From the department head
As the academic year comes to a close, I’m proud to reflect on how our department continues to evolve and adapt in a rapidly changing world. Innovation in education has never been more crucial, and at Carnegie Mellon, we are committed to equipping our students with the skills, knowledge, and hands-on experiences that prepare them to solve the real-world challenges ahead.
We are particularly excited to see our reimagined undergraduate project courses come to fruition. These classes tackle real-world problems through careful planning, team collaboration, engineering design, and problemsolving. With an emphasis on resilience and community engagement, the projects are more than just homework; they are the first tangible solutions our students create in their careers as engineers and demonstrate their skills as systems thinkers.
Similarly, we’ve taken a hands-on approach with our online certificate program, AI Engineering: Digital Twins and Analytics. To enhance learning in this emerging field, faculty and students developed a physical testbed that allows students to interact with real infrastructure systems, bridging the gap between virtual models and their physical counterparts. This integration of practical experiences into both traditional and online learning, ensures that students—whether on campus or across the world—are prepared to drive innovation in their fields.
Alongside this experiential learning, we continually assess and adapt our offerings to teach the field’s latest technological advancements. Artificial intelligence (AI), for example, has presented tremendous opportunities and risks to civil and environmental engineers. As a result, we have implemented coursework to ensure our students know how to use AI, and other new tools, effectively and responsibility.
What we teach in the classroom is closely tied to the challenges and approaches we’re exploring in the lab, aligning our department under a shared mission to engineer resilience for a changing world. In this issue, you’ll read about our civil and environmental engineering faculty who are solving a diverse array of problems, from the composition of our soils, to the glaciers in Alaska, and even space travel to the Moon or Mars.
As you read through this edition, I hope you’ll see how our department is not just keeping pace with the changing landscape of civil and environmental engineering, but actively shaping it. Thank you for your ongoing support, and I look forward to what we can accomplish together in the months ahead.
Sincerely,
Burcu Akinci Hamerschlag University Professor and Department Head
Debra
IMAGE / Illustration: K. Huber
Blending the virtual and physical worlds
Technological advancements of the past few years have brought new norms to civil engineering and academia. Students are increasingly interested in online education and enjoy the convenience of completing courses at their own pace. At the same time, civil engineers parse through an array of new tools, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and digital twins, that are set to transform the field as they know it.
But when remote learning and civil engineering intersect, how are concepts that are–literally–concretely rooted in society’s physical structures translated to asynchronous forms of thinking and learning?
When instructors in Carnegie Mellon’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering set out to develop their new online certificate program, AI Engineering – Digital Twins and Analytics, these were the challenges they were tasked to solve. For a program designed for practicing engineers looking to upskill, remote learning was necessary to make the curriculum flexible to a full-time work schedule. Additionally, because a physical counterpart is so crucial to a digital twin’s virtual model, they needed to capture the substance of real-world data in a remote setting.
“Digital twins are very new to our field so there isn’t a lot of precedent set on how to teach them, especially in an online class,” said Mario Bergés, professor of civil and environmental engineering. “A key process in digital twin modeling is closing the loop between simulating the behavior of an infrastructure system and actually controlling it in the real world. Because of this, we felt strongly that we needed to give students the opportunity to interact with a physical structure instead of just models.”
To accomplish this, the team enlisted help from an undergraduate student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering to construct a testbed that bridged the gap between the virtual and physical environments. Consisting of a train locomotive equipped with sensors navigating tracks that traverse a bridge, the 20-foot scaled down model sits in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering’s Autonomous Infrastructure Systems lab, but is continuously streamed to the classroom web portal.
Students can log-in from their computers, input the variables they’d like to test– such as speed of the vehicle or the sampling rate– and watch the train run live from wherever they may be. The data from the test is sent directly to their email, where they can analyze their results and adjust as needed, identifying problems like abnormal vibration patterns between the train and tracks that could indicate defective railway sections and use control algorithms to stabilize motion and maximize passenger comfort.
“A problem we see in digital twin adoption is that most people are only dealing with one aspect of them. They differ from standard modeling technologies in that the virtual and physical environments are constantly informing and improving on each other,” said Bergés. “The testbed will give students their own physical structure to manipulate and ensure they understand how each aspect of the digital twin is integrated.”
Bergés and Associate Professor Pingbo Tang emphasize these points in the online certificate courses, Principles of Digital Twins and Digital Twins and AI for Predictive Analytics, first teaching students how to use digital twin models, then how to capture and analyze the data they generate. Both courses use the train testbed as an integrated project on which to apply the course material. Students who complete
Student tests various bridge thicknesses, materials, and loads.
the program are equipped with new AI skills to bring back to their organizations and make better engineering decisions.
Though originally built to advance digital twin education, the testbed has also proved useful in active department research projects and is directly applicable to work being done in the industry, explained Katherine Flanigan, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering.
“The testbed serves as an active research site, offering a scaled-down, hands-on environment to test, collect, and
analyze data, and make informed decisions to improve our infrastructure systems,” Flanigan explained. “With this at our disposal, we can explore new configurations safely and conduct experiments at a much faster rate than would be possible in real-world settings.”
Faculty look forward to using the testbed in the lab and classroom, setting a new standard for how civil engineers integrate cutting-edge technologies into their field.
Side-view schematic of the testbed, vehicle, and pulley system.
The testbed’s train car is equipped with sensors for data collection.
Autonomy in orbit
CMU team supports a NASA project developing deep space habitats by proposing frameworks for environmental control and life support systems that can sustain human life to missions to the Moon or Mars.
As humans look to expand space exploration and reach further destinations, the facilities and resources they need to survive become more complex. Missions to the Moon or Mars require environmental control and life support systems (ECLSS) for astronauts that function more autonomously given the extreme, restrictive, and unfamiliar conditions presented by deep space travel.
Currently, experts on Earth operate ECLSS on the International Space Station, analyzing data collected from systems onboard that meet the metabolic and environmental needs of the crew by providing a breathable atmosphere, potable water, and food and waste management. Because these technologies and databases are neither well integrated nor fully available onboard, the habitat is highly dependent on communications with and expertise from ground control crews.
“It’s easy to forget how much our so-called autonomous technologies rely on support and intervention by knowledgeable humans within a relatively short communication range, especially when things go wrong,” said Mario Bergés, professor of civil and environmental engineering and lead of the HOME project’s Carnegie Mellon University research team.
