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Rani El Hajjar UWM Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering Director, UWM Engineering Mechanics and Composites Research Laboratory Dr. El Hajjar has expertise in outlining quality controls, understanding testing and certification requirements and ensuring build reliability in lightweight polymer-based composite materials.He is a field leader on carbon fiber and cellulose nanofiber composites, and the author of the upcoming book “Practical Design and Validation of Composite Structures.” His research focus is on testing composite structures for safety, developing composite materials for zero greenhouse emissions and developing on-site, non-destructive testing methods. He is recognized for his industrial expertise in advanced materials at SpaceX, Boeing and Intel corporations; he led the UWM team that was named one of five universities by NASA to participate in the 2015 X-Hab Academic Innovation Challenge. |
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Junjie Niu UWM Assistant Professor, Materials Science and Engineering Associate Editor RSC Advances, a publication of the Royal Society of Chemistry Dr. Junjie Niu is an Assistant Professor in Department of Material Science and Engineering at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He received Ph.D. in Materials Science from Zhejiang University. Before joining in UWM, Dr. Niu worked as a Postdoc Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) from 2011 to 2014. He also did interdisciplinary research as a Postdoc Associate at the Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) from 2009 to 2011. Dr. Niu’s interdisciplinary research includes understanding fundamental science in physics/chemistry/mechanics, and engineering materials in applications of energy storage and water-energy nexus. In particular, lithium-based batteries, advanced lead-acid battery, self-cleaning, water purification and air purification. Dr. Niu has published over 70 papers in peer-reviewed journals including 3 Nature series journals with a total citation 4900+ and h-index of 33 and filed over 5 US patents. |
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Konstantin Sobolev UWM Professor, Former Chair, Civil and Environmental Engineering Advanced concrete is Dr. Sobolov’s focus, specifically water-resistant and high-performance concrete composites, designed to flex, making them ultimately stronger and last longer. He is working with Spancrete to enhance pervious concrete with a titanium dioxide-based catalyst, which, when activated by sunshine, breaks down organic contaminants from the vehicle exhaust near the concrete. |
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Habib Tabatabai UWM Associate Professor, Civil Engineering Dr. Tabatabai’s research focus is on reliability and durability of bridges, repair and rehabilitation, damage detection and structural health monitoring, also is on utilization of byproducts in construction. His work with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation on discovering more efficient ways to extend the life of Wisconsin bridges through the testing and application of several thin, lightweight polymer overlays, was cited as one of the nation’s most promising to address highway and transportation issues by Maintenance Research, a magazine published by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO). |
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Jian Zhao UWM Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering Chair, Joint American Concrete Institute/American Society of Civil Engineers 447 Committee After receiving his B.S., Dr. Zhao worked as a structural engineer for two years, during which time he participated in the design of several buildings in seismic regions. He earned his PhD from the University of Minnesota, where he developed a new seismic testing method for large-scale structures. Dr. Zhao is the principal investigator of a National Science Foundation-funded project focusing on the behavior and design of cast-in-place anchors and studs subjected to seismic loading. |