Research Projects - Current and Previous
Research projects conducted by the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering has been sponsored by the National Science Foundation(NSF); National Aeronautics and Space Administration(NASA); U.S. Corps of Engineers(USAE); U.S. Geological Survey(USGS); U.S. Air Force(USAF); state, regional and local agencies; and private industries.
Current faculty research projects and interests span a wide range of technical areas as described below;
Coastal Engineering
- documented evidence of the impact of seawalls on adjacent beaches
- economic alternatives to increase the fill life of renourished beaches
- current effects on wave transformation in shallow water
- computer-aided design of coastal structures
- physics of breaking water waves on beaches
- coastal waves and current numerical modeling systems
Environmental engineering
- particle removal and ozone in water treatment
- coagulation and organics removal
- environmental monitoring
- transport and fate of contaminants in lakes and reservoirs
- chemical equilibrium modeling
- water quality modeling
- dewatering of water treatment residuals
- water and wastewater process evaluation studies
- organic matter and disinfection
- by-product precursor characterization
- toxicity characterization of wastewater
- effluent and residuals disposal
- water quality assesment/management
- watershed-scale distributed parameter modeling of nonpoint source pollution
- particle and contaminant transport/fate modeling
- dewatering of dredged materials
- air pollution control
- hazardous waste management
- freeze drying of sludge
- surface and groundwater modeling
- water quality modeling and simulation
- GIS-based uni-directional flushing modeling
- DNAPL site characterization adn remediation of superfund site
- GIS-based spatial/temporal environmental modeling & simulation
- GIS-based uni-directional flushing modeling
- engineering geographic information systems(GIS) application development
Geotechnical and Earthquake Engineering
- granular mechanics
- soil dynamics
- soil liquefaction during earthquakes
- soil-structure interaction
Structural Engineering
- base isolation and energy absorptions for bridges
- fatigue fracture
- fiber reinforced concrete
- finite element analysis
- nonlinear optimization
- parallel computing techniques in nonlinear structural mechanics
- parallel-vector algorithms for computational structural mechanics
- passive damping of space structures
- polymer-fiber composite materials
- stability and behavior of steel structures
- structural optimization
- sub-base stabilization with solid waste fly ash
Water Resources Engineering
- channelized overland flow
- computational hydraulics
- engineering geographic information systems(GIS) application development
- flood frequency analysis and flood routing
- GIS in large-scale modeling and simulation
- GIS in water resources engineering
- GIS-based spatial/temporal environmental modeling & simulation
- stochastic/statistical hydrology
- stormwater runoff from marine drydocks
- surface and groundwater modeling
- transport and fate of contaminants in lakes and reservoirs
- urban storm-drainage systems
- urban stormwater management
- water quality modeling
Transportation Engineering
- Hampton Road Evacuation Study
- Primary and secondary Incident Management
- Case-based Reasoning
- Economic Impact of Traffic Incidents on NC Interstate Facilities
- Innovative Large Truck Speed Enforcement