As one of the final installments in a five-year NASA-funded project Habitats Optimized for Missions of Exploration, or HOME, a team of researchers propose using AI-enabled digital twins to integrate dissimilar ECLSS information models and move these systems closer to autonomy. This transformation would enable the habitat to interpret its own data, answer queries, and inform decisions using mission control knowledge accessible within the smart habitat itself.
In a study published in the Journal of Aerospace
Information Systems, the team introduces their vision for a digital twin framework, consisting of the physical ECLSS assets, which includes its material components and behaviors, and a supervision agent, namely a human or software onboard to perform analysis and execute control inputs. Unlike the current system on the International Space Station, where mission control on Earth handles supervision, this framework enables the agent to operate independently of ground support.
The digital twin itself is characterized by robust information and simulation models which work together to process detailed semantic information about the system and inform, predict, and modify its current and future behaviors. Using data, sensing, and AI, the digital twin is constantly informing and updating itself based on the most recent data it collected, ensuring the system is always current.
The supervision agent uses the models to complete a decision-making loop, informing the habitat and its occupants how to act in the face of anomalies or fault detection.
“While much of the work out there on digital twins is focused on bespoke models created from scratch, we envision a digital twin framework that ties together multiple existing digital representations of the habitat and its subsystems through a federated framework, while keeping them consistently updated via sensing and actuation loops,” said Bergés. “This approach should be more scalable and easier to adapt to different habitat conditions and designs.”
The study was conducted in collaboration with CMU’s Burcu Akinci, head of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and students Nicolas Gratius, Zhichen Wang, and Min Young Hwang. Other research institutions included Western New England University, University of Colorado Boulder, and University of California Davis. CMU’s contributions feed into NASA’s larger multiuniversity Space Technology Research Institute to advance the design of autonomous systems for space habitats.
Image source // UC Davis, HOME kickoff meeting, 2019
Mind the gap: Testing the EV charging network
Carnegie Mellon researchers develop a metric to measure the gaps in EV charging coverage across the country. Findings show the significant work that lies ahead in deploying charging infrastructure, especially among rural areas.
Although electric vehicles (EVs) present a considerable opportunity to lower our greenhouse gas emissions, EVs currently only account for 1% of vehicles on the road in the U.S. One reason consumers have reported hesitation in purchasing EVs is “charging anxiety,” or concerns about losing power without access to a nearby, quick, and reliable charging station.
To instill confidence in buyers and encourage EV adoption, the federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program are helping to deploy fast chargers along select main highway routes called alternative fuel corridors, or AFCs. Despite this investment, large gaps stretch between charging stations in many parts of the country, disproportionately affecting rural counties and inhibiting long distance travel.
Seeking to better understand the current and future state of EV charging coverage in the U.S., researchers from Carnegie Mellon University are assessing consecutive charging coverage on all National Highway System roads. In a paper published in Nature Communications, the team evaluates individual states and counties by the percentage of roads, weighted by traffic, that are without 50 mile or more long gaps between charging stations within 500 miles of any given county.
“There is a chicken and egg problem with EVs and charging infrastructure. Charging stations need EVs to be profitable, but consumers hesitate to purchase EVs due to a perceived lack of chargers,” said Corey Harper, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering. “Using our metric, we found that many states have a long way to go before we achieve the consecutive coverage that would ease the minds of potential buyers.”
The team discovered that states such as California, Nevada, and those in New England generally have adequate charging coverage when looking at stations with slower charging speeds and fewer chargers per station. But, when implementing NEVIcompliance standards, which mandate at least four fast chargers per station, the effective coverage area shrinks. Consequently, while drivers in these states can find a charger every 50 miles, they may face wait times and queues due to lower power ratings and fewer chargers available at each station.
Even with NEVI’s plan to install fast charging stations along AFCs, while the northeast, California, Nevada, and Arizona would achieve continuous charging coverage, more rural states such as North and South Dakota, Arkansas, and Texas could not provide the same level of assurance for EV drivers. NEVI would need to deploy charging stations on 1,900 road segments to meet the plan’s goals, and this number rises to 4,500 segments to extend fast consecutive charging coverage to all highways, including those rural states.
To expedite this process, EV manufacturer Tesla has made recent arrangements to open some of their Supercharger network and share their connector design with select car manufacturers. However, the full potential of this collaboration remains untapped. Making the Tesla charging network universally accessible could
have a huge impact on the cost and labor in realizing NEVI’s vision.
“By adding magic docks to Tesla Superchargers or opensourcing their connector design, we could achieve fast consecutive charging coverage with 500 fewer new stations,” said Harper. “We estimate that this could save between $166 and $332 million in NEVI programming costs.”
The team believes their findings can help policymakers and consumers navigate the realities of EV charging access. Looking forward, they hope to extend their research to medium and heavy-duty electric trucks, for which charging access lags significantly behind that of everyday cars.
“Ultimately, we hope to inform policy development at both the federal and state levels and show that, while most of the country will have sufficient coverage once AFCs reach NEVI-compliant status, additional work needs to be done to ensure charging access in rural areas,” Harper explained.
“One of the largest values of this study is understanding the true range limitations for the national build out of EV infrastructure,” said Destenie Nock, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and engineering and public policy. “Often we talk about the distance capabilities of gas compared to electric cars. Now, we have a forward looking method for estimating the range limitations.”
The CMU team, led by Ph.D. alum Lily Hanig (EPP’24), conducted this research in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
top: Current state-level charging coverage when considering stations with slower charging speeds and fewer chargers per station.
middle: Current fast charging coverage at the state-level with NEVI-compliant chargers.
bottom: Projected fast charger coverage at the state-level when AFCs reach NEVI-compliance.
How smart loading zones seek to improve traffic
Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University are looking to use “smart loading zones,” designated loading and unloading spaces, to optimize city curb space usage and reduce traffic congestion.
Competition for city curbsides is rising as demand increases for ride-hailing services and e-commerce delivery. Increased use of this space can lead to more traffic congestion. A recent study by researchers from Carnegie Mellon University demonstrates how smart loading zones (SLZs) may help solve this problem and improve traffic speed on some streets.
SLZs are designated loading and unloading spaces with advanced sensors and cameras that actively monitor curbside usage. The data provided by these sensors can enable policymakers to create informed pricing and enforcement policies to optimize the use of curb spaces.
“The data that smart loading zones provide is invaluable for optimizing the use of city curb spaces,” said Sean Qian, professor of civil and environmental engineering. “This technology allows us to track and quantify how, when and where curb spaces are used.”
