Civil and Environmental Engineering Graduate Courses

Environmental & Water Resources Engineering courses

CE-ENGIN 560 Hydrology
A quantitative account of elements of the hydrologic cycle, including precipitation, evapotranspiration, snowmelt, infiltration, and surface runoff. Basic laws from such various disciplines as physics, chemistry, meteorology, astronomy, fluid mechanics, and thermodynamics, combined into simple mathematical descriptions used in the hydrologic design process.

CE-ENGIN 561 Open-Channel Flow
A rigorous mathematical study of flow in open channels, including uniform, gradually varied, rapidly varied, tidal, and flood flows. Analytical and numerical solutions to the governing conservation equations developed with the aid of the computer, and stable channel design addressed.

CE-ENGIN 565 Environmental Institutions & Policies
Policies and laws relating to use and conservation of water resources. Analysis of water-related governmental organizations and programs at federal, state, and local levels.

CE-ENGIN 570 GIS for Engineers 
Principles of geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial analysis for engineering application. Topics include data structures and manipulation, topology, and attribute information. Use of spatial data for mapping and spatial analysis to address real world problems.

CE-ENGIN 572 Environmental Engineering Analysis
With lab. Basic concepts of physical and chemical parameters used to measure water quality in natural aquatic systems and in treatment plants. Laboratory covers important water analysis methods, including gravimetric, volumetric, colorimetric, and alkalinity-acidity titration methods.

CE-ENGIN 573 Environmental Engineering Microbiology
With lab. Microbiological and biochemical properties of microorganisms important in environmental engineering practice. General fundamentals of microbiology and application to drinking water treatment and distribution, water pollution control, and natural systems.

CE-ENGIN 575 Advanced Solid and Hazardous Waste Management
Introduction to municipal solid waste management and hazardous waste management. The relationship between the properties of wastes, the techniques and hardware used for waste handling and processing and the ultimate disposal (containment) of waste and other residual materials will be emphasized. Remediation of contaminated areas is also covered. The design of systems for the management and disposal of solid and hazardous wastes subject to economic factors, safety, reliability and ethical and social implications will be examined.

CE-ENGIN 577 Surface Water Quality Modeling
Evaluation and control of water quality in streams, lakes, and estuaries. Mathematical analyses of patterns of water movement and their relation to water quality. Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) allocation design.

CE-ENGIN 579 Air Quality
The course examines the sources, fate, transport, and control of the major categories of air pollutants. Topics include: sources and characteristics of air pollutants; atmospheric chemistry and physics; effects of air pollutants on human health and the environment; global climate change; atmospheric dispersion modeling; and design of systems for the control of gaseous and particulate air pollutants.

CE-ENGIN 597F Design of Fish Passage Facilities
This course focuses on the engineering evaluation and design of facilities for the passage and protection of aquatic organisms at hydropower projects and other stream barriers.  Topics include hydropower, ichthyomechanics, ecohydrology and the design of baffled chute passes, pool-type ladders, fish lifts, and downstream protection devices.

CE-ENGIN 660 Subsurface Hydraulics
The transport of water through the unsaturated and saturated zone using rigorous mathematical theory, analytical and numerical solutions. Topics include hydraulic properties of soils, infiltration, confined and unconfined aquifer flow, consolidations, and well hydraulics.

CE-ENGIN 661 Subsurface Pollution
Transport of contaminants through the unsaturated and saturated zone using rigorous mathematical theory, analytical and numerical solutions. Topics include the fate and transport of conservative and reactive contaminants in single or multiphase flow fields.

CE-ENGIN 662 Water Resource Systems Analysis
Application of systems analysis techniques, including mathematical programming, uncertainty analysis and economic analysis, the analysis of water resource problems. Topics include water storage, supply, conveyance, treatment, control and quality management.

CE-ENGIN 670  Transport Processes in EWRE 
Transport of fluids and constituents in environmental systems. Advection, diffusion, dispersion, zero and first-order reaction kinetics and equilibrium partitioning processes. Mathematical models solved with analytical and numerical methods. Multi-scale application to surface and subsurface waters and the atmosphere.

