited during LbL assembly. To date, few researchers have attempted to develop SWNT-based strain sensors. Thus, characterization of this novel strain sensor’s performance is crucial prior to adoption in SHM applications. It is anticipated that embedded SWNTs in a conformable polymeric matrix can enhance strain sensitivity, sensor resolution, and fi lm ductility. Upon fabrication of SWNT-PSS/PVA strain sensors on a glass substrate, they are cut (using a diamond-tipped scribe) to small 7-by-13-mm2 rectangular pieces and mounted onto a PVC Type I coupon for uniaxial loading (Figure 4). Using an

MTS-810 load frame (courtesy of Professor Victor Li and the ACE-MRL group), a tensile-compressive cyclic load pattern (to ±10,000 μm/m strains) is applied to each specimen while an Agilent 34401A digital multimeter records the change in resistance of the SWNT-PE thin fi lm over time (Figure 4). From Figure 5, it can be observed that the nanocomposite strain

Figure 1: Single-walled carbon nanotube

Figure 2: A schematic illustrating the layer-by-layer self-assembly process to fabricate multifunctional thin fi lm sensors using carbon nanotubes and a variety of polyelectrolyte species.

Figure 3: An SEM image of a 50-bilayer LbL SWNT-PSS/PVA thin fi lm strain sensor indicating selective deposition of individually dispersed and small bundles of carbon nanotubes. Inset: free standing thin fi lm etched from substrate.

Figure 4: SWNT-PSS/PVA thin fi lm strain sensor on glass epoxy-bonded to a PVC specimen fi xed within an MTS-810 load frame.

Figure 5: (Top) Experimental time history record of an SWNT-PSS/PVA specimen under a 10-cycle tensile-compressive load pattern (to ±5,000 μm/m strains). (Bottom) Experimental time history upon removal of baseline resistance drifts using a high-pass resistor-capacitor fi lter at 0.020 Hz.


sensor exhibits a well-behaved and repeatable piezoresistive response. Although a nominal resistance drift is observed over time (due to current-induced resistive heating and physio-chemical changes), the resistance decay can be accurately removed using numerical modeling or a high-pass fi lter. Furthermore, sensor properties (e.g. gauge factor, nominal resistance, among others) can be easily tailored by varying initial LbL fabrication parameters (Loh et al. 2007b).

Similarly, LbL thin fi lms can also be doped with pH sensitivity by replacing PVA with an electroactive polymer such as poly(aniline) emeraldine base (PANI). When subjected to a variety of pH buffer solutions, different levels of charge injection induce bulk fi lm conductivity changes that are easily measured with an Agilent 34401a digital multimeter. In this study, to facilitate thin fi lm exposure to various pH solutions, a plastic well is mounted on the SWNT-PSS/PANI thin fi lm pH sensor. Upon measuring the two-point thin fi lm resistance as different pH buffer solutions (pH 1 to 10) are pipetted into the plastic well, the experimental time history record shown in Figure 6 illustrates the drastic changes in fi lm resistance as pH is increased over time. It has been verifi ed that resistance increases linearly in tandem with increasing pH, displaying a pH sensitivity of approximately 20 kΩ-cm-2/pH (Loh et al. 2007b). Furthermore, upon the addition of a pH 1 solution, nominal sensor resistance can be restored immediately (Figure 6).

To fully realize densely-distributed sensing for large-scale SHM, these multifunctional thin fi lm sensors have been patterned into a coil antenna for passive wireless sensing (Figure 7). These systems, known as radio frequency identifi cation (RFID) sensors, can receive power from a remote reader and transmit sensory data back to the base station via inductive coupling. When confi gured as either a series or resonant parallel circuit, sensor output, as detected by the portable RFID reader, exhibits changes in resonant frequency or system bandwidth (Loh et al. 2007c). Recent studies have validated their performance to show drastic shifts in resonant frequency and bandwidth due to strain and pH, respectively. In the near future, other nanoparticle species (e.g. gold, silver, and platinum nanoparticles) will be incorporated during the LbL assembly process to enhance wireless communications range and reliability. Work is also underway to utilize photolithographic techniques to reduce sensor form factor for embedment within reinforced-concrete structures for corrosion monitoring. Furthermore, other conductive and electroactive

polymers (e.g. poly(vinylidene fl uoride)) are being investigated for potential thin fi lm actuation capabilities for active sensing.

References:

Loh, K. J., Kim, J., Lynch, J. P., Kam, N. W. S. and Kotov, N. A. (2007a). “Multifunctional layer-by-layer carbon nanotube-polyelectrolyte thin fi lms for strain and corrosion sensing.” Smart Materials and Structures, 16(2): 429-438.Loh, K. J., Lynch, J. P., Shim, B. S. and Kotov, N. A. (2007b).“Tailoring piezoresistive sensitivity of multilayer carbon nanotube composite sensors.” Journal of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures, accepted and in press.

Loh, K. J., Lynch, J. P. and Kotov, N. A. (2007c). “Inductively coupled nanocomposite wireless strain and pH sensors.” Smart Structures and Systems, submitted.

Figure 6: Time history plot of SWNT-PSS/PANI thin fi lm resistance due to increasing pH buffer solutions (pH 1 to 10).

Figure 7: Picture of a patterned 50-bilayer SWNT-PSS/PVA thin fi lm coil antenna connected to a 0.1 μF capacitor to form a resonant circuit for passive wireless sensing.

