Ground, water and structural engineering
Theme Leader: Dr Pierfrancesco Cacciola
Research investigates the response of materials, soils, structures and engineered systems to forces imposed by their interaction with naturally occurring processes, such as earthquakes, permafrost and waves.Research strands undertaken in the ground, water and structural engineering theme are:
- geotechnics - Soil-structure interaction, foundation engineering, soil and rock mechanics, laboratory study for rock stability in permafrost areas
- hydraulics - wave processes and interactions, cohesive and non-cohesive sediment transport on beaches, tidal and density currents, modelling of waves via Finite Elements and Boundary Elements methods, physical modelling of sediment movement and waves
- materials - modelling and testing of conventional and innovative construction materials, cyclic behaviour of plane and confined concrete hysteretic behaviour of materials via new methodologies such as the Preisach formalism, usage of natural fibres for concrete and soil reinforcement, effect of restrained concrete shrinkage on the performance of concrete structures, use of conventional concrete, steel fibre reinforced concrete and Fibre Reinforced Polymers (FRPs) for the earthquake strengthening of existing structures, the development of Ultra High Performance Fibre Reinforced Concrete (UHPFRC), the investigation of the impact resistance of Ultra-High Performance Fibre Reinforced Concrete (UHPFRC), and the development of geopolymer concrete with and without fibres.
- structures - identifying mechanical parameters and presence of damage via non-destructive tests, seismic action modelling , proposing and testing new mechanical jointing systems for timber, glued-laminated timber and engineered wood products and numerical modelling of timber structures, analysis of structures under stochastic loads, redesign of structures under seismic action, validation of numerical models via dynamic testing of small-scale prototypes of structures