CE-ENGIN 671  Environmental Biological Processes
The major biological phenomena and processes used in environmental engineering. Fundamentals of microbiology and biochemistry as applied to wastewater treatment, bioremediation drinking water treatment, and biological air pollution control.

CE-ENGIN 672  Physical & Chemical Treatment Processes
With lab. Fundamentals of physical and chemical processes used in environmental engineering. Applications include processes used in the treatment of drinking waters, industrial waters and wastewaters, municipal wastewaters, and hazardous waste remediation.

CE-ENGIN 675  Pollutant Dispersion
Physical processes of turbulent diffusion and advection. Calculation of contaminant distributions in nature. Description of natural and man made circulation and mixing patterns of rivers, lakes, and ponds; their pollutional dispersion characteristics in the analysis of practical contaminant transport problems.

CE-ENGIN 680  Water Chemistry
Chemical equilibrium principles of acids-bases, dissolution-precipitation, oxidation-reduction, and complexation applied to understanding the chemistry of surface waters, groundwaters, and water and wastewater treatment. Course website.

CE-ENGIN 684  Environmental Reaction Kinetics
Rates and kinetics of chemical and biological systems important to Environmental Engineers. The fundamentals of kinetic theory, mathematical simulation of kinetic systems, analysis of kinetic data and many relevant case studies are examined (formerly CEE 697K). Course website.

CE-ENGIN 690R  Environmental Remote Sensing
Introduction to the fast-growing field of remote sensing from space. The course covers physical concepts and other aspects of remote sensing including: characteristics of electromagnetic spectrum and remote sensing devices, digital processing methods for interpreting, manipulating and analyzing remotely-sensed image data, and application of satellite imagery to environmental monitoring.

CE-ENGIN 697CC Climate Change Impacts on the Northeastern U.S.
This seminar will explore impacts of climate change on the Northeastern US. Seven speakers from various academic disciplines are invited to speak on topics of ecology, water resources, land use, and cultural resources.  Attendance at lectures is absolutely required. Additional meetings will focus student-facilitated discussion on issues addressed by the speakers as well as assigned readings.

CE-ENGIN 697N Environmental Nanoscience and Nanotechnology
Covers elements of environmental nanoscience and nanotechnology that are currently of concerned to the research community, consultants, industry, as well as regulators.  Students examine the synthesis and characterization of nanomaterials, tranformation and transport in the environment, potential health effects, and applications in various technologies.

CE-ENGIN 697W  Advanced Topics in Water Chemistry and Process Engineering 
Graduate level course on reading and analyzing current literature in the field of water quality, water and wastewater treatment, and aquatic systems modeling.

CE-ENGIN 697X  Advanced Topics in Environmental Engineering 
Graduate level course on reading and analyzing current literature in the field of water quality, water and wastewater treatment, and aquatic systems modeling.

CE-ENGIN 770 Environmental & Water Resources Engineering Design-A
Selection, evaluation, and design of environmental and water resources engineering systems.

CE-ENGIN 771 Environmental & Water Resources Engineering Design-B
Selection, evaluation, and design of environmental and water resources engineering systems.

CE-ENGIN 772 Instrumental Methods Environment Analysis
Principles and techniques of instrumental chemical analysis, including molecular and atomic spectrophotometry, gas chromatography, mass spectrometry, and electro-analytical methods. Emphasis on solving analytical problems of trace pollutants in water and wastewater. Course website.

CE-ENGIN 774 Process Particle-Water Interface
An analysis of physical and chemical aspects of the behavior of particles in aquatic systems. Topics include surface chemistry, adsorption, nucleation, precipitation, dissolution, forces between interacting surfaces, and the hydrodynamics of particle transport and deposition.

CE-ENGIN 776 Bioremed Contaminated Soils & Waters
Application of biological processes as they are currently used to remediate convention-al, industrial, and hazardous wastes. Fun-damentals of microbial physiology and metabolism as applied to the major groups of hazardous chemicals. Theory and design of remediation technologies.