International Collaborative Research on Geotechnical Engineering Properties of Palm Island Sand, Dubai, UAE

By PhD Pre-candidate Kathryn A. Gunberg and Assistant Professor Russell A. Green

To foster collaboration between US institutions and foreign counterparts, the US National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Directorate for Engineering established the International Research

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CEE Newsletter

and Education in Engineering (IREE) Program. The IREE Program provides, on a competitive basis, supplemental funding to add an international component to existing NSF grants. Assistant Professor Russell Green received an IREE supplement to his grant entitled “NEESR II: Mechanisms and Implications of Time-Dependent Changes in the State and Properties of Recently Liquefi ed Sands.” The additional component is in collaboration with the School of Engineering at the American University in Dubai (AUD), United Arab Emirates (UAE), and entailed U-M doctoral student Kathryn Gunberg spending 4 months in Dubai, UAE, studying the post-depositional and post-densifi ed properties of the calcareous sand being used to construct the large, palm-tree-shaped islands (i.e., Palm Islands) off the coast of Dubai. The lead for the AUD contingent is Dr. Alaa Ashmawy (Figure 1), Dean of the School of Engineering at AUD. In addition to the technical component of the IREE supplements, a cultural component was required. This latter requirement was achieved by Ms. Gunberg when she audited AUD courses about Islam and regional politics and interacted with AUD students as the instructor for some courses.

The sand used to construct the Palm Islands (Figure 2) is dredged from the Persian Gulf and densifi ed by vibrocompaction (Figure 3). The three Palm Islands (Palm Jumeirah, Palm Jebel Ali, and Palm Deira) are the largest artifi cial islands in the world, and although several major construction companies are involved in their construction, the project has received little to no attention from the geotechnical academic community. The construction of these islands, however, is effectively the world’s largest geotechnical experiment on the time-dependent properties of recently deposited and densifi ed calcareous sand (i.e., the world’s largest “sand aging” experiment).

The fi rst well-documented fi eld study where “sand aging” effects were both signifi cant and widespread was the Jebba Dam project on the Niger River, Nigeria (Mitchell and Solymar, 1984). At the Jebba Dam site, sand deposits with depths of 25m to 40m were densifi ed by deep blasting. Initially after improvement, there was a decrease in penetration resistance, despite the fact that surface settlements ranged from 0.3m to 1.1m. Over the next 124 days, however, the cone penetration resistance increased to approximately 150-200% of the pre-densifi cation values. Subsequent investigations into the underlying mechanisms of sand aging have been inconclusive, sometimes raising more questions than resolving. The boundary conditions for most published fi eld studies have been too numerous and variable to allow for conclusive identifi cation of the mechanisms underlying aging. Nevertheless, the results of such fi eld studies add to the evidence that the aging phenomenon exists.

The sand aging phenomenon is more than an academic curiosity, as it has important ramifi cations to construction schedules. This can be understood because in-situ indices, such as standard and cone penetration test (SPT and CPT) resistances, are traditionally used as quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC) metrics to ensure the sand is properly densifi ed. The time-dependent increase in penetration resistances inherently delays subsequent construction; if the increases are not suffi cient, additional densifi cation may be required, thus further delaying the construction schedule.

Ms. Gunberg’s main goal in Dubai was to work with local geotechnical engineering fi rms to compile a database of vibrocompaction data (i.e., vibrocompaction logs and pre- and post-CPT data). This seemingly simple goal proved to be quite diffi cult due to business politics. One of the contractors performing the vibrocompaction that we contacted welcomed and appreciated our research efforts, but the developer, who ultimately owns the

vibrocompaction data, did not and would not grant permission for us to use the vibrocompaction data in our study. However, the contractor provided data from other vibrocompaction projects from around the world, which is a substantial benefi t to our study. With the help of Dr. Ashmawy, Ms. Gunberg made contact with Shad Khan, General Manager at Keller-Grundbau’s Dubai offi ce, who also is performing vibrocompation on the Palm Islands. Mr. Khan was very helpful and more than willing to assist with the project. Ms. Gunberg traveled to Keller-Grundbau’s offi ce on numerous occasions to collect data and visit sites in the nearby areas. The data gathered will add substantially to the fi eld study already in progress under Dr. Green’s initial NSF grant and allow us to make more statistically sound conclusions about the aging phenomenon.

Regarding the cultural component of the IREE supplement: During her stay in Dubai, Ms. Gunberg taught two courses at AUD. The fi rst was the laboratory for Physics I, where Ms. Gunberg guided the students through experiments involving particle position, velocity and acceleration, projectile motion, Atwood’s machine, Newton’s second law, and so on. The second class was an SAT review course. Both of these classes were fi lled with students from such areas as the Sudan, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, and India. The experience gained by Ms. Gunberg during these classes was invaluable. Ms. Gunberg was also approached by Sareh Khoshi, an Iranian student, who requested a tutor to help maximize her score on the GMAT exam so she could attend graduate school at AUD (Figure 4). Ms. Gunberg tutored Ms. Khoshi twice a week throughout the semester and found the experience amazing—she obtained fi rsthand exposure to another culture on a personal level. Ms. Khoshi really looked up to Ms. Gunberg as a teacher and friend; both learned much about the other’s culture and enjoyed sharing traditions and stories from their homelands. One of the major lessons Ms. Gunberg learned, both from her time with Ms. Khoshi and throughout the semester, is that the portrayal of the Middle East and its people by the American media is incomplete. In general, Middle Easterners were very welcoming and friendly (and they love American movies!).

