Civil and Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Evaluation And Development Of Cpt Based Pile Design In Nebraska Soils, Alex Silvey

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cone penetration testing (CPT) is a well established geotechnical subsurface investigation technique commonly used for site characterization and soil classification. The CPT gives real time end resistance, side friction, and pore pressure readings. Axially loaded piles also share these two resistance mechanisms, suggesting the cone can be considered similar to a miniature pile. This study focused on evaluating eight CPT methods prediction of pile bearing capacity. The Nebraska Department of Roads (NDOR) conducts dynamic load tests (PDA) of driven pile to verify pile capacity for bridge foundations. 91 comparisons of CPT logs and PDA data were evaluated. CPT prediction methods …

Understanding Asphalt Concrete Aging Using Nanoindentation, Hasan M. Faisal

Civil Engineering ETDs

Asphalt concrete (AC) is created by mixing liquid asphalt binder with solid aggregates. When asphalt binder is mixed with aggregates, it creates a thin film (about 7-16 microns thick) around the aggregate surface. Fine aggregate (smaller than 0.075 mm size) get entrapped within the binder film or mixed with the binder, and create a phase called mastic. Both asphalt film and mastic play significant roles in aging of asphalt pavement. To this day, tests were performed mainly on the bulk liquid asphalt, but not on the film or mastic. In this study, for the first time, nanoindentation tests were done …

My Catalyst, Gabrielle Gambino Lyon

Celebration of Learning

Over the course of my internship and shadow program with Pepper Lawson Construction and Ziegler Cooper Architects, I was able to explore the various career paths involved in the design, construction, and civil engineering fields. My work on the construction site of a high-rise apartment building located in the heart of Houston, TX allowed me first-hand experience working and learning alongside project engineers, contractors, building developers, and the construction team.

This project was the perfect confluence of my main areas of interest: structural, mechanical, civil, and environmental engineering, as well as architecture. My daily work consisted of on-site walk throughs, …

In Situ Strain And Damage Monitoring Of Gfrp Laminates Incorporating Carbon Nanofibers Under Tension, Yanlei Wang, Yongshuai Wang, Baoguo Han, Baolin Wan, Gaochuang Cai, Ruijuan Chang

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

In this study, conductive carbon nanofibers (CNFs) were dispersed into epoxy resin and then infused into glass fiber fabric to fabricate CNF/glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP) laminates. The electrical resistance and strain of CNF/GFRP laminates were measured simultaneously during tensile loadings to investigate the in situ strain and damage monitoring capability of CNF/GFRP laminates. The damage evolution and conduction mechanisms of the laminates were also presented. The results indicated that the percolation threshold of CNFs content for CNF/GFRP laminates was 0.86 wt % based on a typical power law. The resistance response during monotonic tensile loading could be classified into three …

Investigating The Pavement Vibration Response For Roadway Service Condition Evaluation, Zhoujing Ye, Yang Lu, Linbing Wang

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Dynamic response of pavement provides service condition information and helps with damage prediction, while limited research is available with the simulation of pavement vibration response for evaluating roadway service condition. +is paper presents a numerical model for the analysis of the pavement vibration due to the dynamic load created by a passing vehicle. A quarter vehicle model was used for the determination of the vehicle moving load. Both random and spatial characteristics of the load were considered. The random nonuniform moving load was then introduced in a 3D finite element model for the determination of the traffic-induced pavement vibration. The …

Connected Autonomous Vehicles: Capacity Analysis, Trajectory Optimization, And Speed Harmonization, Amir Ghiasi

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Emerging connected and autonomous vehicle technologies (CAV) provide an opportunity to improve highway capacity and reduce adverse impacts of stop-and-go traffic. To realize the potential benefits of CAV technologies, this study provides insightful methodological and managerial tools in microscopic and macroscopic traffic scales. In the macroscopic scale, this dissertation proposes an analytical method to formulate highway capacity for a mixed traffic environment where a portion of vehicles are CAVs and the remaining are human-driven vehicles (HVs). The proposed analytical mixed traffic highway capacity model is based on a Markov chain representation of spatial distribution of heterogeneous and stochastic headways. This …

