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2005 REU Symposium Held in Reno

• 22 undergraduate attended the REU Symposium in Reno, Nevada.

More photos: 1 2 3 4 5 6

• David Sanders, UNR, replayed video footage of testing conducted in UNR’s NEES lab.

At the 2005 Annual Tri-Center Earthquake Engineering Symposium for Young Researchers, held August 11-14 in Reno, Nevada and organized by MAE, twenty-two undergraduate students, sponsored by MCEER, PEER, and MAE, presented research conducted as part of the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) 10-week summer program.

MCEER sponsored nine REU students this year. Six of them completed their programs at the University at Buffalo (UB): Kelly Doyle from the University of Nevada, Reno; Elizabeth Goodwin from Texas A&M; Charles Ekiert and David Keller, both from UB; Tyler Ross from the University of Utah; and Richard Wood from Clarkson University. Three additional MCEER-sponsored students remained at their home institutions: Waleed Barnawi at Florida State University, Vicente Ruiz at Florida A&M and Said Sadek at the City College of New York. Both Waleed and Vicente traveled to Japan for a portion of their research work.

Symposium activities included tours of the Nevada Seismological Lab and the NEES Equipment Site, both at the University of Nevada, Reno. The students viewed a successful five-year, $10M seismic retrofit project at the Mackay School of Earth Sciences and Engineering and visited the engineering lab and shake table while testing was taking place. They also participated in a special activity focused on ethical considerations associated with engineering projects led by guest speaker, Dr. Charles Harris.

Students participating in the program are encouraged to pursue graduate studies in their field of interest. Symposium Proceedings will be available from MAE at http://mae.ce.uiuc.edu.