In addition to her interaction with students at AUD, Ms. Gunberg enjoyed visiting museums and historic areas of town in order to learn about the local culture (Figures 5 – 8). One of the most rewarding experiences was attending a cultural breakfast hosted by the Sheikh Mohammed Center for Cultural Understanding. There, AUD students were able to try local food and talk to local women about their culture and customs.

In summary, the IREE supplement allowed an international collaboration to be established that will bear fruit for many years to come. The vibrocompaction data is still being analyzed and adds signifi cantly to the initial NSF grant on the sand aging. In addition, the cultural experiences were truly tremendous; the friendships established will be life-long.

Acknowledgements:Financial support for this study came from National Science Foundation grant CMMI 0636710.


Figure 1: Dr. Green (left), Ms. Gunberg (middle), and Dr. Ashmawy (right) at dinner in the Mall of the Emirates. In the background, windows overlook Ski Dubai, the world’s largest indoor ski slope.

Figure 2: Aerial photo of the Palm Jumeirah, which is still under construction and is the fi rst of the three Palm Islands being constructed.

Figure 3: Keller Gundbau’s vibrocompaction probes (or vibrofl ots) on Palm Deira, the third and largest of the Palm Islands.

Figure 4: Sareh Khoshi (left) and Kathryn Gunberg (right).

Figure 5: Cultural breakfast in a traditional style home.

Figure 6: Ms. Gunberg (left) and friend Audrey Froelich on a camel ride.

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CEE Newsletter

Faculty News

Figure 7: Ms. Gunberg in front of Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates.

Figure 8: Ms. Gunberg sandboarding in the Dubai desert.

On January 1, 2008, Dr. Jason McCormick will join the structural engineering faculty.

Since June 2006, Dr. McCormick has been a postdoctoral fellow at the Disaster Prevention Research Institute of Kyoto University (Japan). He was awarded the fellowship as part of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Postdoctoral Fellowship Program for

Foreign Researchers. He was awarded undergraduate degrees from both Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH, and the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC; he completed both a master’s degree and a doctorate (Spring 2006) at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Jason’s research interests lie in the general area of earthquake engineering, extreme load mitigation, and structural response reduction through innovative systems. A component of this work includes characterizing and optimizing the properties of innovative materials, such as shape memory alloys, through multi-scale experimental programs in order to incorporate them into structural systems. Recent research in Japan has focused on large-scale experimental studies on various aspects of the performance of steel structures under seismic loadings. This work has included the development of hybrid testing systems, the evaluation of non-structural elements under earthquake loadings, self-centering and friction based systems, and the effects of residual deformation on structures. Dr. McCormick’s work provides a means of incorporating multi-disciplinary efforts into the mitigation of damage to infrastructural systems during extreme events.

In September, 2007, CEE will welcome Assistant Professor Valeriy Ivanov to the department. He will join the faculty in EWRE. Ivanov received his master’s and doctoral degrees in hydrology from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at MIT (in 2002 and 2006, respectively). In 2006-07, he served as the Ziff Postdoctoral

Fellow at the Harvard University Center for the Environment. Dr. Ivanov’s research interests involve the study of interactions and feedback among components of environmental systems—in particular, land surface hydrology; spatially-explicit aspects of the basin hydrological response; interplay between the hydrologic and vegetation processes; and formulation of numerical mechanistic models of environmental processes suitable for rainfall-runoff and ecohydrologic analysis. Such research promotes both an interdisciplinary approach in studying water, energy, and element cycles at the catchment and larger scales, and the integration

Professor Antoine E. Naaman retired from active faculty status on May 31, 2007. He joined the University of Michigan as a Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering in 1983. Professor Naaman is recognized nationally and internationally for his research in three distinct areas of Civil Engineering, namely prestressed and partially prestressed concrete; high performance

of models and in situ and remote sensing data. Future interests include addressing science objectives related to the development of hydrologic forecasting tools for regional weather forecasting and water resources applications; studying the interactions between land-surface hydrology and atmosphere; and investigating the bilateral linkages between soil water regimes and soil-geomorphology processes as well as hydrological aspects of vegetation biochemistry.


The College of Engineering awarded Professor Peter Adriaens a Research Excellence Award. His efforts were recognized at the College’s annual spring Faculty Honors Dinner Dance.

Professor Jonathan W. Bulkley has received a Service-to-the-Profession Award from the American Society of Civil Engineers Environmental and Water Resources Institute.

The American Society of Civil Engineers has awarded Associate Professor Sherif El-Tawil the Arthur M. Wellington Prize. In addition, Dr. El-Tawil has been awarded the 2007 Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize. The research achievement award, given annually to an engineer younger than the age of 40, was bestowed on Associate Professor El-Tawil for “the development and

application of novel numerical simulation models for the analysis and design of steel and hybrid steel-concrete structures.”

Assistant Professor Russell Green was selected by the CEE Honors and Awards Committee to receive the 2006-07 Excellence in CEE Department Award. This award is bestowed annually on a CEE faculty member in recognition of outstanding contributions to the department.