Mathematical And Numerical Modeling Of Hybrid Adsorption And Biological Treatment Systems For Enhanced Nitrogen Removal, Karl A. Payne

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

High nutrient loading into groundwater and surface water systems has deleterious impacts on the environment, such as eutrophication, decimation of fish populations, and oxygen depletion. Conventional onsite wastewater treatment systems (OWTS) and various waste streams with high ammonium (NH4+) concentrations present a challenge, due the inconsistent performance of environmental biotechnologies aimed at managing nutrients from these sources.

Biological nitrogen removal (BNR) is commonly used in batch or packed-bed reactor configurations for nitrogen removal from various waste streams. In recognition of the need for resource recovery, algal photobioreactors are another type of environmental biotechnology with the potential for simultaneously treating wastewater …

Pressure Swing Adsorption Separation Of H2s/Co2/Ch4 Gas Mixtures With Molecular Sieves 4a, 5a, And 13x, Howell H. Heck, Merilyn L. Hall, Rudy Dos Santos, Manolis M. Tomadakis

Mechanical and Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

Pressure swing adsorption experiments were carried out for the separation of equimolar mixtures of carbon dioxide and methane containing small amounts of hydrogen sulfide, utilizing 4A, 5A, and 13X molecular sieves. High-purity methane of zero or nearly zero hydrogen sulfide concentration was produced in the adsorption stage with 13X and 5A sieves, at high product recovery rates; high-purity carbon dioxide was obtained with the same sieves in the desorption stage. Zeolite 4A was found capable of raising considerably the hydrogen sulfide concentration in the accumulated desorption product (vs. the adsorption feed) at high recovery rates too. Adsorption selectivity values derived …

Lateral Deformation Behavior Of Mass Timber Beam To Column Gravity Connection, Tyler James Williams

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

A beam-to-column connection consisting of glulam beam and column and cross laminated timber floor slab was developed and experimentally evaluated for use in buildings that are expected to undergo earthquake-­­induced lateral drift. The connection utilized a passive gap closure mechanism designed to allow beam rotations during lateral drift while minimizing residual separation between the beam and the column following an earthquake. Full scale cyclic experiments were used to validate the connection’s minimal rotational stiffness and demonstrate low damage performance for lateral drifts exceeding 4.5% drift. The connection exhibited no degradation in gravity load capacity throughout the imposed lateral deformations. An …

Characteristics And Applications Of Biochars Derived From Wastewater Solids, Zhongzhe Liu, Simcha L. Singer, Yiran Tong, Lee Kimball, Erik Anderson, Matthew Hughes, Daniel Zitomer, Patrick J. Mcnamara

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Pyrolysis is a thermochemical decomposition process that can be used to generate pyrolysis gas (py-gas), bio-oil, and biochar as well as energy from biomass. Biomass from agricultural waste and other plant-based materials has been the predominant pyrolysis research focus. Water resource recovery facilities also produce biomass, referred to as wastewater solids, that could be a viable pyrolysis feedstock. Water resource recovery facilities are central collection and production sites for wastewater solids. While the utilization of biochar from a variety of biomass types has been extensively studied, the utilization of wastewater biochars has not been reviewed in detail. This review compares …

Determining The Location Of Runway Exits Using Airport Surface Detection Equipment, Christopher Bryan Clemmer

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Airport surface detection equipment, such as ASDE-X, is used by thirty-five commercially operated airports throughout the United States. ASDE-X is responsible for the safe monitoring of aircraft movements as well as ground support vehicle operating on the airfield. Like most radar-based technologies, ASDE-X can report the position of any aircraft within a one second time interval. This data not only contains the geographic position, but also reports speed, heading, altitude, and aircraft specific characteristics. Using a quantitative approach, this research will use the data reported by ASDE-X to analyze current runway exit locations and develop an improved method of determining …

