John A. Reif, Jr. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Three teams of student engineers are showcasing their applied research this week at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s National Student Design Expo, as they vie for a second round of funding from the EPA’s People, Prosperity and the Planet program, which aims to spur new systems and technologies that advance sustainability. “Despite the challenges of last year, you worked hard, you thought creatively and you developed innovative solutions that support EPA’s mission to protect human health and the environment,” said Janet McCabe, deputy administrator of the EPA, in opening remarks...

Early on in the COVID-19 pandemic, health officials seized on contact tracing as the most effective way to anticipate the virus’s migration from the initial, densely populated hot spots and try to curb its spread. Months later, infections were nonetheless recorded in similar patterns in nearly every region of the country, both urban and rural.  A team of environmental engineers, alerted by the unusual wealth of data published regularly by county health agencies throughout the pandemic, began researching new methods to describe what was happening on the ground in a way that does not...

New Jersey Institute of Technology is one of the nation’s best colleges for students seeking a superb education with great career preparation at an affordable price, according to The Princeton Review, an honor held since 2018. NJIT ranked No. 39 as a Best Value College and No. 10 for Best Career Placement among public colleges and universities. The Princeton Review profiles NJIT in the recently published 2021 edition of its annual guide, The Best Value Colleges. In order to make the list, institutions needed to demonstrate a stellar academic program and affordability, and offer strong...

In NJIT’s Materials and Structures Laboratory, Noah Thibodeaux is concocting a series of concrete mixtures containing varying levels of old, pulverized roadway. The lab, which is working with the New York City Department of Transportation to determine the feasibility of using recycled aggregate in new projects, is focused on its near-term performance and durability over time, as well as its impact on the environment.  “Durability and sustainability go hand in hand – you can’t have one without the other,” notes Thibodeaux, a Ph.D. student in civil engineering. “It’s important to assess...