To use SLZs, users simply need to register their vehicle and pay through a nearby QR code. Payment is typically measured in minutes to boost turnover rate. CMU researchers found that by strategically placing SLZs throughout Pittsburgh, they can increase traffic speed by up to 4.5% in select areas.
“We have been able to conclude that SLZs significantly increase traffic speed in certain locations by carefully considering factors such as the length of smart loading zones and how many lanes are on the road,” explained Qian.
In 2022, Automotus placed 20 SLZs throughout downtown, Lawrenceville, Oakland, South Side Flats, and Bloomfield through a grant from the Department of Energy. Thirteen of them are located
downtown. With the data from this pilot, CMU researchers found that SLZs with lengths less than or equal to 30 feet have the best results and are able to significantly increase traffic speed. Longer SLZs typically see a high volume of activity, which may ultimately nullify any gained efficiency and slow the rate of nearby traffic. Roads with one lane going in each direction experience a significant reduction in traffic congestion while those with two do not. SLZs have been adopted by other local governments, including those in Santa Monica and Philadelphia. Traffic could be reduced nationally if SLZs are widely adopted and optimized. This research is a continuation of Qian’s work, which studies the increasing importance of curbs in city infrastructure.
Environmental
14 Robotics for environmental innovation
16 Engineering resilience through collaboration
18 Forecasting glacial floods to protect communities
20 AI for adaptation
IMAGE / Professor Greg Lowry with Ph.D. student Hairong Wang in the environmental engineering lab.
Robotics for environmental innovation
At the junction of robotics and environmental engineering, researchers create a robot equipped with sensing and soil sampling technology to address environmental challenges.
When researchers need to collect data about a work site’s soil quality, they can run into several problems. Using excavators to access sites can be challenging, expensive, and may have limited ability to collect samples. Once an excavator does return a scoop of soil, scientists must still collect soil samples by hand for shipping and analysis at an off-site commercial lab. In short, their work is often dirty, dangerous, and expensive.
But what if they could run a googly-eyed robot the size of a small dog along the same route? It navigates to the site alone as its wheels help it pass over stones and other obstacles. Once it takes a sample, its sensor can analyze the sample in real time, allowing its artificial intelligence-enhanced algorithms to determine where the most ideal location is to take the next sample, so it only takes as many as it needs. When it is
done, it navigates back to the researchers. This time, it searched out and measured the presence of chloride in the soil to test for salt concentrations, though in the future, it will be able to sense other substances.
This robot is part of a multi-year project by an interdisciplinary team of Carnegie Mellon researchers, led by Greg Lowry and Aaron Johnson and in collaboration with Chevron, seeking to understand how robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) can help engineers address environmental challenges.
The team has effectively created a new field at the
Illustration: K. Huber
junction of environmental engineering and robotics. Engineers have been increasingly applying robotics to agricultural research and to monitor different environments, such as underwater and aerial imagery. However, Johnson, associate professor of mechanical engineering, said that this team’s focus, which specifically applies robotics to monitoring impacted soils, is unique.
“This is often where the exciting research happens, in this intersection of two fields,” he said.
This robot and paper, ‘Path to autonomous soil sampling and analysis by ground-based robots’, which was published in the Journal of Environmental Management, stand as a “proof-of-concept” for the project as a whole to show that these fields really are complementary. Specifically, the team has sought to answer questions such as: how can we go from a certain study objective to a specific assisting robot? Is it even possible to take a sensor out to a site with a robot?
The authors detail a method of designing robots so that other teams can follow in their footsteps (or wheel-tracks) to meet their own objectives. Johnson and Lowry suggest using four design components to guide decisions: sensing, which quantifies a substance in a sample; sampling, which extracts and processes samples; mobility, which moves the robot around the site; and autonomy, which determines relevant locations and how best to navigate to them.
“Other parts of the project include looking at the exploration algorithm to improve the autonomy, trying out different sensors, different locations, and applying the same strategies to different problems,” Johnson said.
The project has taken several years of careful research, as well as dealing with limitations within a worldwide pandemic, to get to this stage. Therefore, it has involved a number of personnel with a wide range of experience, from undergraduates to postdoctoral researchers. They have also partnered with HEBI Robotics, which has developed a “ruggedized” version of the lab-made robot that was featured in the paper.
“We are now looking to move beyond this proof-of-concept stage into more concrete objectives and demonstrations,” said Lowry, professor of civil and environmental engineering. Currently, the team is focusing on the autonomous systems and algorithms component: the robot determines the best location to take its next sample by understanding the results
it has taken so far. This process is called adaptive sampling.
Vivek Thangavelu, a postdoctoral researcher in Johnson’s laboratory, is working on adjusting the adaptive sampling networks to handle different situations—currently, the robot works best when it is mapping out a single, distributed area that is affected, but it is not as effective when substances are concentrated in multiple smaller “hotspots”, a scenario sometimes found at impacted soil sites. In practice, before engineers begin their study, they do not know how the substance of interest is distributed at the site, so the robot must be able to deal with all manner of environments and parameters.
“How do you categorize those kinds of environments?” Thangavelu said. “How do you say, ‘Okay, we have an algorithm, but when does it work and when does it not work?’”
As the project develops, the team plans to apply its principles and the advances they have made to other research goals, such as helping farmers determine how much fertilizer to use in a field and where to use it, and to identify invasive plant species.
Thangavelu enjoys the applicability of the work, as well as its relevance to current environmental issues. “I enjoy working in a field related to the environment. We have to think about problems with respect to how to deal with the effects of climate change.”
Engineering resilience through collaboration
CMU’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering is built around a clear mission: engineering resilience for a rapidly changing world. So, as climate risks escalate and infrastructure systems face mounting pressure, one question is front and center: how do we build for resilience in an uncertain world?
On March 13, 2025, the department hosted its Spring Industry Workshop, Building Resilient Infrastructure: Civil & Environmental Engineering in a Changing World, to tackle that very question. With more than 60 participants from across academia, industry, and government, the workshop sparked timely, solutiondriven conversations about the future of resilient infrastructure.
From how to fund and design resilience into projects, to the return on investment for resilient systems, and how to drive real-world change through engineering, each session spotlighted urgent challenges and field future collaboration.
The event opened with a panel on incorporating resilience into infrastructure investments, featuring Jason Zang (PennDOT), Adam TindallSchlicht (Ramboll), and Meagan Williams (City of New Orleans). Faculty from CMU’s Center for Engineering Resilience and Climate Adaptation – including Director Greg Lowry, Mario Berges, Corey Harper, David Rounce, and Costa Samaras – shared research designed to
support communities through datadriven, adaptable infrastructure tools.