Measuring And Evaluating Safety Maturity Of Construction Contractors: Multicriteria Decision-Making Approach, Ali A. Karakhan, Sathyanarayanan Rajendran, John Gambatese, Chukwuma Nnaji

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of the Sciences

Evaluating the safety maturity of construction contractors before awarding the contract is an effective strategy that many owners have started to implement. Given the importance of workplace safety, awarding the contract to safer contractors can enhance project performance outcomes in terms of safety, quality, cost, and schedule. Safety maturity is one quality of a construction organization encompassing interdependent factors that can be used to evaluate expected safety performance. However, there is no formal decision-making framework available in literature that owners can use to evaluate contractor safety maturity. The present study aims to bridge this gap in safety knowledge by proposing …

A 3d Model For Earthquake-Induced Liquefaction Triggering And Post-Liquefaction Response, Arash Khosravifar, Ahmed Elgamal, Jinchi Lu, John Li

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

A constitutive soil model that was originally developed to model liquefaction and cyclic mobility has been updated to comply with the established guidelines on the dependence of liquefaction triggering to the number of loading cycles, effective overburden stress (Kσ), and static shear stress (Kα). The model has been improved with new flow rules to better capture contraction and dilation in sands and has been implemented as PDMY03 in different computational platforms such as OpenSees finite-element, and FLAC and FLAC3D finite-difference frameworks. This paper presents the new modified framework of analysis and describes a guideline to calibrate the input parameters of …

Tornado And Hurricane Hazards: Reconnaissance, Structural Analysis And Vulnerability Modeling, Fernando Simon Plaz

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is composed of three main projects which are directly linked to wind engineering. Hazards such as tornadoes and hurricanes are natural disasters which causes human and economic losses. First, the study consists on a forensic analysis made to a Tornado that hit Funing and Sheyang counties, in the Jiangsu Province of China. 21 villages, mostly rural, experienced important damages to different type of structures. The work will describe field observations and structural analyses made to communication towers. Preliminary estimates of wind speeds will be given based on the observations and the analysis as well as recommendations to reduce …

Development Of A Small Diameter Rapid Pressuremeter Test For Unbound Pavement Layer Evaluations, Thaddeus Joseph Misilo Iii

Theses and Dissertations

Six inch and 12 inch long small diameter pressuremeter (SDPMT) probes were developed and tested extensively to determine in situ stress-strain properties of unbound pavement layers. They were deployed in the same hole as the one made during nuclear density testing. The stress strain response of conventional or incremental and continuous or rapid strain controlled tests in unbound pavement layers were evaluated at four sites in Brevard County, Florida. One test site was A-1-b base material, one was A-3 subgrade and two were compacted A-3 fill of subgrade quality. The SDPMT results were compared with nuclear density dry and wet …

Bs News July/August

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.

Modelling Transport Of Nitrogen Compounds In Geita Wetland Along Mtakuja River, Ezrael Masawe

Tanzania Journal of Engineering and Technology (TJET)

The impacts of excessive nitrogen loading to streams in a watershed occur in the receiving waters such as rivers at the outlet of the watershed. To quantify the impacts of land use and management practices on the nitrogen loading at the watershed outlet, simulation models are needed that can both predict the nitrogen loading at the edge of individual fields and predict the fate of nitrogen as it moves through the river network to the watershed outlet. This paper presents the results of a model analysis for describing the processes governing transformations and transport of nitrogen compounds (NO3-N and NH4-N) …

Analysis Of Drought Using Meteorological And Microwave Remote Sensed Data: A Case Of Wami Watershed, Tanzania, Deogratias Mulungu

Tanzania Journal of Engineering and Technology (TJET)

Agricultural sector is important for the economy of Tanzania, but in recent years there is decline in its growth and performance because of persistent droughts. An in-depth study of droughts was conducted on Wami watershed through rainfall and satellite microwave remote sensing data leading for estimates of meteorological droughts and soil moisture based droughts, respectively. Rainfall data during 1973-2008 was used to obtain Drought Severity Index (DSI) and active imaging microwave radar data during 1997-2009 from ESA’s SAR missions of ENVISAT and ERS was used to obtain soil moisture anomalies (SMA). Soil map was used to explain discrepancies in droughts …