The Via Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) has awarded Assistant Professor Vineet Kamat its Outstanding Alumni Award. The program, created in 1998, recognizes special alumni who “have contributed greatly to their profession, to Virginia Tech, and/or to their community.”

Professor Lutgarde Raskin has been awarded the Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

fi ber-reinforced cement composites; and ferrocement and laminated cement composites. His research studies have led to more than 300 technical publications, including two textbooks, one on ferrocement and one on prestressed concrete, ten co-edited books, three book chapters, and a University of Michigan patent on a new fi ber for use in cement and ceramic composites.

Professor Naaman has chaired or co-chaired 32 doctoral thesis committees. Students and colleagues alike characterize his teaching as thorough, his research as innovative, and his student mentoring as exemplary.

The Regents saluted our dedicated teacher, caring mentor, and distinguished scholar by naming Antoine E. Naaman a Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering.

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CEE Newsletter

Congratulations to Aline Cotel on her promotion to Associate Professor with tenure, effective September 1, 2007. Cotel is a member of the EWRE faculty.

Congratulations to Russell Green (geotechnical faculty) who has achieved status as an Associate Professor with tenure. His promotion will be effective September 1, 2007.

STUDENT NEWS Master’s student Chikako Donahue has been awarded a Rackham Non-Traditional Fellowship. The award is given to students who have returned to graduate school after a work or family break of at least fi ve years.

PhD student David Berry (advisor: Professor Lutgarde Raskin) was accepted into the Microbial Diversity Summer Course at the Marine Biological Laboratory. In addition, Berry has been awarded a two-year fellowship by the Graham Environmental Sustainability Institute.

Lana Tyrrell joined the CEE staff on May 7 as the EWRE Contract and Grant Specialist. Lana brought an extensive background in pre- and post-award project administration and has used those skills in EECS and AOSS. She will provide research administration and proposal preparation support to EWRE faculty and general accounting to support to the department as a whole.

Lana has a BA in Accounting from Siena Heights University and is working toward an MBA from Cleary University.

STAFF NEWS

Congratulations to two CEE staff members who were nominated for College of Engineering Excellence in Staff Service Awards for 2006-07. The awards, given annually, recognize College staff who demonstrate exceptional performance and devotion to a department or the College.

Reta Teachout, Human Resources Administrator, has provided support to faculty, students, and staff in CEE for 53 years. As a new staff member in 1954, Reta provided support to the Chair and faculty; in her current role, she processes employment paperwork, administers fi nancial aid, and oversees the department’s

program for international visitors. In the words of one nominator, “Reta has touched the lives of every student, staff, and faculty member in Civil and Environmental Engineering in one way or another—enriching their experiences and helping them to achieve their brightest potentials.”

Linda Fink, Contract and Grants Specialist, has supported fi nancial operations in CEE since 1999. Her job encompasses many aspects of fi nancial planning: assisting with pre- and post-award preparation; reconciling department accounts; and assisting with fi nancial reporting. Her service to the department and his constituents has become integral. In the words of one faculty member: “Simply put, Linda excels in doing what it takes to get the job done, both from an effi ciency and willingness standpoint, and has my highest respect and gratitude for her professionalism and competency in performing her job.”

Reta Teachout Linda Fink


PhD students Xu Li and Giridhar Upadhyaya (advisor: Professor Lutgarde Raskin) won the Michigan American Water Works Association Fresh Ideas Poster Competition.

Xu Li was awarded the Michigan American Water Works Association Fellowship for Water Quality and Treatment Study.

PhD student Tara Jackson (advisor: Professor Lutgarde Raskin) received the North Campus MLK Spirit Award in January. This award recognizes commitment to University, local, and global communities. Ms. Jackson also won a GEM PhD Engineering Fellowship.

PhD student Elijah Petersen has earned two prestigious honors. As a Fulbright Scholar, Petersen will study in Finland for the next year. In addition, he was selected as a winner of the 2007 Graduate Student Paper Award from the Division of Environmental Chemistry (American Chemical Society). This is the highest award given to students by the Division. Professor Walt Weber is Elijah’s

advisor. Elijah will present his winning paper at the Fall ACS Meeting in Boston, MA.

Congratulations to doctoral candidates Amir Behzadan and Hiam Khoury (advisor Assistant Professor Vineet R. Kamat). Mr. Behzadan and Ms. Khoury are the recipients of the second-place award for their poster at the oral competition of the Industrial and Systems Engineering session of the CoE Engineering Graduate Symposium, which took place in November 2006.

Doctoral candidate Amir Behzadan (advisor: Assistant Professor Vineet Kamat) has received a Rackham International Fellowship for 2007. Of the 25 awards bestowed by Rackham, College of Engineering students were awarded 5. The award is given to second- or third-term doctoral students who are actively pursuing a degree in Rackham program. Awards are given to students with strong academic

records who demonstrate outstanding academic and professional promise.

Rita E. Awwad, a PhD pre-candidate in CE&M (advisor: Professor Photios Ioannou), is the recipient of the Barbour Scholarship for 2007-08. The Barbour Scholarship was established in 1914 at the University of Michigan to train women in modern science, medicine, mathematics, and other specialties critical to the development of their native lands. Rita is the past recipient of a Rackham International Student Fellowship.

Three Walker Fellowships have been awarded for 2007-08: the recipients are Stacey Taylor, Elizabeth Windsor, and Bethanie Yaklin.

