Structural Engineering

Faculty Research: Hyperbolic Paraboloid Origami Harnesses Bistability to Enable New Applications

Glaucio Paulino, a professor in the Georgia Tech School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, demonstrates hyperbolic paraboloid origami

While perhaps not as iconic as the paper crane, the hypar origami with its sweeping opposing arcs and saddle shape has long been popular for artists working in the paper folding tradition.

Now researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Tokyo are looking at the shape with an eye toward leveraging its structural properties, hoping to find ways to harness its bistability to build multifunctional devices or metamaterials.

Wednesday, September 18, 2019

LISTEN: Simulating blasts in labs, Stewart leading the research

Lauren Stewart. Text: Uncommon Engineering Podcast Episode! Blast Engineering. Listen Now. (Graphic: Sarah Collins)

Usually when researchers need to understand what happens when you blow something up, they have to go outside and actually, well, blow it up.

Thursday, August 8, 2019

Shahi produces best paper at fuzzy systems conference

Ph.D. student Shahrokh Shahi

Ph.D. student Shahrokh Shahi has won the Best Student Paper award at the 2019 joint World Congress of the International Fuzzy Systems Association and Annual Conference of the North American Fuzzy Information Processing Society.

Wednesday, July 10, 2019

Dashing the dream of ideal ‘invisibility’ cloaks for stress waves

Roman arenas have survived in many earthquake-prone regions. Did the Romans inadvertently build seismic wave cloaks when they designed colosseums? Some researchers believe they did due to the arenas' resemblance to modern experimental elastodynamic cloaking devices. (Photo: Paolo Costa Baldi via Wikimedia Commons)

Whether Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak, which perfectly steers light waves around objects to make them invisible, will ever become reality remains to be seen, but perfecting a more crucial cloak is impossible, a new study says. It would have perfectly steered stress waves in the ground, like those emanating from a blast, around objects like buildings to make them “untouchable.”

Friday, June 7, 2019

New tool will give large concrete structures what amounts to an ultrasound, finding tiny cracks before they grow

A researcher measures the width of a crack in a reinforced concrete column after testing the strength of the column. A new project funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency will develop a field-deployable tool to detect cracks far smaller than this — and inside rather than outside — thick reinforced concrete structures. (Photo: Chris Kiser)

Imagine giving large concrete structures something similar to an ultrasound and getting images so detailed you can see cracks just a tenth of a millimeter long. That level of detail just isn’t possible now. Yet such capability could revolutionize how engineers assess the health of thick reinforced concrete infrastructure like dams and power plants and bridges.

Thursday, May 23, 2019

Community is what matters to Giuliana Stovall, in life and in career

Guiliana Stovall sits on a bench with her roller derby roller skates. Stovall, a long-time roller derby player, knew she would continue to skate when she came to Georgia Tech. And since Tech had no outlet, she founded Yellow Jacket Roller Derby. (Photo Courtesy: Giuliana Stovall)

Giuliana Stovall is pretty sure she knows one of every 64 students at Georgia Tech.

Wednesday, May 1, 2019

New origami can morph from one pattern to another, unlocking possibilities for new structures and materials

A new type of origami can morph from one pattern into a different one, or even a hybrid of two patterns, instantly altering many of its structural characteristics. (Photo: Allison Carter)

Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have created a new type of origami that can morph from one pattern into a different one, or even a hybrid of two patterns, instantly altering many of its structural characteristics.

Friday, April 19, 2019

Stewart, Watkins and a baker’s dozen alumnae make list of influential women in Georgia engineering

Top 100 Influential Women in Georgia graphic from Engineering Georgia magazine, including headshots of many of the women on the list.

Georgia Tech civil and environmental engineers are well represented on Engineering Georgia’s second annual list of the 100 most influential women in Georgia. Faculty members Lauren Stewart and Kari Watkins made the list, along with 13 other women who studied in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Friday, February 22, 2019

Kurtis receives Concrete Institute’s Anderson Medal for excellence, creativity, leadership in concrete

Professor and Associate Dean Kimberly Kurtis (Photo: Christopher Moore)

Kimberly Kurtis didn’t know cement and concrete would become such an important part of her working life until she was a junior in college.

Friday, February 15, 2019

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School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Mason Building, 790 Atlantic Drive, Atlanta, GA 30332-0355
Phone: 404-894-2201
Fax: 404-894-2278