At the 85th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board (TRB), in Washington, DC, January 22-26, 2006 a team of Purdue researchers was awarded the first annual Bryant Mather Award. The Bryant Mather Award was established to recognize the best paper in concrete materials section. It honors one of the world's foremost experts on concrete, Bryant Mather, who served the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for 59 years. This year's Bryant Mather Award paper was authored by Gaurav Sant, undergraduate student, Pietro Lura, post-doc; and Associate Professor Jason Weiss, Civil Engineering, Materials. The paper was titled "Measurement of volume change in cementitious materials at early ages: review of testing protocols and interpretation of results". The paper highlighted recent findings in the measurement of the volume changes that occur in cement at very early ages (i.e., as the cement transitions from a liquid to a solid). The paper builds on Professor Weiss's work in the area of characterizing the propensity for a concrete to crack as well as his research on the development of new materials that are more resistant to cracking. more . . .