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CEE Newsletter

CEE students were well-represented at the College of Engineering’s Spring 2007 Leaders and Honors Brunch:

Elizabeth Windsor (undergraduate) was awarded the Hugh G. Rumler Distinguished Class Prize—given to an outstanding senior who demonstrates sincerity, integrity, goodwill, and scholarship. Ms Windsor also was awarded the Distinguished Academic Achievement Award (undergraduate) for academic and personal excellence.

Graduate student Andres Clarens (advisor: Professor Kim Hayes) was awarded the Distinguished Academic Achievement Award for academic and personal excellence.

Jodi L. Ryder (advisor: Associate Professor Avery Demond) won an Outstanding Student Paper Award in the Hydrology Division at the 2006 AGU (American Geophysical Union) Fall Meeting (Dec. 11-15, 2006) held in San Francisco, CA, for her paper entitled “Mechanism of Wettability Hysteresis in Natural Soils.”

PhD pre-candidate Sharon Gourdji (advisor: Assistant Professor Anna Michalak) has been awarded a three-year NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF). The fellowships (50 awarded each year) are to ensure continued training of a highly qualifi ed workforce of disciplines needed to achieve NASA’s scientifi c goals. Ms. Gourdji’s proposal was entitled “Evaluating the biogenic and fossil fuel components of

North American CO2 fl ux using auxiliary environmental data within a geostatistical inverse modeling framework and implications for carbon management”.

PhD pre-candidate Kim Mueller (advisor: Assistant Professor Anna Michalak) was awarded a two-year NSF Integrated Graduate Education and Research Traineeship Program (IGERT) fellowship with the Biosphere-Atmosphere Research and Training (BART) Program. The title of Ms. Mueller’s proposal was “Evaluation of process-based carbon dioxide fl ux drivers through regional geostatistical methods”.

Master’s student Abhishek Chatterjee (advisor: Assistant Professor Anna Michalak) has been awarded a 2007 Great Lakes Summer Student Fellowship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL). As part of the award, Mr. Abhishek spent three months working with GLERL scientists on evaluating tools for estimating precipitation over Lake Erie.

Pre-candidate Shahar Shlomi (advisor: Assistant Professor Anna Michalak) received a Rackham Graduate Research Grant to conduct groundwater fl ow and transport experiments at the Center for Experimental Study of Subsurface Environmental Processes (CESEP) at the Colorado School of Mines. His proposal was entitled “Evaluation of innovative groundwater quality monitoring methodologies using tracer tests in a sand tank”.

Kapil Khandelwal, a 3rd-year doctoral student working with Associate Professor Sherif El-Tawil, was recently awarded a National PERISHIP Fellowship for his dissertation work. The award is made by the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder and the Public Entity Risk Institute with support from the National Science Foundation. Ten awards are given nationally for multidisciplinary hazard research. The award comes with a grant.


PhD pre-candidate David Saftner (advisor: Assistant Professor Russell Green) has been awarded the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship sponsored by the Department of Defense and American Society of Engineering Educators. The Army Research Offi ce will fund the three-year fellowship.

Cong ratu la t ions to Dong-Hee Lim (advisor: Associate Professor Sherif El-Tawil), who was recognized for his teaching efforts with an Honorable Mention from the student chapter of the American Society for Engineering Education. The 2007 Outstanding Student Instructor Awards showcase the key role that graduate students play in the education of engineering students.

Engineering Graduate Student Symposium

The annual Engineering Graduate Student Symposium, to be held this year on November 7, 2007, is a day-long event featuring presentations and posters by graduate students. The Symposium is designed to expose new, current, and future graduate students to the breadth and depth of the research under pursuit across the College of Engineering. Further information is available at: http://www.engin.umich.edu/students/current/graduate/symposium/

CEE students participated in their fi rst-ever Symposium on November 3, 2006. One CEE graduate student was part of the organizing committee; twelve others gave oral and/or poster presentations. The presentations were judged by College of Engineering faculty members, who gave high marks to participants and awarded the following:

Design and Manufacturing (oral)1st - Andres Clarens [advisors: Professors Kim Hayes and Steven Skerlos]

Re-Inventing Metalworking Fluids: A Case Study in Environmentally Benign Manufacturing

Abstract:

Over 2 billion gallons of metalworking fl uids (MWFs) are used annually in the U.S. manufacturing sector to lubricate, cool, and evacuate chips in machining operations even though they are known

to have high economic, occupational health, and environmental costs. A new method to perform these functions using supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) and vegetable oils has been developed. In this process, an oil-in-CO2 dispersion is sprayed out of a nozzle at high speed and pressure to deliver oil and form dry ice near to the cutting zone in minimal and precise quantities. The rapid expansion of the CO2 leads to cooling at cryogenic temperatures and the combination of high pressure and low surface tension provides access to interstitial spaces that are inaccessible to conventional MWF sprays, which leads to increased performance over conventional fl uids. A life cycle study suggests that the environmental impacts of scCO2-MWFs.

