The Steel Bridge Task Force of the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI); the National Steel Bridge Alliance (NSBA); and the American Association of State and Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) T-14 Technical Committee for Structural Steel Design have named Robert J. Connor, the Jack and Kay Hockema Professor in Civil Engineering and Director of CAI and S-BRITE at Purdue University's Lyles School of Engineering, as the recipient of the 2020 Richard S. Fountain Award.

Is the water in your home actually safe, given that water utility companies in the U.S. aren't required by law to monitor the water that specifically enters a building at its service line? A study has found that the water quality of a home can differ in each room and change between seasons, challenging the assumption that the water in a public water system is the same as the water that passes through a building's plumbing at any time of the year.

Area high school students will test their bridge design capabilities at Purdue University's annual Bridge Bust Competition on Friday (Feb. 21). The 41st annual Bridge Bust will feature 147 teams composed of 270 students from 19 schools in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky. It is hosted by Purdue's American Society of Civil Engineers.

On the 5th annual International Day of Women and Girls in Science, CE alum Shelley Finnigan (BSCE '05, MSCE '06) reflects on her path to a science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) career, hopeful that her story will serve to inspire young women around the globe.

PhD student Miguel Montoya has been selected as one of four students nationwide to receive the Association of Modified Asphalt Producers (AMAP) Dr. David R. Jones IV scholarships for 2020.

Congratulations to PhD candidate Mohamed Yamany and his advisor Professor Dulcy Abraham. They have been awarded the best poster presentation from the 2020 Transportation Research Board (TRB) Committee on Pavement Management Systems.

Brian D. Harlow (BSCE 1978), Vice President, Head of NAFTA Manufacturing, Global Head, Powertrain Manufacturing Engineering at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (retired), and Alex D. Oak (BSCE 1968), CEO & Chairman of Cripe, have been named recipients of the 2020 Distinguished Engineering Alumni Award by the College of Engineering.

CE alumni Ron Klemencic, PE, SE (BSCE '85) and Dr. Essam Sharaf (BSCE '75, MSCE '80, PhD '84) have been elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer.

Darcy Bullock, Lyles Family Professor of Civil Engineering and Director of the Joint Transportation Research Program, says a recently-announced partnership between Purdue and Germany-based Magment Concrete Wireless Power aims to address future electric vehicle charging needs. The partners will be working on several electric transportation pilots, including the development of wireless charging technology for electric scooters.

Robert Frosch, Senior Associate Dean of Engineering for Facilities & Operations and Professor of Civil Engineering, has been awarded the American Concrete Institute's Joe W. Kelly Award In recognition of his outstanding contributions to engineering education, insightful research to improve the performance of structural concrete systems, and dedicated service to ACI.

Dr. Randall Poston, Sr. Principal at Pivot Engineers, a structural engineering consulting firm in Austin, Texas, held two seminars this March as a member of the inaugural class of Neil Armstrong Distinguished Visiting Fellows.

Dr. Jian Wang, who completed his Ph.D. at Purdue University under the supervision of Dr. Srinivas Peeta in December 2018, has received the 2019 COTA Best Dissertation Award from the Chinese Overseas Transportation Association (COTA).

Future long-term habitats on the Moon or Mars will have to be resilient against many hazards, including radiation, sandstorms, quakes, and meteorites. Prof. Shirley Dyke is the director of the Resilient Extra Terrestrial Habitats Institute (RETHi), a NASA-funded institute researching how to make these habitats resilient, self-monitoring, and serviceable autonomously. She discusses these challenges in the latest issue of Civil Engineering magazine.

A team of Purdue and INDOT colleagues was recognized with an exceptional paper award by the Transportation Research Board (TRB) committee on Traffic Signal Systems.

Shirley J. Dyke, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Civil Engineering, and Julio A. Ramirez, Karl H. Kettelhut Professor in Civil Engineering and NHERI-NCO Center Director, were invited to give keynote lectures at the 2019 Advances in Steel Structures Conference, held in Cairo, Egypt on December 17-19. 2019.

Rao "G.S." Govindaraju, Bowen Engineering Head of Civil Engineering and Christopher B. and Susan S. Burke Professor of Civil Engineering, has been recognized by the American Institute of Hydrology with the AIH Founders Award.

The Lyles School of Civil Engineering would like to congratulate the following faculty for their outstanding dedication to teaching Boilermaker Engineers! These exemplary faculty received teaching evaluation scores of 4.7 or higher in classes with enrollments of 10 or more, and 50% or higher response rates, based on student evaluations from courses taught in Engineering in fall 2019.

Recent PhD graduate Sikai Chen has been selected to receive the Council of University Transportation Centers (CUTC) Milton Pikarsky Award, a national level prize. This prestigious award recognizes one outstanding PhD dissertation in transportation science and technology.

Grad student Bortiorkor Alabi has been awarded the 2019-2020 Greater Indianapolis Women's Transportation Seminar (WTS) Chapter Helene M. Overly Memorial Scholarship. The scholarship recognizes an outstanding graduate female in the transportation industry and academia.

CE undergrad Amanda Lefebvre was selected for the 2019 Exceptional Leadership Award at the Engineers Without Borders (EWB) National Conference in Pittsburgh last month. This award recognizes those individuals that truly show a commitment to their chapters, Program Communities, and the mission of EWB-USA.