“Resilience in engineering isn’t a ‘nice to have’—it’s the foundation,” said Costa Samaras, director of the Scott Institute for Energy Innovation and professor of civil and environmental engineering. “Collaborating with stakeholders and designing what they need is the driver for engineering innovation.”
Afternoon sessions dove into the true cost—and value—of resilience, with perspectives from Natalia Moudrak (Aon), Lauren Seydewitz (Gresham Smith), and Emilie Mazzacurati (Tailwind), who explored what startups are contributing to this space.
The workshop underlined that building resilience requires a shared commitment across sectors. By connecting decision-makers with cutting-edge research and actionable insights, CMU CEE is helping shape a future where infrastructure isn’t just built to last, but built to adapt.
targeted plant delivery
Panels, presentations, and poster sessions at the 2025 Industry Workshop on Building Resilient Infrastructure: Civil & Environmental Engineering in a Changing World.
Forecasting glacial floods to protect communities
Climate change has exacerbated glacier outburst floods, posing a growing threat to nearby communities like Juneau, Alaska. Researchers are developing robust models to better understand and predict glacial flooding and how it will evolve in the future.
Outburst floods are nothing new to glaciologists. For years, researchers have known the potential hazard that forms when glacier movements create ice-dammed basins, trap meltwater, and pool into large reservoirs. Recently, however, glacier outbursts have become more devastating to their surrounding communities, releasing increasing water levels year after year. In 2024, a flood in Juneau, Alaska broke records for the second year in a row, displacing residents, eroding landscapes, and destroying homes.
models will help communities develop effective early warning systems and adaptation strategies.”
“Understanding glacier retreat and its effects on outburst floods is critical for mitigation and adaptation,”
- David Rounce, assistant professor of civil and environmental
To better understand these phenomena, the National Science Foundation is funding a team of researchers to focus on better understanding and estimating an annual outburst flood that affects Juneau as well as develop large-scale flood hazard models to improve glacial flood forecasts and identify future outburst hazards across northwest North America. Using field and remote sensing data, the study will produce physically based models of glacier evolution and outburst floods to identify and quantify how flood hazards will continue to change.
“Understanding glacier retreat and its effects on outburst floods is critical for mitigation and adaptation,” said David Rounce, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and co-principal investigator on the project. “Improving our flood prediction
The study centers on the Juneau-based Áak’w T’áak Glacier (Mendenhall Glacier), which regularly produces outburst floods that have been monitored since 2011, including the 2024 disaster. While the team will conduct its fieldwork there, they will use models to investigate changes in hazards for all of Alaska and western Canada. Alaska’s diverse landscapes and climates reward researchers with data that is widely applicable, including to regions like High Mountain Asia, where they experience similar glacier flood threats. Subsequently, researchers are optimistic that the knowledge gained could be useful for better understanding changes in hazards globally.
“As glaciers continue to change, understanding and predicting their impact on communities becomes more crucial,” explained Rounce. “Our goal is to enhance current flood forecasting models, helping communities better prepare for and respond to the growing threat of glacier outburst floods.”
This five-year project is led by the University of Alaska Southeast and conducted in collaboration with the State of Alaska Department of Geological & Geophysical Surveys.
Mendenhall Glacier and Suicide Glacier retreat comparison: 1893 and 2018
New course teaches responsible AI use for engineering climate adaptation and resilience.
AI for adaptation
At the core and intersection of all civil and environmental engineering research at Carnegie Mellon is fostering resilience for our infrastructure, our natural systems, and our communities. In the face of climate change and heightening climate crises, engineers are using the tools at their disposal to build resilient systems that can withstand and adapt to an unpredictable future.
The use of artificial intelligence (AI) presents both opportunities and risks in this capacity, enabling researchers to unlock unprecedented data and insights, but not without consequence. A new course in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering highlights the positive and negative impacts AI presents for the energy system and broader climate mitigation efforts. Taught by Costa Samaras, professor of civil and environmental engineering and director of the Wilton E. Scott Institute for Energy Innovation, students enrolled in the course learn how responsible use of AI can protect the public, advance innovation, maximize its benefits, and minimize its risks.
“It’s essential for students to understand the impacts of designs, algorithms, and decisions, on broader systems and on how engineers can guide emissions reductions and respond
to the impacts of climate change,” said Samaras. “I hope this course provides an opportunity for students to build a systems perspective on the intersection of energy, climate mitigation, and resilience.”
Through analysis of emerging AI applications for climate mitigation and adaptation, students will be equipped with the skills to act as decision-makers in this space, constructing policy briefs with technical recommendations that harness AI’s potential while addressing challenges such as energy consumption, data privacy, and system reliability.
The course is the quintessential embodiment of the department’s commitment to resilience, as seen in faculty projects across all research focus areas and in the new Center for Engineering Resilience and Climate Adaptation, an initiative dedicated solely to building resilient solutions for climate adaptation.
“Civil and Environmental Engineering at Carnegie Mellon has been a leader in educating engineers to improve the resilience of our infrastructure systems such as energy, water, and transportation,” said Samaras.
“Understanding how to guide outcomes that are good for the climate and good for society is another way our curriculum can help our graduates be leaders at the forefront of engineering.”
New online course pairs the virtual and physical in an AIenabled digital twin, providing a robust way to analyze data and make better engineering decisions through predictive modeling.
Learn these invaluable skills at your own pace. The principles and techniques delivered in the course will help you to close the loop between predicting the behavior of a physical system and ultimately controlling the environment throughout its lifecycle for each unique project, process, building or environment. This is an elite skill for engineers to lead and innovate in their organization.
For more information on the learning objectives of this course go to: https://www.cmu.edu/online/aie-dta/ Advance your career by bringing the value of AI-enabled digital twins into your workplace.
A buzz-worthy engineering design course
Civil and environmental engineering undergraduate students learn the engineering design process by working with stakeholders to build habitats that protect local pollinator populations.
Many think of mason bees as pests –bothersome insects that nest in holes in your homes, decks, or wooden fences. But, if you ask Carnegie Mellon students in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, they might give you a different answer.
“They started seeing the bees as their clients,” said Katherine Flanigan, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and course instructor.
In the department’s sophomore year project course, the assignment was to design, build, and deploy homes for solitary, cavity nesting species of bees, including masons. The structures, commonly known as “bee hotels,” often look like large birdhouses with perforated fronts, made of many small holes stacked on top of each other for the bees to properly lay eggs. They provide safe and ideal conditions for the bees to reproduce, protecting species that are native to the Western Pennsylvania region and vital to the local pollinator ecosystem.