Industrial and Systems Engineering (oral)2nd - Amir Behzadan and Hiam Khoury [advisor: Assistant Professor Vineet Kamat]

An Extensible AR Framework for Visualization of Simulated Construction Processes

Abstract:

Discrete-Event Simulation is an objective function evaluator that is well suited for construction operations planning and analysis. Visualization, in its two aspects, Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) can be used for the verifi cation, validation and accreditation of simulation models. However, in VR, every element in the scene has to be modeled while the equivalent AR approach sizes down the model engineering job signifi cantly requiring CAD models of only the entities under study. This can comparatively result in signifi cant time savings. Therefore, the objective of this research is to design and implement an extensible real time AR platform for the visualization of simulated construction processes.

Experimental Mechanics of Materials (oral)1st - Tsung-Chin Hou [advisor: Assistant Professor Jerome P. Lynch]

Monitoring of cementitious materials using electrical impedance tomography

Abstract:

Cementitious materials are widely used for civil engineering infrastructures. In many cases, minor damages, interior or exterior of cementitious structural members are somewhat diffi cult to be detected. Even being detected, the magnitudes as well as distribution of damages are hard to be understood by simply observing surface cracks. This study present a applicable approach, electrical impedance tomography (known as EIT) to monitor the damages of cementitious material under some simple loading cases. The results reveal the possibility of using EIT to detect damages of cementitious structural members.

Theoretical and Computational Mechanics & Experimental Mechanics of Materials (poster)

1st - Dong Joo Kim [advisors: Associate Professor Sherif El-Tawil and Professor Antoine E. Naaman]

Rate-Dependent Behavior of High Performance Fiber Reinforced Cementitious Composites

28 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

Jennifer (Starkman) Macks, PE, LEED AP, assumed the vice presidency of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Friends Association (CEEFA) in July. Ms. Macks has dedicated her entire professional life to building hospitals. Upon graduation from U-M (BSCEE, 1994), she joined Barton Malow Company (Southfi eld, MI) as a fi eld engineer; she rose rapidly to the position of Health Facilities Group project director. In recent years, she administered construction of the award-winning 656,000-square-foot South Hospital Addition at William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak; she currently oversees $200 million in contracts. To sharpen her professional skills, Jenn earned an MBA with honors from Wayne State University in 1999, graduating in the top fi ve percent of her class, and in 2000 passed her professional engineering exam. In 2004, she became a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Accredited Professional, passing the exam administered by the US Green Building Council. In 2003, the University of Michigan Alumni Society conferred the Recent Engineering Graduate Award upon her, in recognition of her early and signifi cant career achievements. That same year, the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce named her one of the top 100 emerging business leaders in southeastern Michigan, refl ecting her professional advancement, direction, or signifi cant Barton Malow initiatives, commitment to continuing education, mentoring of other construction professionals, and guiding role in community and professional organizations. In addition to her service to CEEFA and other outside activities, Jenn is a member of the Civil Engineering Advisory Board and the Lear Entrepreneurship Advisory Board at Lawrence Technological University. Jenn is married and the mother of two daughters, ages 3 and 1.

ALUMNI NEWS

Edward Biskis, PE (BSCE, 1985) has moved to Indianapolis, IN, after living and working in the Louisville, KY area for seven years. In his new position, he “got the exciting experience of going through a corporate merger”. In addition to his demanding job as Offi ce Manager for Fleis and Vandenbrink Engineering, Inc., Mr. Biskis reports that he has four teenaged daughters.

Dirk Start (BSCE, 1983) has joined Dan Vos Construction Company in Ada, MI, as a Project Manager. Mr. Start is a PE and a LEED-Certifi ed Professional.

Earl C. Howard, PE (BSCE, 1976; MSCE, 1983) has fi nished his appointment to “represent registered professional engineers” on Governor Jennifer Granholm’s Fire Safety Board. The two-year term expired in July.

CEE was represented in the World Masters 2006 Rowing Championship Regatta held at Lake Mercer in Princeton, NJ. The team, on which CEE graduate 78-year-old Anderton (Pete) Bentley, Jr., competed, took second place after losing to Germany by a time equivalent of less than one stroke. The event is an I-8 oar crew event.

Mr. Bentley captured two gold medals and one silver in the Master’s National Championships (2006) held in Seattle. In a regatta with more than 1000 competitors, Bentley earned medals in the I-8 oar crew event, the J-quadruple sculls event, and the I-4 oared crew event. His philosophy: “It is a simplistic attitude—if you don’t compete in something, there is no incentive to train for it and test your capabilities.”

Theresa E. (Horvath) Harrison, PE (MSCE, 1979), reports that she is enjoying life, traveling with her children, attending Michigan and Ball State football games—as well as those tennis and soccer matches in which her children compete. Currently, Ms. Harrison is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of Notre Dame, teaching “Introduction to Transportation Engineering”.

Richard Beubien PE, PTOE, has just completed his tenure as president of the ITS Michigan Board of Directors. The goal of the not-for-profi t organization: “to improve the safety, security and effi ciency of the nation’s transportation system for the traveling public through the deployment of ITS.” ITS America was established in 1991 to foster the use of advanced technologies in surface transportation systems.

Larry P. Jedele, PE (BSCE, 1972; MSCE, 1973) has been elected to the Geo-Institute Board of Governors (American Society of Civil Engineers). The Geo-Institute works to advance the geo-engineering community by “improving the built environment, mitigating natural hazards, and constructing sound and reliable engineered facilities and structures.”

