Geotechnical & Geoenvironmental Engineering
Geotechnical & Geoenvironmental Engineering
 
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Faculty
 


John J. Bowders
John J. Bowders
( Professor)

John J. Bowders joined the geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering group in August 1997. He served on the Civil Engineering faculties at The University of Texas at Austin and West Virginia University prior to coming to Missouri. John's research interests include the effects of chemicals and wastes on the properties and behavior of soil, subsurface containment systems, in situ remediation systems, and design of experiments for laboratory and field tests involving water and chemical movement in soil. He has collaborated on research involving geosynthetics, in situ containment and waste containment systems. His current work includes soil erosion and water quality in timber harvest areas, pavement drainage systems, settlement of municipal solid waste, asphalt barrier for waste containment, erosion control using geosynthetics, soil vapor extraction using wick drains and stabilization of slopes using recycled plastic pins. John teaches courses covering seepage in soils, foundation engineering, consolidation and settlement, and landfill design.

 

J. Erik Loehr
J. Erik Loehr
(Associate Professor)



J. Erik Loehr joined the geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering group in January 1998. Erik's primary specialties include evaluating the stability and performance of earth slopes and retention systems, large-scale laboratory modeling of geotechnical engineering problems, geotechnical composite systems, and computer applications in geotechnical engineering. His recent research projects include development and evaluation of techniques for using recycled plastic reinforcement for stabilization of surficial slope failures, large-scale laboratory and numerical evaluation of reticulated micropile systems for slope stabilization, development of a constitutive model to predict the behavior of fiber-reinforced soils, application of asset management principles to geotechnical engineering structures, reliability-based design of earth slopes and retaining structures, and application of Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) to earth slopes. Erik is a recipient of an NSF CAREER Award and teaches courses covering fundamental soil behavior, stability of slopes and earth retaining structures, and foundation engineering and design.

 

William J. Likos
William J. Likos
(Assistant Professor)

William J. Likos joined the MU faculty in August 2002. Bill was previously on the faculty at the Colorado School of Mines where he received his doctoral degree in 2000. The emphasis of his most recent work has been with expansive clays, which has included experimental investigations of the crystalline swelling mechanism, drilling fluid - shale interaction, and the development of new methodologies for classifying swelling potential. Bill is widely involved in unsaturated soil research, particularly in the development of experimental techniques for measuring soil suction, suction-induced stress, and the unsaturated permeability function. He is the co-author of Unsaturated Soil Mechanics (Wiley, 2004). He has been involved in a broad variety of projects including geotechnical centrifuge modeling of dynamic soil-structure interaction, in situ monitoring of active landslides, and innovative computer controlled testing for measuring soil properties and coupled fluid flow. He brings his exceptional enthusiasm, energy, and technical capabilities to MU and will be a driving force within the group. Bill teaches courses in geotechnical earthquake engineering, unsaturated soil mechanics, and clay behavior.

 

Brent Rosenblad
Brent L. Rosenblad
(Assistant Professor)

Brent L. Rosenblad joined the MU faculty in August 2003. He received his doctoral degree from The University of Texas at Austin in 2000. Prior to coming to MU, Brent was an instructor at the University of Texas at Austin where he was also project manager for the Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) project. Brent managed the day-to-day operations of the $3-million dollar NEES project to develop state-of-the-art field equipment for geotechnical and structural earthquake engineering research. Brent has significant experience in the areas of non-destructive testing, soil dynamics and in-situ studies of soil and rock properties. He has been involved in pavement research such as non-destructive methods to detect voids and delaminations in rigid pavements and super-accelerated testing of pavements. His recent work has focused on developing and applying non-intrusive surface wave methods to characterize seafloor sediments. Brent has also been involved in several soil characterization studies in earthquake prone regions of the world such as California, Turkey and Taiwan. He has collaborated on many consulting projects including extensive site characterization studies of the Yucca Mountain nuclear storage facility in Nevada. Brent’s primary research interests are in laboratory and field studies of dynamic soil properties, application and development of non-intrusive surface wave methods, and geotechnical aspects of pavement performance. Brent currently teaches courses in soil dynamics and geotechnical earthquake engineering.

 


Yong-Chai Chang
(Visiting Professor)

Yong-Chai Chang joined the geotechnical and geoenvironmental group as a visiting professor for the period of February 2007 to February 2008. He received his BE (1984), MS (1986), and PhD (1991) from Chonnam National University in Korea. His research interests include: Soft Ground Treatment, EPS Construction Method, Slope Stability, Geo-synthetics, and Highway Design and Construction. He is an Associate Professor at the Department of Ocean Civil Engineering, Faculty of Ocean System Engineering, Mokpo National Maritime University. Prior to his current position, he worked for the Geotechnical Division of Highway & Transportation Technology Institute, Korea Highway Corporation as a Principal  Research  Engineer.

R.David Hammer
R.David Hammer
(Professor Emeritus)


 

R. David Hammer is National Leader, Soil Survey Investigations for USDA-NRCS and is adjunct professor in the geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering group. He joined the Geotechnical group in 2002 after a 16 year career as professor and chair of the Soil & Atmospheric Sciences Department at Missouri . David has degrees in mechanical engineering, ecology, and soil genesis. He has a wealth of experience in applying principles from soil science and natural resources to provide solutions to current environmental problems and brings a distinctly interdisciplinary character to the geotechnical engineering group. He is an active researcher on topics that include urban stormwater control, surface mine reclamation, effects of deforestation on soil erosion and water quality, and the temporal and spatial variability of soil carbon and its influence on global climate change. He has also served as a consultant for several high profile projects involving the same topics, and has chaired several national committees for the Soil Science Society of America. David has taught courses in soil mechanics, soil classification, hydrology, urban stormwater management, pedology, and geomorphology.

 

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Last updated: March 19, 2007