The project began with a trip to Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens, a future home for one of the finished bee hotels, to
learn more about the bees they were designing for. Quickly, the group realized that even the smallest stakeholders have big needs.
“Cavity nesting bees require very specific conditions to reproduce in their habitats,” said Braley Burke, integrated pest management specialist at Phipps and a client for one of the student groups. Burke recently purchased a mason bee hotel for the conservatory, but found that many of these specifications often aren’t met with mass-manufactured bee houses.
“From the length and diameter of their cells to the materials used, the smallest error in design choice can enable the spread of disease, attract predators, and ultimately harm the species you’re trying to help,” she said.
Ideal bee hotels are made of untreated wood, avoiding materials like plastics, metals, and paints, with stacked straw-like cells filling in the middle. Cells should be between three to six inches long with a 3/32 to 3/8 inch diameter hole through the center. To protect the structure from the elements, a roof or overhang may be necessary, as well as a way to
remove and clean the straws to prevent the spread of disease or infestation.
On top of nature’s constraints, the groups also needed to satisfy the requirements of the other interested parties: the gardens, parks, and nature centers across Western Pennsylvania and Ohio where the bee hotels would be deployed. Different stakeholders came with their own unique needs, including shape, size, aesthetics, and level of maintenance. Divided into six teams, instructors assigned a client to each student group and challenged them with the task of creating something that balanced their stakeholder’s needs and the bee’s environmental necessities.
“We spent a month going over the engineering design process before they started building so they knew how to approach the project effectively,” said Flanigan. “They learned how engineering is applied in the real world with assignments like building a team contract, ranking stakeholder objectives, developing metrics to measure success, and producing engineering drawings.”
Once designs were approved and materials were ordered, students moved into the construction phase. Senior Project Engineer Brian Belowich, who also supervised the groups during this time, noted that most of the students were working in a woodshop and operating power tools for the first time. So, lessons like how to optimize their time with the tools and best use their materials to avoid waste were crucial.
“It’s exciting to watch them learn how to build something sustainably, efficiently, and safely because this is what engineering is all about:
envisioning something and making it a reality,” said Belowich.
Several student groups made similar design decisions, including building removable cartridges to minimize the maintenance required by the stakeholders to keep the structure clean, increasing the lifespan of the bee houses by years. Two teams were so enthused by everything they learned about mason bees that they integrated QR codes into the side of their hotels for visitors to scan and learn more about their local pollinators. Only one group chose to drill holes into solid wood rather than using individual straws, a preference of their stakeholder.
All groups, however, began to see their job as serving two clients: the actual organizations and the mason bees. “A rationale I started hearing often in the shop was ‘I don’t think the bees will like that,’” said Belowich.
“I loved the entirety of the design process, from learning about mason bees and client needs to creating and choosing designs,” said Samhita Gudapati, a sophomore double majoring in environmental engineering and chemistry. Her group built a hexagonal bee hotel for Phipps Conservatory. “This class taught me valuable communication and presentation skills that I will definitely reference in internship, job, and classroom settings. But it was also just fun!”
Jonathan Subramanian, a sophomore studying environmental engineering, agreed. “The most memorable part was working with an outside stakeholder. Creating something that would be used outside the classroom by many groups of people and for an extended period of time was new and incredibly valuable to me,” he said.
“This has been my favorite course so far at CMU,” Subramanian’s team member, Nurshinta Berry, shared. The group designed the most unique bee house from the course, drilling holes into solid wood over using individual bamboo tubes at the request of their stakeholder, Winthrop Community Garden.
“At first, we questioned the feasibility of the design. But after a lot of planning and reworking, we were able to make the client’s vision a reality, which was really exciting,” said Subramanian.
Now, as the bee hotels find their homes in gardens and parks across the region, the students’ hard work will play a meaningful role in supporting local ecosystems and benefitting both our pollinators and public spaces.
Fifth Year Scholar brings sustainable mending to campus
The Fifth Year Scholars Program offers exceptional students the opportunity to stay at CMU after graduating. This year, a CEE graduate is here to bring sustainable mending to the CMU and Pittsburgh communities.
The Fifth Year Scholars Program at Carnegie Mellon University is highly selective. Only a handful of exceptional students receiving their undergraduate degree are selected to become Fifth Year Scholars. Those who are selected are welcomed back to campus for an additional year with free tuition and a $7,000 fellowship to pursue a project of their choosing.
For 2024, there are four such Scholars from various colleges, and Kat D’Arms is one of them. D’Arms received her BS in Environmental Engineering from the Civil & Environmental Engineering (CEE) Department in the spring of 2024. But she knew that after the 2024 summer break, she would not be going off to pursue a new career or higher degree just yet. D’Arms applied to the Fifth Year Scholars Program in her junior year and was selected well before her graduation date. She had time to carefully plan out what her Scholar project would entail.
As an environmental engineer, D’Arms is passionate about sustainability. With the knowledge that the fashion industry is the second largest polluter in the world (just behind oil/gas pollution), she keeps her closet pared down and is mindful about where she buys her clothes and what kind of materials the clothes are made from. “Clothing is made of stuff,” she points out, “In a lot of cases, it’s oil, it’s just plastic… and even if it’s not, it’s made of something like cotton, which is incredibly nutrientintensive and takes a lot of water to farm. And it’s often farmed in places that don’t have that much water to begin with.”
Part of keeping her pollution footprint small is knowing how to mend her clothing so that objects that require minor repairs are not simply cast aside into a landfill.
“Clothing is viewed as really disposable, because it’s so cheap. And it’s so poorly made that it falls apart after a few wears,” explains D’Arms. She said that people can fight back on consumption by buying second-hand clothing at thrift stores (such as The Thrifty Mellon, a student-run, pop-up style shop on CMU’s campus) and vintage shops. But D’Arms knows that thrifting offers limited sizes and styles: “it’s difficult to find stuff that fits you really well… so you need this set of [mending] skills as well.”