Abstract:

“Recent disasters around the world have heightened the interest in improving the resistance of structures subjected to seismic, impact and blast load conditions. HPFRCC (High Performance Fiber Reinforced Cementitious Composites) have the potential to be a viable solution for improving the resistance of buildings and other infrastructure components. The promise of HPFRCC is based on its observed static mechanical properties, i.e. there has not been enough research conducted to completely characterize the behavior of HPFRCC under higher strain rates. Since the behavior of fi ber, matrix and the bond between them is likely dependent upon the rate of loading, it is expected that the response of HPFRCC is also rate dependent. The overall goal of this research is to develop a fundamental understanding of the effect of high strain rate on the behavior of HPFRCC and to use this information to increase material ductility and toughness under high strain rate condition.”

A full listing of results is available at: http://www.engin.umich.edu/students/current/graduate/symposium/results.html

Congratulations to all CEE participants! We look forward to a strong showing at the 2007 event!


OBITUARIES

Mr. Lawrence R. Anderson, MSECE 1949, July 27, 2006, at age 91.Mr. William Bendas, BSECE 1950, December 22, 2003, at age 81.Mr. Domenico N. Bibbo, MSECE 1956, April 6, 2007, at age 88.Mr. Marvin Paul Church, MSECE 1958, March 19, 2006, at age 75.Mr. Ernest L. Constan, BSECE 1954, October 21, 2006, at age 76.Mr. Elroy G. Denz, BSECE 1951, March 11, 2007, at age 79.Mr. Harry B. DeYoe, BSECE 1940, October 22, 2006, at age 89.Mr. Roger S. Frazier, BSECE 1938, September 6, 2005, at age 90.Mr. Thomas E. Fricke, BSECE 1954, Janurary 28, 2007, at age 75.Mr. Maurice Greenberg, MSECE 1951, November 15, 2001, at age 82.Mr. Glen James Hopkins, MSECE 1948, August 24, 2005, at age 96.Mr. Johannes E. N. Jensen, BSECE 1935, March 28, 2004, at age 90.

Federico Di Lello Maurin (MEng, 2002) died in a tragic accident in his home country of Argentina. Federico and his wife Maria Laura Ortega de Di Lello lived in Ann Arbor between 2001 and 2004 while he completed his master’s degree in Construction Engineering and Management. A brilliant student, he then began a successful engineering career.

Federico is survived by his wife, Maria Laura Ortega de Di Lello, an architect, two daughters, Agustina (3) and Florencia (1), his parents, Federico Di Lello and Marta Maurin de Di Lello, sister Maria Marta Di Lello and many close friends.

Remembered by his U-M mentors as one of their “best students” Federico graduated with the highest scores of the class of 2002. He then worked at the local engineering fi rm Orchard, Hiltz & Mc.Climent, Inc until 2004, when the family moved to Mendoza, Argentina, the city of his birth and their families, to further develop their careers. During this period of economic turmoil in Argentina, the family struggled with whether to relocate there or make a permanent home in the USA. They decided for home.

In 2004 Federico and Laura together founded Di Lello & Ortega, a company for architecture and engineering projects. Their dedication paid off, and the company grew rapidly, developing both residential and commercial properties throughout Argentina and even in neighboring Chile.

His best friend since childhood, Fernando Vargas, also a partner in the engineering fi rm, wrote from Argentina that professional success was only a small facet of Federico’s life. One of his most important attributes was “personal integrity”. He lived and practiced with “the perfect defi nition” of what is to be “a real friend”.

Katie Swartzloff (BS, 2006) is an assistant project manager for Norcon, Inc., in Chicago, IL. In October, 2006, the company was contacted by a senior producer from ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Because of both the group’s experience with green roof design and its construction reputation, Norcon, Inc. was asked to build a home for a deserving family with six children. The catch: build that house with just a couple of weeks of planning and 7 days of construction! The successful build was featured on the January 14, 2007 episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. For more information, see the website at www.extremehomechicago.com

Mr. Paul H. Jones, BSECE 1950, March 16, 2005, at age 76.Mr. Theodore E. Leask, BSECE 1952, April 27, 2007, at age 82.Mr. George W. Marek, BSECE 1952, August 23, 2006, at age 79.Mr. James L. Melcher, BSECE 1950, April 2, 2005, at age 78.Mr. Herman Y. Misirliyan, MSECE 1951, March 10, 2007, at age 80.Mr. Richard E. Noll, BSECE 1950, March 3, 2007, at age 81.Mrs. Karen K. Olson, BSECE 1989, July 27, 2006, at age 55.Mr. Joseph D. Pavia, BSECE 1951, August 21, 2004, at age 83.Mr. Walter H. Rieger, BSECE 1940, August 5, 2001, at age 83.Mr. Howard F. Russell, P.E., BSECE 1960, April 4, 2007, at age 71.Mr. Daniel H. Safford, BSECE 1974, October 22, 2006, at age 54.Mr. William John Scheeff, BSECE 1947, August 14, 2006, at age 83.Mr. Russell L. Schwing, BSECE 1928, February 14, 2002, at age 97.Mr. Matthew C. Sielski, BSECE 1938, July 29, 2006, at age 92.Mr. James G. Stephens, BSECE 1947, June 1, 2007 at age 83.Mr. G. Richard Sutherland, P.E., MSECE 1950, December 12, 2002, at age 80.Mr. Thadeus T. Torzynski, BSECE 1940, May 1, 2007, at age 90.Mr. John C. Trakas, BSECE 1939, May 23, 2007, at age 93.Mr. George W. Weesner, BSECE 1941, May 24, 2007, at age 87.Mr. Thomas A. Weyand, BSECE 1955, December 31, 2006, at age 73.Mr. B.J. Wright, BSECE 1971, February 26, 2007, at age 57.