 

Geotechnical Engineering courses

CE-ENGIN 523 Ground Improvement 
Engineered ground improvement; slurry trenches, dewatering systems; grouting; deep dynamic compaction, vibro compaction; stone columns; wick and vertical sand drains. Emphasizes basic principles and design methodology.

CE-ENGIN 525 Environmental Geotechnology 
Geotechnical engineering related to environmental issues. Topics include: site investigation techniques for environmental drilling; site instrumentation procedures; groundwater sampling procedures; groundwater sampling methods; methods of evaluating in situ and laboratory hydraulic conductivity for use in design; design of containment facilities; and current methods for addressing subsurface environmental problems. Written engineering reports.

CE-ENGIN 527 Earthquake Engineering
Seismic considerations for the design of civil engineering systems. Topics include geology of earthquakes, strong motion records, ground motion, site amplification, response spectra, seismic hazard, seismic design.

CE-ENGIN  620 Soil Behavior and Shear Strength  
Fundamentals of soil behavior, soil mineralogy and structure, soil stresses, stress-strain-strength behavior of cohesionless and cohesive soils, consolidation behavior of saturated soils, and determination of consolidation and strength parameters in practice.

CE-ENGIN  622 Geotechnical Material Testing 
Experimental investigation of the fundamental aspects of soil behavior including classification, index and engineering properties. Emphasizes experimental determination of the consolidation and stress-strain-strength characteristics of soils for design. Experiments include: classification and basic index tests, hydraulic conductivity, consolidation, triaxial tests and direct simple shear.

CE-ENGIN  623 Advanced Foundations Design  
Geotechnical analysis and design related to shallow and deep foundations. Topics include: site investigations, bearing capacity theory, analysis and design of shallow spread footings, isolated pads and mat foundations; total stress and effective stress design of drilled shaft and driven pile foundations. Emphasis on the presentation of designs in a formal geotechnical report.

CE-ENGIN  625 In Situ Testing  
The theoretical and practical aspects of in situ tests in geotechnical engineering. Tests discussed include: Standard Penetration Test, Field Vane, Piezocone, Dilatometer, Pressuremeter, and Borehole Shear. Emphasis on use of in situ test results for determining engineering properties of soil for design.

CE-ENGIN 722 Numerical Methods/Geomechanics
Computer and numerical methods in soil mechanics, consolidation, seepage, slope stability, stress distribution, and finite element analysis.

CE-ENGIN  724 Soil Dynamics  
Dynamic behavior of soils with application to problems of seismic survey, measurement of dynamic soil properties, foundation vibration and performance under earthquake loading.

CE-ENGIN  728  Geotechnical Instrumentation  
Design, selection, and use of instrumentation for geotechnical engineering purposes. Laboratory and field instrumentation considered. Topics include: purpose of instrumentation, planning projects, procurement of instruments and services, measuring devices, and examples of applications. Lab demonstration.

 

Transportation Engineering courses

CE-ENGIN 509 Transportation Planning and System Analysis
Introduction to transportation systems analysis and modeling as applied to the urban transportation planning process, multiple transportation modes, and the larger metropolitan environment.

CE-ENGIN 510 Public Transportation Systems
Relationship of public transportation to technological innovation; financing and regulation; supply, demand, and price considerations; performance evaluation; routing and scheduling; application of microcomputers; and project planning and design.

CE-ENGIN 511 Traffic Engineering
Characteristics of traffic system components including drivers, vehicles, and roadways. Fundamental principles of traffic flow, operations, and controls. Traffic demand analysis and highway capacity analysis. Traffic engineering studies involving volume, speed, travel time, and delay. Techniques of field data collection and methodology of office analysis. Intersection design and analysis. Signalized intersection control involving signal phases and timing. Emphasizes methodology as well as practice.