With this in mind, D’Arms decided to share her mending knowledge with her community at CMU. She started as a sophomore, bringing mending programming and drop-in hours to Tech Spark, the largest campus maker space which includes a sewing area. The mending workshops were popular, so D’Arms started expanding them outside of Tech Spark. She started by doing a few mending workshops at more centrally located buildings, such as the Cohon University Center. She also hosted workshops in the basement of Hunt Library where the IDeATe (Integrative Design, Arts, and Technology) Collaborative Making Facility is located. As part of her studies, D’Arms took one of IDeATe’s courses from the Soft Technologies track, focusing on the manufacturing of textiles. D’Arms learned about various processes such as weaving, spinning thread, and dyeing. While she thought the course was fascinating, she believed someone looking for quick mending instructions could benefit from a course focused solely on the practice of mending. So she developed curriculum and taught a StuCo (student-taught course) that students could take for course credit while learning mending techniques.
“My class is focused on sewing techniques that are required for maintenance,” she explains. “There are four different stitches that you can use to fix different kinds of rips, on different kinds of cloth.”
D’Arms has even expanded into offering workshops with business partners in the Pittsburgh area such as the Pittsburgh Center for Creative Reuse, the Carnegie Libraries of Pittsburgh, the Big Idea Bookstore, restaurants and coffee shops like Trace Brewing, and Pittsburgh Public Parks during nice weather. D’Arms will continue to offer mending sessions for the rest of the academic year. People who are interested in learning these techniques can follow her on Instagram @mendwithkat where she has posted her drop-in campus hours (Mondays 5-7 p.m. in Tech Spark and Tuesday 5-7 p.m. in Hunt Library Studio B). She also posts about pop up events around the Pittsburgh area.
Study abroad expands horizons in human-centered city design
Lex Capestany traveled abroad once during his childhood, to Vietnam. Doing so taught him about the rich and diverse cultures outside the United States, and he has always been interested in further exploring.
The current junior double majoring in civil and environmental engineering and engineering and public policy got that chance last summer when he studied abroad in a number of different Scandinavian countries.
The program, organized through DIS abroad, consisted of three separate courses, two in Copenhagen, Denmark, and the other in Stockholm, Sweden. One course also included a short, one-week trip to Berlin, Germany.
“I chose the program initially because of how cool the coursework was, and hand-in-hand with that was Copenhagen,” Capestany explains. “I heard such amazing things about the city’s design.” With the added bonus of being able to study in Stockholm, Sweden, his choice was easy.
The first course in Copenhagen was called Strategies for Urban Livability. Copenhagen’s city design is
what initially drew Capestany to this program, which made the curriculum particularly interesting. The course taught the principles of designing a liveable city using the works of Danish architect Jan Gehl, who Capestany later got the chance to hear speak at a film festival during his time abroad.
The second course in Copenhagen, Visual Culture of Cities, used both anthropology and design to discuss whether cities influence people or if people influence cities. He found this course incredibly eye-opening and progressive, discussing the range of human experiences in a city, such as queer spaces. This was also the course that took Capestany to Berlin where he learned about the visual communication of memory and identity in cities via tours and sketching exercises.
“They gave us a sketchbook, and I’m still writing in it today, as a journal. It’s been really impactful.”
For the final course, Public Health Policy in Practice, Capestany traveled to Stockholm, where he learned about the intricacies of healthcare policies in their country
and throughout Europe. Capestany notes that the incredibly progressive and immersive teaching style he experienced in Sweden is distinctly different from the United States.
Capestany found the interdisciplinary work offered him the perfect mix of both city planning and humancentered policies, a unique and complementary blend. This merging of fields was further emphasized by the fact that he got to see the different ways European engineers applied and thought about the same foundational principles he learned at CMU. “I think it’s very inspiring to see how, with a very strong foundational education, people can branch off into a wide variety of professional fields.”
Capestany’s experience has also inspired him to pursue graduate work, perhaps even pursuing graduate degrees in Europe. If there is one thing studying abroad can teach students, it is that they will get a glimpse into how vast the field of engineering extends and that they don’t have to limit themselves to just one profession or one country.
First years design floating bridges
First-year students spent a semester learning the fundamentals of civil and environmental engineering by designing and building climate-resilient bridges. Their designs focused on quick construction, minimal maintenance, and sustainability. By integrating sensing, data science, environmental science, life cycle analysis, and infrastructure design, students developed solutions that support smart and connected communities.
At the end of the semester, their knowledge was put to the test in a competition that evaluated safety, costeffectiveness, and aesthetics. To succeed, they had to support the safe passage of a remote-controlled truck simulating carrying humanitarian aid from one side to the other, as if affected by a flood.
FACULTY AWARDS
Faculty member receives National Academies Early-Career Research Fellowship
Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty member David Rounce was chosen for an Early-Career Research Fellowship by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Gulf Research Program. This fellowship is part of an environmental protection and stewardship research program that seeks to improve understanding of how climate change, sea-level rise, and water quality affect ecosystems in the Gulf of Mexico. The fellowship supports earlycareer scientists by granting $75,000 for research and providing networking and mentorship opportunities, all toward the
ultimate goal of improving the well-being of coastal communities and ecosystems.
Rounce’s research examines how glaciers respond to climate change, and how projections of regional sea-level rise can support the development of climate-resilient adaptation strategies.
“We’re trying to project how the glaciers are going to respond to various warming scenarios, and then have a good understanding as to what the contributions to sea-level rise will be, and how that’s going to affect sealevel rise in the Gulf,” said Rounce.
He currently leads a highly interdisciplinary Gulf Research Program project that seeks to develop multiple
adaptation strategies to address flooding and land loss in the Gulf, dependent on the amount of global greenhouse gas emissions. He said it is important to plan multiple courses of action, because defaulting to the worstcase scenario is not cost-effective.
“What we try to do with our research is develop probabilistic projections of regional sea-level rise and then use those projections to develop multiple adaptation strategies. Then we can start to monitor those strategies and choose the one that is most appropriate depending on what happens in the future,” Rounce explained.
global mean sea-level rise. So they’re a huge contributor,” Rounce explained.
“Regardless of whether you live in the high mountains or on the coast, the glaciers have some impact on your life.”
Rounce began his glacier research in Nepal while obtaining his doctorate. He studied how retreating glaciers form lakes that can flood downstream communities. He eventually became interested in expanding his research to a global scale.
“I quickly realized that working community by community, and glacial lake by glacial lake halfway around the world wasn’t really a pathway to success,”
“Regardless of whether you live in the high mountains or on the coast, the glaciers have some impact on your life.”
-David Rounce, Assistant Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering
He said that because glaciers are located in isolated parts of the world, they are good indicators of climate change.
“They are responding to what’s happening with our greenhouse gas emissions and the associated temperature increases,” said Rounce. “So first and foremost, they tell us what our impacts are on the natural environment.”
Even though glaciers are isolated from where most people live, they affect global water supply and contribute significantly to sea-level rise.