The Fate Of Nitrogen And Faecal Coliform In The Lubigi Wetland In Uganda, Aloyce Mayo

Tanzania Journal of Engineering and Technology (TJET)

The capacity of the Lubigi wetland to reduce nitrogen and faecal coliform pollution entering Lake Kyoga in Uganda was investigated. Three transects with 5 sampling points in each, were established in the wetland. Wetland plants samples were collected from the specific locations along the transects, and laboratory tests and analyses were carried out for plants biomass and nitrogen contents determination. Samples of wetland sediments were also collected, and laboratory tests and analyses were done for determination of nitrogen content in the sediments. Wetland water samples were taken from the main wetland inlet and the main outlet from the wetland main …

Comparative Study Of One Parameter Budyko Model Index And The Scs Curve Number, Cihad Ayberk Doner

LSU Master's Theses

This study investigates two water balance models from different levels of complexity to recognize the impacts of climate change on water resources. The main objective is to examine the capacity of future runoff calculations of a parsimonious simple water balance model compared to a more complex model under the climate change variables. The selected water balance models are the simple one-parameter Budyko-type model using the Zhang’s equation with single parameter (a) and the more complex model (HELP3) applying Soil Conservation Service (SCS) curve number method to calculate future runoff predictions. The study has a twofold focus, first on explaining the …

Abraham, John E., 1844-1925 (Sc 3233), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scan (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3233. Letter, 8 March 1886, of John E. Abraham, Beattyville, Kentucky, to Captain Thomas J. Hardin, Monterey, Kentucky. He discusses timber transactions and meeting with a supplier of stone in connection with a bid to construct dikes on the Ohio River.

Wave Attenuation By Constructed Oyster Reef Breakwaters, Jason M. Chauvin

LSU Master's Theses

Biloxi Marsh, located along the shoreline of Eloi Bay in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana has experienced significant shoreline erosion in recent years. The Living Shoreline Demonstration Project, completed in November 2016, constructed three miles of living shoreline structures to attenuate waves and thus combat marsh edge erosion along the shoreline of Eloi Bay. Several types of constructed oyster reef breakwaters were installed for this demonstration project. Due to the experimental nature of these products, available performance characteristics are limited.

This research measures wave attenuation across the constructed oyster reef breakwaters using bottom-mounted pressure gauges. Seven pressure gauges were deployed to …

Hydraulic Performance And Vulnerability On Sanitary Sewer Overflow In Southern Pinellas County, Fl, Uchechi O. Akabogu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Rain-induced sanitary sewer overflow due to high infiltration is a significant challenge for many utilities, including Pinellas County utilities. The main aim of this study is to develop a hydraulic model to analyze the performance of the existing sanitary sewer system, especially during intense rainfall events.

To calculate the flow inputs for the model, a times series analysis was performed to separate the inflow and infiltration from the actual sewer flow. Using the Stevens-Schutzbach method, daily Base Infiltration (BI) was calculated and was subtracted from the total observed flow to give the Dry Weather Flow (DWF). Adjusting the DWF by …

Efficient Adjacency Queries And Dynamic Refinement For Meshfree Methods With Applications To Explicit Fracture Modeling, James Olliff

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Meshfree methods provide a more practical approach to solving problems involving large deformation and modeling fracture compared to the Finite Element Method (FEM). However meshfree methods are more computationally intensive compared to FEM, which can limit their practicality in engineering. Meshfree methods also lack a clear boundary definition, restricting available visualization techniques. Determining particle locations and attributes such that a consistent approximation is ensured can be challenging in meshfree methods, especially when employing h-refinement. The primary objective of this work is to address the limitations associated with computational efficiency, meshfree domain discretization, and h-refinement, including both placement of particles as …

A Coupled Thermo-Mechanical Theory Of Strain Gradient Plasticity For Small And Finite Deformations, Yooseob Song