CE-ENGIN 515 Pavement Design
Design procedures for flexible highway pavement structures including AASHTO and the Asphalt Institute methods; determination of design parameters for mixed traffic, materials, and performance characterization; reliability of design. Design project, a written engineering report and oral presentation.

CE-ENGIN 516 Transportation Design
Highway location and geometric design principles for streets and highways with emphasis on roadway safety. Includes state-of-the-art design policies and current research findings. AutoCAD and transportation design computer software used for class assignments and the class project. Students enrolled in CE-ENGIN 516 will work in design teams on transportation design projects with an emphasis on creative design and problem solving through transportation systems management techniques.

CE-ENGIN 518 Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS)
A review of intelligent transportation systems, technologies and user services with an emphasis on the operation of advanced public transportation systems (APTS) and technologies including wire and wireless communication, sensors, automated vehicle location, information processing and other technological applications; user services include traffic signal priority control, en-route and pre-trip traveler information, electronic payment, and management and operations as they pertain to public transit and paratransit services in large metropolitan areas as well as in small urban and rural communities.

CE-ENGIN 520 Traffic Flow Theory & Simulation I
Fundamentals of traffic flow including its characteristics and their relationships; Mathematical models that describe traffic flow dynamics at multiple levels of detail; Solutions and applications of these models that capture traffic flow phenomena such as congestion and queue dissipation.

CE-ENGIN 521 Traffic Flow Theory & Simulation II
Applications of traffic flow theory involving traffic flow modeling at varying levels of details using manually-generated and commercially-available transportation simulation tools. Fundamentals involved in transportation simulation such as random number generation, input/output analysis, and macroscopic and microscopic traffic flow models.

CE-ENGIN 610 Transportation Analysis and Planning
Advanced topics in transportation planning and analysis, including a review of linear regression, discrete choice model theory, estimation and applications, and traffic assignment model theory and applications with a computer programming component. Topics covered vary across semesters. Supplemented by scholarly publications that reflect the current research development in travel behavior modeling, transportation demand forecasting, traffic network modeling and optimization.

CE-ENGIN 611 Transportation Investment and Pricing Analysis
The application of economic principles to transportation investment and pricing analyses; emphasis on highway and public transportation in urban settings.

CE-ENGIN 612 Transportation Planning and Policy Analysis
An intensive survey of current issues in transportation planning and policy.

CE-ENGIN 614 Advanced Concepts in Traffic Safety
This course covers advanced topics in traffic safety including both motorized and nonmotorized modes with an emphasis on the science of safety. The course is divided into modules. Specific components include safety management systems, human factors, data needs and limitations, identification of hazardous locations, diagnosis of problems, development of countermeasures, road safety audits/reviews, and crash reconstruction. As applicable safety modeling using the Interactive Highway Safety Design Modules and other modeling platforms will be incorporated. Several traffic engineering software packages will also be used to demonstrate relationships between traffic safety and operational efficiency.

CE-ENGIN 697F Traffic Flow Theory & Simulation II
Applications of traffic flow theory involving traffic flow modeling at varying levels of details using manually-generated and commercially-available transportation simulation tools. Fundamentals involved in transportation simulation such as random number generation, input/output analysis, and macroscopic and microscopic traffic flow models.

 

Structural Engineering and Mechanics courses

CE-ENGIN 514 Infrastructure Management
Asphaltic concrete pavements used to demonstrate and study issues, problems, concepts, principles, and techniques associated with the design and implementation of civil engineering infrastructure management systems.

CE-ENGIN 535 Matrix Analysis of Structures
Development and use of flexibility and stiffness methods of matrix analysis for de-terminate and indeterminate structures. Use of computer programs for the analysis of simple structures.

CE-ENGIN 536 Advanced Topics Reinforced Concrete Designs
Design of various types of reinforced concrete systems including one and two-way slabs, continuous beams, -building frames, and beam-column joints. Moment-curvature analysis of reinforced concrete sections, moment redistribution of continuous systems, and strut-and-tie modeling techniques are discussed.