“Even if you’re not living in the high mountains near these glaciers, if you live anywhere on the coast, the glaciers are contributing about 20% of the
said Rounce. “So I started shifting toward global glacier modeling and trying to think about how all the glaciers in the world are changing and what the impacts associated with that are.”
Rounce looks forward to continuing his research through the fellowship.
“I’m in my early career, so it feels very humbling. I’m very honored to receive this,” said Rounce. “It is inspiring to be able to be a part of a cohort that is actively working on these challenges that we’re facing in the Gulf of Mexico.” He said networking opportunities provided through the fellowship are important for progressing work in the Gulf.
Nock named 2024 Science Defender
Destenie Nock, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and engineering and public policy, was named a 2024 Science Defender by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The title is bestowed annually on “individuals and groups who use science to improve the world and help people, including those who have taken a stand to protect science and scientists from political or other interference.”
Nock was selected for her ongoing work in affordable energy and energy justice as both a researcher and a startup founder.
“I am grateful for this award and the opportunity to continue advocating for equitable energy solutions,” Nock said. “While I approach this work driven by the desire to create social good, it’s humbling to be recognized in this way.”
Fakhreddine selected for AAEES
40 under 40
Sarah Fakhreddine, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, was named one of the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists 40 Under 40 Rising Stars in Engineering and Science.
In her research, Fakhreddine focuses on developing water management solutions that holistically address issues of water quantity and quality. By translating hydrologic and biogeochemical processes into actionable engineering approaches, she aims to ultimately protect our water quality for human and ecosystem health.
Faculty named College of Engineering endowed chairs
Carnegie Mellon University’s College of Engineering announced the selection of eight new endowed chairs, one of the highest recognitions that can be awarded to faculty. Four are professors in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and largely influential figures in our department, university, and engineering field. These recipients are listed below.
Amit Acharya
PAUL P. CHRISTIANO PROFESSOR OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING
Acharya specializes in continuum mechanics, theoretical materials science, and applied mathematics, focusing on structural imperfections in crystalline materials. His research explores defect mechanics in various systems and the interplay of differential geometry and structural mechanics. Recently awarded the Simons Foundation Pivot Fellowship, Acharya spent a year studying mathematical physics to develop a new branch of mathematical gauge theory for understanding topological defects in nonlinear elastic solids.
Costa Samaras
TRUSTEE PROFESSOR OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING
Samaras researches clean, climatesafe, and equitable energy and infrastructure systems, examining the intersection of technology, policy, and sustainability. He is the Director of CMU’s Scott Institute for Energy Innovation and has held key policy roles, including serving in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy from 2021–2024. His work informs climate resilience, national security, and clean energy transitions.
Kaushik
Dayal
WALTER J. BLENKO, SR. PROFESSOR OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING
Dayal’s research bridges atomic and continuum scales using theoretical and computational multiscale methods in materials science. His work explores how materials respond to nonequilibrium conditions, electromagnetic effects, and functional behaviors across geophysics, biology, and advanced technologies. By leveraging mechanics, he aims to develop innovative solutions for sensing, actuation, and materials design.
Sean Qian
H.J. HEINZ III PROFESSOR OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING
Qian specializes in optimizing civil infrastructure systems, with a focus on transportation resilience and sustainability. As director of the Mobility Data Analytics Center (MAC), he integrates AI, network flow, and economics to address aging and overcrowded infrastructure. He is also the founder of TraffiQure Technologies, a CMU spinoff that commercializes AI/ML innovations for mobility and infrastructure management.
Chen receives George Washington prize honorable mention DFI Scholars
Undergraduate civil engineering alum Sam Chen received a 2025 George Washington Prize honorable mention award. The prize is named after the first president of the United States and the first engineer and awarded to undergraduate seniors in the College of Engineering who demonstrate academic excellence, commitment to service, and leadership.
Chen’s dedication to education and research has set him apart as a leader among his peers. As a teaching assistant for the Fundamentals of Programming and Computer Science course, he not only helped students develop their computational skills but also refined his own expertise through recitation preparation and one-on-one student support. His teaching efforts continued in the civil and environmental engineering department, where he received outstanding reviews from students and faculty for his instruction in the Computational and Data Science course.
Alongside Jerry Wang, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, Chen has also contributed to advancing research in computational mechanics. Over the past two summers, he applied high-powered computing methods and fluid mechanics principles to pedestrian simulation. One of his published studies, “PicoScale Science for Pedestrian-Scale Solutions,” was recently accepted at the International Conference on Systems for Energy-Efficient Buildings,
Cities, and Transportation.
Chen’s leadership extends beyond the classroom and lab, where he serves as Treasurer and Booth CoChair on the Executive Board of the American Society of Civil Engineers student chapter at CMU. Additionally, as a coordinator for Carnegie Mellon’s Student College (StuCo) program, he both organizes and teaches a class on Tea Culture, exploring the history and customs of tea drinking. Through StuCo, he has provided a platform for students to design and teach their own courses, fostering a community of peer-led learning.
After completing his B.S. in Civil Engineering in December, Chen is set to continue his academic journey as a master’s student in the department this spring. Looking ahead, he plans to pursue a Ph.D. in computational mechanics, with the ultimate goal of applying his expertise to develop more sustainable infrastructure solutions.
Dalton Harmon, a senior studying civil engineering, and Beatrice Wu, civil and environmental engineering master’s student, received the Menard-Deep Foundations Institute Educational Trust Award, which supports outstanding and underrepresented undergraduate and graduate students in Civil and Environmental Engineering.
ASCE Student Award
Senior Mia Constantin received an American Society of Civil Engineers student award at the ASCE Pittsburgh Chapter Engineer’s Week banquet. Mia is a senior studying Civil Engineering with a minor in Architecture. She previously served as CMU’s ASCE co-president and led the organization’s booth team to victory three times during Carnival.
Eisenhower Fellow
PhD student Elizabeth Krauss received the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Graduate Fellowship. The award will help advance her research quantifying the effects of transit-oriented development projects on the employment accessibility of low-income residents using public transit networks.
Tech Spark Award
CEE’s “Got Manganese?” group won the Best Design award at Tech Spark’s Fall 2024 Engineering Expo. Group members included Carmen Hagerty, Kate Hanson, Samantha Lee, Flannery McNair, and Shria Shyam. Their project proposed three upgrades to the water treatment plant to address water quality concerns in Bedford borough including high manganese concentrations, unsafe disinfection practices, and a chemical storage closet non-compliant with EPA regulations. The study serves as a test bed for innovative and sustainable approaches to minimize chemical exposure risks in small-scale drinking water treatment facilities.