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

In this work, a thermodynamically consistent coupled thermo-mechanical gradient enhanced continuum plasticity theory is developed for small and finite deformations. The proposed model is conceptually based on the dislocations interaction mechanisms and thermal activation energy. The thermodynamic conjugate microstresses are decomposed into energetic and dissipative components. This work incorporates the thermal and mechanical responses of microsystems. It addresses phenomena such as size and boundary effects and in particular microscale heat transfer in fast-transient processes. Not only the partial heat dissipation caused by the fast transient time, but also the distribution of temperature caused by the transition from the plastic work …

Underground Stormwater Treatment Performance In Urban Coastal Catchments: Case Study Of Baffle Boxes In The City Of Tampa, Awet Eyob Tsegay

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In coastal urban regions, underground stormwater treatment units are suitable infrastructure options because they take less space where premium land is expensive. Even then, they should be accessible and ideally small enough to fit into existing stormwater networks. Since 2003, the City of Tampa and Florida’s Department of Transportation (FDOT) have installed 47 baffle boxes into the city’s stormwater pipe networks. Baffle boxes are underground stormwater treatment structures designed to capture sediments and floating debris. Since their deployment, many challenges regarding their practical sediment capturing performance was raised by the city.

The objective of this research was to evaluate the …

Multihazard Scenarios For Analysis Of Compound Extreme Events, Mojtaba Sadegh

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Compound extremes correspond to events with multiple concurrent or consecutive drivers (e.g., ocean and fluvial flooding, drought, and heat waves) leading to substantial impacts such as infrastructure failure. In many risk assessment and design applications, however, multihazard scenarios of extremes and compound events are ignored. In this paper, we review the existing multivariate design and hazard scenario concepts and introduce a novel copula-based weighted average threshold scenario for an expected event with multiple drivers. The model can be used for obtaining multihazard design and risk assessment scenarios and their corresponding likelihoods. The proposed model offers uncertainty ranges of most likely …

Characterization Of Mg-Based Bimetal Treatment Of Insensitive Munition 2,4-Dinitroanisole, Emese Hadnagy, Andrew Mai, Benjamin Smolinski, Washington Braida, Agamemnon Koutsospyros

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

The manufacturing of insensitive munition 2,4-dinitroanisole (DNAN) generates waste streams that require treatment. DNAN has been treated previously with zero-valent iron (ZVI) and Fe-based bimetals. Use of Mg-based bimetals offers certain advantages including potential higher reactivity and relative insensitivity to pH conditions. This work reports preliminary findings of DNAN degradation by three Mg-based bimetals: Mg/Cu, Mg/Ni, and Mg/Zn. Treatment of DNAN by all three bimetals is highly effective in aqueous solutions (> 89% removal) and wastewater (> 91% removal) in comparison with treatment solely with zero-valent magnesium (ZVMg; 35% removal). Investigation of reaction byproducts supports a partial degradation pathway involving …

Formal And Informal Undergraduate Ethics Education In Engineering, Grace Ports

Undergraduate Voices

This literature review attempts to answer the question of whether formal education or informal education of ethics within civil engineering is more beneficial. If there is a lack of structured education of ethics in civil engineering, then another area of interest is to discover where engineers are being informally educated. Another area of inquiry is whether it is more beneficial to teach engineers ethics prior to the time when they are required to study the code of ethics for their certification exam, or should engineers wait until moments before the exam to study the code. This article examines the potential …

Closure To The Discussion Of “Long-Term Performance Of A Highway Embankment Build With Lightweight Aggregates”, Anand J. Puppala, Sireesh Saride, Raja V. Yenigalla, Bhaskar C. S. Chittoori, Ekarut Archeewa

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

The authors thank Dr. Diyaljee for his interest on the subject and providing assessments based on the two research articles (Saride et al. 2010 and Puppala et al. 2017). Authors appreciate the comprehensive analysis done in the discussion. Following the comments noted in the discussion, we would like to provide our explanations on the discussion.