Continuing in the vein of pavement was Dr. Karim Chatti, acting associate dean for research at MSU’s College of Engineering and a professor of civil and environmental engineering who has a 20-year track record of research into advanced pavement materials.
The Pavement Engineering Group in the department has just been awarded a Tier 1 University Transportation Center designation by the U.S. Department of Transportaiton, one of just 20 such centers nationwide. Most such centers study specific modes of transportation. But MSU’s will be different — it will be the only one focused exclusively on pavement and its preservation.
“The goal is to bring new science to pavement preservation,” Chatti said. “Think of it as being like medicine, the prevention of problems. It will focus on innovative materials that can protect an existing pavement — self sensing, self healing materials — as well as health monitoring — the earlier we detect things, the less expensive it will be to fix things.”
The center will also analyze pavement performance data, making pavement management and economic analysis.
The Center for Highway Pavement Preservation will receive $1.41 million in its first year and is expected to receive similar levels of funding for up to four years. The other universities in the center are the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Texas-Austin, the University of Minnesota, North Carolina A&T State University, and the University of Hawaii.
There will be six faculty from MSU engineering who now work on pavement technology working for the center, as well as other faculty in materials science and chemistry.
http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2013/11/10/msu-tech-tour-super-spartan-innovations/