CERCA Scholars
The Center for Engineering Resilience and Climate Adaptation (CERCA) awarded two Ph.D. student fellows to advance their climate adaptation research: Matthew Weathers and Maral Doctorarastoo.
Weathers is a Ph.D. student coadvised by David Rounce and Destenie Nock, assistant professors of civil and environmental engineering. His research focuses on developing equitable, climate-resilient coastal adaptation strategies for compound flooding, using advanced sea-level rise projections and flood modeling. By integrating equity metrics into adaptation planning, he aims to address climate change’s disproportionate
impacts, with an initial focus on the Gulf Coast and broader global applications.
Doctorarastoo is a Ph.D. student co-advised by Professor Mario Berges and Assistant Professor Katherine Flanigan in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Chris McComb, assistant professor of mechanical engineering. Her research explores how occupants’ behavior affects energy demand in buildings using unobtrusive sensing systems and learning-based algorithms. By modeling human decision-making, she aims to create virtual occupants that improve energy predictions, leading to more efficient and adaptive building design.
Annual alumni awards honors innovation and service
Each year during CMU’s Carnival weekend, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering celebrates a group of alumni who are making a lasting impact in their field.
Distinguished Alumni Award
Roseanna Neupauer (CEE’89)
Neupauer is a professor and president’s teaching scholar at the University of Colorado Boulder specializing in groundwater modeling. Her research advances novel modeling tools for groundwater flow, solute and heat transport, and includes projects on groundwater remediation, Arctic river icings, and geothermal energy systems. A registered professional engineer, she has received numerous honors, including the ASCE Margaret S. Petersen Award and fellowship recognition from both ASCE and the Geological Society of America.
Outstanding Alumni Service Award
Emre Can Kara (CEE’14)
Kara earned his PhD in Civil & Environmental Engineering from CMU in 2014. He is currently an Associate Staff Scientist at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, contributing to advanced research in energy and environmental sciences.
Recent Alumni Achievement Award
Eilis Rosenbaum (CEE’19)
Rosenbaum received her PhD in Civil & Environmental Engineering in 2019 and now serves as a Principal Investigator at the Research & Innovation Center at the National Energy Technology Laboratory. Her work focuses on cutting-edge research in energy and environmental innovation.
Lt. Col. Christopher K. Raible Distinguished Public Service Award
Tom Curry (CEE’99) Curry is the Director for the Division of Policy and Analysis in the Office of Resource Sustainability at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). He leads a team providing strategic intelligence on natural gas, oil, and critical minerals and oversees an international collaboration on greenhouse gas emissions monitoring for natural gas. A CMU and MIT graduate, his expertise informs DOE’s climate and economic impact analyses, shaping national energy policy and international sustainability efforts.
Russell Markosky (CEE’16)
Markosky, a 2016 graduate in Civil & Environmental Engineering, serves as a U.S. Air Force Captain with the 16th Special Operations Squadron. He has completed multiple overseas deployments, demonstrating exceptional dedication to public service and national security.
Alum takes on toxic chemicals at leading women’s health organization
Women in STEM have been a large influence on Amy Dale’s (CEE’15) career. From the mentors she was inspired by, to her current work at the Silent Spring Institute, women-led work has always been a constant.
“I’ve applied the valuable skills I learned at CMU to dozens of real-world cases of environmental pollution across the country”
“I think of my grandmother, who first introduced me to the fields of ecology and computational science – subjects that have formed the cornerstone of my career,” Dale recalled.
“At CMU, it was my doctoral advisor, Dr. Elizabeth Casman, who transformed me from a naive undergrad into an expert in my field of study.”
Dale completed her graduate work at Carnegie Mellon’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, earning both her master’s and Ph.D., with a dual focus in engineering and public policy during her doctorate. After graduation, Dale completed postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology under the mentorship of Dr. Susan Solomon. She then worked as a scientific consultant for five years before joining Silent Spring Institute as deputy director.
Silent Spring Institute is a nonprofit research organization that investigates the environmental risk factors for breast cancer, specifically the role of cancer-causing chemicals in our everyday products and environments. The organization is named in honor of biologist, writer, and environmental activist Rachel Carson and is composed primarily of women scientists working to address women’s health issues and prioritize disease prevention.
Silent Spring’s scientists share their science with advocates, lawyers, and legislators to help
strengthen policies and protect the public from dangerous chemicals. In addition, the institute partners with communities impacted by pollution and engages the public through tools like their Detox Me app to help people reduce harmful exposures and live healthier lives.
“It’s an incredible feeling to work at an organization where everyone, from our scientists to our accounting staff, is united in the pursuit of a powerful shared vision,” said Dale.
With her transition to the nonprofit sector, Dale continues to apply the knowledge she gained from CEE courses such as Fate, Transport & Physicochemical Processes of Organic Contaminants in Aquatic Systems and Integrated Environmental Modeling to Silent Spring’s work on synthetic chemicals in the environment. Her education, she says, provided her with a crucial foundation to advance her professional career.
“Because of the skills and training I received at CMU, I’ve been able to apply this valuable knowledge to dozens of real-world cases of environmental pollution across the country,” Dale said. “My hope for my career is to continue to leverage that knowledge to help make the world a healthier place.”
Alumni Advisory Council
The department is excited to welcome new members to our Alumni Advisory Council, a group dedicated to providing expertise and strategic guidance to advance the mission and goals of the department and CMU. Council members play an essential role in promoting and cultivating meaningful relationships in industry, government, and academia for the benefit of our students, faculty, and society as whole.
2025 Alumni Advisory Council
Emily Ammerman, (CEE’02), Westinghouse
Stephanie Emore (CEE’16), Clark Construction
Frank Frisby (CEE’11), Department of Defense
Alejandro Gomez Rivera (CEE’13), Binni
Steve Hinson (CEE’97), Schlumberger
Linda Kaplan (CEE’07), Pennoni Associates
Will Kotterman (CEE’07), Autodesk
John Kovacs (CEE’93), Consultant
Shail Pandya (CEE’00), Tetra Tech
Seth Pearlman (CEE’79), Menard
Mark Pleskow (CEE’85), WSP Consulting
Frank Sidari (CEE’02), Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority
Bill Wang (CEE’87), formerly of ExxonMobil Corporation
Todd Wilson (CEE’06), GAI Consultants, Inc.
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