The Concrete Canoe Team

30 Fall 2007

CEE Newsletter

PLEASE STAY IN TOUCH

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2007- 2008 CEEFA DUES FORM

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Please send this completed form with your $20.00 check or money order payable to University of Michigan—CEEFA:

CEEFAUniversity of MichiganDepartment of Civil & Environmental Engineering2350 Hayward Street2340 GG Brown BuildingAnn Arbor, MI 48109-2125

Thank you for your support!

CEEFA Board Ballot

The CEEFA Board presents the following nominated candidate for Director on the CEEFA Board. Please vote for either the nominated candidate or write in an alternative. Only dues-paying members are permitted to vote. Deadline: September 10, 2007.

BALLOT: BOARD OF DIRECTORS

POSITION NOMINEE YOUR VOTE

Director: Earl Howard _________(3-year term ending 2010) Write in: ____________________ _________

Please return this ballot to:

CEEFAUniversity of MichiganDepartment of Civil & Environmental Engineering2350 Hayward Street2340 G.G. Brown LaboratoryAnn Arbor, MI 48109-2125

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CEEFA

2007 Steel Bridge Team


CIVIL & ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERINGFRIENDS ASSOCIATION

( CEEFA )

24th ANNUAL TAILGATE BRUNCH & FOOTBALL GAME

Saturday, September 22, 2007

Brunch: 2 ½ hours before kickoffKickoff: TBA

Place: O’Neal Construction, Argus Building525 W. William Street

MICHIGAN VS PENN STATEGO BLUE!

Brunch attendees will receive fi rst priority for football tickets. Any remaining tickets will be issued on a fi rst-come, fi rst-served basis. If you have additional questions, contact Kimberly Bonner at (734)764-8495.

If you purchase football tickets but do not attend the Brunch, you can pick up your tickets at the Crisler Arena WILL CALL window. You must have photo identifi cation.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Cut Here------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Return this section by September 13, 2007, with your check payable to “University of Michigan—CEEFA.”

# OF TICKETS AMOUNT Names for Name Tags__________ Football Tickets @ $55.00 each $_________ 1. ____________________________________________ Brunch Tickets @ $25.00 each $_________ 2. __________________________________ 3. __________________________________ADOPT-A-STUDENT FOR BRUNCH 4. __________________________________# of students adopted AMOUNT 5. ____________________________________________ Student Brunch Tickets @ $12.50 $_________ 6. __________________________________

TOTAL AMOUNT ENCLOSED $_________

NAME: ___________________________________________________________________________________________

ADDRESS: ________________________________________________________________________________________

PHONE: __________________________________________________________________________________________

E-MAIL: __________________________________________________________________________________________

Send to: CEEFAUniversity of MichiganDepartment of Civil & Environmental Engineering2350 Hayward Street2340 G.G. Brown LaboratoryAnn Arbor, MI 48109-2125

MICHIGAN VS. PENN STATE


CEEFA President: Walter Alix Send news and comments to:CEEFA Vice President: Jennifer Macks University of Michigan CEECEEFA Secretary/Treasurer: Roman Hryciw NewsletterCEE Department Interim Chair: Roman Hryciw 2340 G.G. Brown Laboratory; 2350 Hayward StCEEFA Directors: Tom Newhof (2008) Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2125 Dan Sinnott (2009) TBA (2010)

The Newsletter is prepared for alumni and friendsThe Regents of the University: of the CEE Department. Credits: Julia Donovan Darlow, Laurence B. Deitch, U-M News Service; College of Engineering;Olivia P. Maynard, Rebecca McGowan, Printing-U-Litho; Editors: Kimberly Bonner Andrea Fischer Newman, Andrew C. Richner, and Patricia MackmillerS. Martin Taylor, Katherine E. White, Mary Sue Coleman, ex offi cio

Front Cover:

The opinions expressed in this newsletter are not necessarily the opinions of the CEE Newsletter, its staff, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, or the University of Michigan College of Engineering.

The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/affi rmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affi rmative action, including Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of nondiscrimination and equal opportunity for all persons regardless of race, sex*, color, religion, creed, national origin or ancestry, age, marital status, sexual orientation, disability, or Vietnam-era veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions. Inquiries or complaints may be addressed to the Senior Director for Institutional Equity and Title IX/Section 504 Coordinator, Offi ce for Institutional Equity, 2072 Administrative Services Building, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1432. (734) 763-0235; TTY (734) 647-1388. For other University of Michigan information call: (734) 764-1817.

*Includes discrimination based on gender identity and gender expression.

Civil and Environmental EngineeringUniversity of Michigan2340 GG Brown BuildingAnn Arbor, MI 48109-2125

Photo by David Parkhurst: The Student Steel Bridge Team chose prudent design and precise fabrication as the theme for their competition run in 2007. In competition, steel bridge teams are judged on how fast they construct their bridge; how many people are used during the construction; and how many penalties are incurred during the construction process. This year’s team competed at the regional conference and placed third in the Construction category, fi rst in the categories of Stiffness and Structural Effi ciency, and third place in overall evaluation.

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