Spring 2015

In the News
Ilgin Guler has joined the department as an assistant professor.  MORE>>

Scholarships to enhance learning opportunities for architectural and civil engineering students.

Abstracts for the 3rd Residential Building Design and Construction Conference are due April 15.
MORE>>
Recognitions and Awards
Student home builders team takes first place in national competition. MORE>>

Two CEE graduates among the eight alumni to receive Distinguished Alumni Award.  MORE>>

Civil engineering's Qiu awarded $500K grant to study landslides.  MORE>>

National organization honors Kearney as a New Face of Civil Engineering.  MORE>>

Ramaji receives Chicago high-rise committee scholarship award.  MORE>>

NSF award supports Warn's research on building design.  MORE>>

Alumni Updates
Ted Engman: involved with NASA launch.  MORE>>

Dawn Bontempo: breast cancer survivor.  MORE>>

William H. Farrell: business president.  MORE>>

Upcoming Events
March 4 & 5 The  23rd annual Housing and Land Development Conference  MORE>>

March 25 & 26: The Industrial and Professional Advisory Council (IPAC) Conference at the University Park Campus  

April 2, 2015: The 2015 Annual Thomas C. Kavanagh Lecture  MORE>>

April 11 & 12Mid-Atlantic Regional (MAR) Competition MORE>>

May 8 : Spring Commencement at the Bryce Jordan Center at 8 p.m.
About this month's cover photo: CoverPhoto
The Penn State Concrete Canoe Team poured this year's concrete canoe on Saturday, January 24, 2015. It took them less than two hours to pour eight batches of concrete! The concrete canoe races will be on Sunday, April 12 at Stone Valley Recreation Area. 


 

For more photos from College of Engineering events, follow us on Flickr.
Join our mentoring program!
The Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) and the Penn State Civil and Environmental Engineering Alumni Society (CEEAS), in cooperation with the Penn State American Society of Civil Engineers student chapter, collectively sponsor the Civil and Environmental Engineering Mentoring Program. The program provides career guidance to current Penn State CEE undergraduates by Penn State graduates currently engaged in the civil engineering profession and to facilitate a bridge between academia and industry for current students. Mentors and proteges interact on a one-to-one basis using mutually agreed methods of communication. This effort also includes group meetings and activities of all program participants several times a year.

Detailed information on the program can be found  here.


Story1Undergraduates develop mine water treatment plant for Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection
Students develop a mine water treatment plant in collaboration with the PaDEP
According to the Schuylkill Action Network, the Schuylkill River and its tributaries provide drinking water to more than 1.5 million Pennsylvania residents and habitats for both fish and wildlife. It's also being actively polluted.


Two abandoned coalmines in Minersville - the Oak Hill Collieries and the Pine Knot Complex - are releasing thousands of gallons of contaminated water into the river each minute. 

 

LINK TO FULL STORY>>

Story6Low-grade waste heat regenerates ammonia battery
Researchers hope to produce power using waste heat

 
An efficient method to harvest low-grade waste heat as electricity may be possible using reversible ammonia batteries, according to Penn State engineers.

"The use of waste heat for power production would allow additional electricity generation without any added consumption of fossil fuels," said Bruce E. Logan, Evan Pugh Professor and Kappe Professor of Environmental Engineering. "Thermally regenerative batteries are a carbon-neutral way to store and convert waste heat into electricity with potentially lower cost than solid-state devices."
Story6Model helps size boulders to protect buildings from vehicle impacts
Boulders may be effective in preventing buildings from large vehicle impact
  Boulders can be effective barriers to protect embassies and other buildings from large vehicle impacts, and a simple model is sufficient to select the right size boulder for the job, according to a team of Penn State researchers.

A team led by Tong Qiu, assistant professor, civil engineering, Penn State, studied landscape anti-ram barrier systems, typically constructed of a boulder embedded in soil. "Can we use that boulder to stop a truck, traveling at 30 miles an hour?" Qiu asked. Their results appear in the International Journal of Impact Engineering.
 
Department accepting applications for new master's program 
The one-year degree will launch in fall 2015
Our new one-year professional master's degree program will give you a strong foundation in civil engineering and prepare you to apply your skills across a broad range of disciplines in both academia and industry.

If you wish to develop and expand your expertise in what is continually ranked one of the top professions in the country, you will have ample opportunity to do so here. Our first-rate faculty collectively possess a deep and broad range of knowledge that provides an ideal environment for interdisciplinary work.

Whether your passion calls you to start your own business, pursue the next ground-breaking innovation or help solve a humanitarian crisis, this degree program can take you closer to your goals.

Story5American Concrete Institute vice president to speak at 2015 Annual Thomas C. Kavanagh Lecture
The 2015 Thomas C. Kavanagh Memorial Structural Engineering Lecture will be presented on Thursday, April 2 in 108 Forum Building beginning at 7:30 p.m.


This year's speaker is Dr. Sharon Wood, professor and dean of the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin. Wood is a 2013 inductee to the National Academy of Engineering for design of reinforced concrete structures and associated seismic instrumentation for extreme loadings and environment. Wood is also the vice president of the American Concrete Institute and has been nationally recognized for her research on the earthquake response of reinforced concrete structures.

Her research interests include improving the structural response of reinforced concrete buildings, design and evaluation of bridges, and development of passive sensors for infrastructure systems. She has served on federal advisory committees for the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs, the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program and the U.S. Geological Survey. 


Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering | 212 Sackett Building | University Park, PA 16802
  Privacy and Legal Statements  | U.Ed. ENG 15-25