PhD candidate Jyoti K. Chetri has a strong work ethic and an even stronger desire to make the world a better place. It is this drive that helped the Department of Civil and Materials Engineering student win a Chicago Consular Corps (CCC) Scholarship for the academic year 2018-2019 from UIC’s Office of International Affairs (OIA). She is one of only a several successful applicants university-wide who were “favorably reviewed” and awarded the $1,000 scholarship. Eligibility for the scholarship is limited to students who have a minimum cumulative UIC GPA of 3.5 (on a 4-point scale). Chetri, of Nepal, is working under the direction of CME Professor Krishna R. Reddy in the Sustainable Engineering Research Lab and the Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental…

Scholarship donors and their recipients came together on Nov. 1, 2018, for the Department of Civil and Materials Engineering’s annual Civil Engineering Professional Advisory Council (CEPAC) Scholarship Reception and Awards Dinner. The event recognizes the generosity of scholarship donors and partners who give annually to students to help them pursue their academic and professional dreams. CME awarded dozens of scholarships to students and supports UIC in its mission to provide access to excellence and success for our students. Board members, many of whom are UIC alumnus, added personal stories to the ceremony as they detailed the scholarship requirements and the interests and accomplishments of the donors. Additionally, two new scholarships were awarded from CEPAC members. The “Infrastructure Engineering Scholarship” was established…

John Klein, a PhD student studying Materials Engineering within the Civil and Materials Engineering Department at UIC, has been selected for a fellowship award in the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (USARL) Research Associateship Program. Earlier this year, two researchers from The Composites and Hybrid Materials Branch of the USARL visited UIC, and met with CME Associate Professor Eduard Karpov to discuss opportunities for collaboration. The researchers expressed specific interest in some of the research coming out of his lab. They also were looking for U.S. citizen PhD students in the field of materials engineering, and Klein – who grew up in Wilmette, IL – fit the candidate profile. After receiving positive feedback regarding his credentials, he applied to the fellowship,…

Three new faculty members are joining the department in Materials Engineering. Dr. Sara Kadkhodaei is joining CME as an assistant professor of materials engineering. Her research interests include: Developing quantitative tools in computational materials science Ab-initio thermodynamics and kinetics Developing fundamental understanding of new bulk and nano materials Diusion process in novel energy materials Structure-property prediction with application to energy materials Rational materials design Dr. Matthew Daly is joining the department as an assistant professor of materials engineering. His research interests include: Deformation behavior of advanced materials Mechanics of nanostructured and 2D materials In situ characterization techniques Atomistic modeling of deformation processes Physical metallurgy Dr. Sean Vitousek came to CME and made headlines instantly with his research on the potential…

Only a handful of students are awarded scholarships by the Environmental Research and Education Foundation (EREF). This year, UIC’s Girish Kumar, a PhD student in the Department of Civil and Materials Engineering was named a recipient. This highly competitive and prestigious scholarship recognizes several doctoral students each year working at the forefront of the waste management and engineering field. The winners are selected from an international pool of applicants. Kumar was one of only eight students nationwide selected by the EREF to receive the scholarship in the amount of $14,400 for his research. “My research is focused on understanding the fundamental processes that occur within the waste when it is dumped in a landfill and mathematically interpret those processes to…

2018 Student Days Winning Team's Presentation from Construction Institute of ASCE on Vimeo. Huzefa Dewaswala, a master’s student in Department of Civil and Materials Engineering’s (CME) Construction Engineering program, was a key member on the winning team during the recent Student Days Conference, which was part of the 2018 National ASCE Construction Institute's Heavy Civil Competitions in San Diego.   The Construction Institute brought only 35 students to the conference and team competition. Five teams created written and oral proposals to build the Voigt Street Pedestrian Bridge, a component of the Mid-Coast Corridor Transit Project in San Diego. Dewaswala’s team, Pontem Inc., was awarded the winning bid, and consisted of teammates from Stony Brook University, Princeton University, University of South Florida,…