Roberto Ballarini's blog

A few days ago I had a good discussion with a dear colleague on the topic of the current state of scholarship in mechanics and the education of the new generation of mechanicians. During the past few decades most mechanics researchers have limited their activities to the writing of papers and research proposals. This because the “reward system” places little value to the authoring of monographs and textbooks.

Two faculty positions are available in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Houston. One is in the general area of geoengineering (including geomechanics), and the other in the general area of fluid mechanics. Additional information is included in the attached advertisements.

Two Ph.D. positions in the general area of mechanics are currently available in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Houston.

Applicants should possess an MS degree in civil, mechanical, or other related engineering field at the time of enrollment at University of Houston. A strong background in continuum mechanics is required.

Two POSTDOCTORAL ASSOCIATE POSITIONS will be available at University of Houston. The start dates are flexible, and hopefully be filled by the end of Fall 2014. Applicants are sought in the general area of (theoretical and/or computational and/or experimental) solid mechanics, structural mechanics, structural engineering, materials science, and microelectromechanical systems (MEMS).

I wrote this report a while back, and a limited printing was circulated by Wright Pattterson Air Force Base. I found a scanned version that I attach for your interest.

I have always, and I believe correctly, considered cohesize/bridging models linear elasticity. This is because whether we apply them to holes or cracks, we are solving the equations of ELASTICITY, with nonlinear boundary conditions along the part(s) of the crack along which a traction-separation law is applied. So the material model is totally elastic. All we did was to augment the elasticity theory with an ad hoc physical condition (inspired by experiments such as Dugdale).

University of Minnesota Civil Engineering Faculty Search

I attach an essay we wrote for a book that will be published by University of Minnesota Press titled "The city, the river, the bridge." The essay is a transcription of part of a public lecture I gave on infrastructure and on the bridge collapse.

After the bridge collapse there were several posts on Imechanica that included speculation about the cause of the collapse, including fatigue crack growth, lack of redundancy, etc.. Our investigation determined the collapse was a result of an undersized gusset plate that reached its plastic limit load. 

The research funding environment we are all experiencing is extremely frustrating, and has the potential for long-term damage to academics and the nation. You may be interested in reading the letter to the Wall Street Journal by two Nobel Prize winners, David Baltimore and Ahmed Zewail.

In a recent discussion it was suggested that it would be useful to perform tension tests on collagen fibrils. We have developed a MEMS-based experimental procedure that is capable of applying very large strains to individual collagen fibrils. The attached paper presents illustrative data; an upcoming paper will present much more data that illustrates the rich behavior of these fibrils during loading and unloading tests.