Sustainability

Leading in the development of sustainable cities and villages through innovation, research, and practice.

MArkerS And MileStoneS

1989 The Civil Engineering Institute is established

1997 Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering is established

1999 Dewberry Chair for Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering is established

2012 CEIE renamed to honor Sid and Reva Dewberry

2014 Hazel Endowed Chair for CEIE established

What the Drone Sees—

Developing Accurate, Reliable Data for Robotic Bridge and Tunnel Inspection for Sustainable Infrastructure

Assistant professor David Lattanzi knows how dangerous bridge inspection can be because he has done it. Prior to completing his PhD, he was a structural engineer at Gannett Fleming, a frm specializing in international planning, design, and construction management, where he inspected and was responsible for the rehabilitation design of automobile and railroad bridges, tunnels, and other structures.

"Most of the nation's highways, bridges, and tunnels were built to last about 75 years. The big postwar building boom was in the 1950s so these structures are nearing the end of their life span," says Lattanzi. "The cost and difculty of inspecting and repairing them will demand that we think of new ways to attack this problem." Anyone who has ever tried to navigate a busy street or drive an interstate highway when roadwork is going on knows that traditional repair methods can be a slow and cumbersome process. These methods use heavy, expensive equipment and often place workers in life-threatening situations. "If we can develop safe, cost-efective, and accurate robotic inspection tools, we can eliminate many of the dangers of this hazardous work," says Lattanzi.

That's where robots can help. But as they become a more accepted tool for infrastructure inspection, it becomes important to consider how humans will interact with the information that those same robots capture. Lattanzi and his team see this as a data representation problem. If the data are not clearly

Mason engineering student Jef Bynum works in David Lattanzi’s 3-D printer lab.

represented or interpreted, tunnel walls could be mistaken for foors, or the top of a bridge deck could be mistaken for the bottom. "Sometimes, when you watch the camera footage from one of these Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), you almost need a dose of Dramamine," says Lattanzi.

The team is studying how to convert robotic inspection information into virtual computer “worlds” that can be explored by a human inspector. To accomplish this, they adapted techniques from computer vision (such as Structure From Motion) and virtual reality equipment like the Oculus Rift. Wearing the virtual reality headsets allows the researcher/inspector to see what the UAV sees, to measure, and then to recreate a scale model to discover, examine, and fx structural problems. With this combination of technology and accurate data interpretation, they hope to save time and money while reducing the dangers for inspectors and their crews.

A version of this story by Martha Bushong originally appeared in Mason News.

“If we can develop safe, cost-efective, and accurate robotic inspection tools, we can eliminate many of the dangers of this hazardous work.”

—DAVID LATTANZI

Civil Engineers Build a Concrete Canoe

Dominick Casciano III, BS Civil and Infrastructure Engineering ’15, has been a member of the Volgenau School of Engineering concrete canoe team since its inception three years ago. In 2014, he led the team that built a canoe named Perseverance and competed near the University of Virginia in the mid-Atlantic portion of this national collegiate engineering competition. This year, Virginia Military Institute in Lexington hosted the April competition, and Casciano and his teammates built a new canoe for it.

why Concrete? n “They make ships out of steel,” he said. “Why not a concrete canoe?” Concrete is the most widely used building material on earth, and it requires a certain amount of knowledge and experience to be done correctly. Planning and implementation for the project comes down to the concrete mix the team decides on and the design of the canoe, which they mold using big sheets of foam. “You want the [concrete] mix to be light and strong.”

looking for team Players n In addition to coming up with a concrete recipe and a canoe design, Casciano said the other team tasks involve working with suppliers to pull together the materials, and raising funds. The team gets some support from the Volgenau School and its Civil Engineering Institute. They also receive donations.

using hands-on research n In 2015, Casciano and team leader Justin Kurz received support from the Ofce of Student Scholarship, Creative Activities, and Research (OSCAR) that helped with their work on the canoe. Both had research projects with team faculty mentor and acting Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering Department chair Liza Durant.

Kurz’s research involved using graphite nanomaterials as concrete reinforcement. “I am working with geopolymers, basically concrete without cement,” said Casciano.

remembering the Maiden voyage n Casciano admits the frst year the team competed was defnitely a learning experience. “It was like trying to paddle a foating bathtub,” said Casciano, who paddled in the frst heat with that frst canoe. Mason’s creation came in last—and backwards. “The frst boat we made was so ugly. It was too big, too tall, and too heavy. We got the sympathy cheers. We defnitely weren’t a threat so everyone cheered us on.”

the team Stats n In 2014, their second year of competition, the team fared better. “Perseverance” won a number of heats against other universities at the regionals, including frst place in the men’s slalom/ endurance race and frst place in the co-ed sprint.

Casciano says the 2015 canoe—named The Green Machine in honor of Mason’s award-winning pep band—was the most resilient and smooth canoe produced by the Mason student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers so far. The canoe was a departure from the norm—it was designed and constructed to be too narrow for adequate stability, even under the control of capable paddlers.

“We now understand that we cannot sacrifce beam [canoe width] for speed at the cost of stability,” he says. “We were unable to complete some of the races due to the severe instability.”

In spite of the difculty, the team’s best heat—men's sprint or endurance—still landed them in second place.

A version of this story by Colleen Kearney Rich originally appeared in Mason Spirit, spring 2015.

Civil and infrastructure major Dominick Casciano works on the mold for this year’s concrete canoe.