CE-ENGIN 540 Strength of Materials II
Stress-strain-temperature relations in elastic and plastic structural systems. Energy methods. Stress concentration and stress intensity factors. Role of linear fracture mechanics in design.

CE-ENGIN 541 Structural Dynamics
Behavior of structures and structural components exposed to time dependent loadings. Vibrations of systems; descriptions of dynamic systems.

CE-ENGIN 542 Advanced Topics in Steel Design
Expands on the basic design methods of CE-ENGIN 434. Includes plate girder design, composite steel and concrete member design, overall structure considerations, and other topics both extending on previous class descriptions as well as entirely new concepts.

CE-ENGIN 548 Finite Element Method
Introduction to finite element techniques for the solution of structural engineering problems.

CE-ENGIN 549 Structural Stability
Linear and nonlinear buckling of columns, beam-columns, frames and plates. Role of linearization in formulation of stability problems. Adjacent equilibrium, kinetic, imperfection and energy criteria for stability analysis. Variational approaches for formulating and solving buckling problems.

CE-ENGIN 550 Intro to Bridge Engineering
Discussion of basic concepts in the analysis and design of bridges using current American Association of Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) specifications. Presentation of common types of bridges, types of bridge loads, load distribution, design of bridge structural components. Techniques for bridge inspection and load rating.

CE-ENGIN 605 Finite Element Analysis  
Introduction to finite element method in engineering science. Derivation of element equations by physical, variational, and residual methods. Associated computer coding techniques and numerical methods. Applications. Prerequisites: programming ability, ordinary differential equations, basic matrix algebra. Same as M&I-ENGIN 605.

CE-ENGIN 615 Problem Methods/Structural Mechanics
Solution of problems in structural mechanics that contain sources of input or system uncertainty; reliability, random vibrations, homogenization, stochastic differential equations and other topics.

CE-ENGIN 630 Advanced Solid Mechanics
Unified treatment of the analysis of solids. Consideration of continuity, mechanical energy, stress and strain. Application to elasticity, thermoelasticity, and plasticity. Same as M&I-ENGIN 630.

CE-ENGIN 631 Civil Engineering Analysis I
Mathematical methods for solution of typical engineering problems. Analytical methods for solution of ordinary differential equations; perturbation methods, special functions, eigenvalue problems. Introduction to complex variable methods.

CE-ENGIN 632 Civil Engineering Analysis II
Mathematical methods for solution of typical engineering problems. Analytical methods for solution of ordinary differential equations; perturbation methods, special functions, eigenvalue problems. Introduction to complex variable methods.

CE-ENGIN 639 Structural Mechanical Composite Material
Types of composite systems. Analytical models of filamentary and laminated materials. Elastic and plastic analysis of structures subject to static or dynamic loadings. Failure criteria of composites, influence of time, temperature, and moisture. Design of composite material systems.

CE-ENGIN 643 Elasticity
General equations of the mathematical theory of elasticity in space. General formulation of basic equations and methods of solution.

CE-ENGIN 644 Theory of Plates
Classical theory of plates as well as modern developments. Relationship of general theory of elasticity to plate theory.

CE-ENGIN 645 Advanced Topics in Vibrations
Free and forced vibrations of strings, rods, bars, and thin elastic plates. Free vibrations of circular, cylindrical, and conical shells. Forced harmonic vibrations of thin shells. Propagation of elastic waves. Ray-leigh surface waves. Statistical concepts of random vibration analysis. Same as M&I-ENGIN 745.

CE-ENGIN 646 Seismic Structural Analysis
Principles of engineering seismology, including analysis and design of structures to resist earthquake motions.

CE-ENGIN 647 Structural Dynamics II
Continuation of CE-ENGIN 541. Emphasis on analysis of civil engineering structures subject to various steady state and transient loadings.

CE-ENGIN 648 Structural Shells
Analysis of structural shells. Membrane theory, bending theory of shells of revolution, shear deformation shell theory, non-linear theories, stability. Consent of instructor required.

CE-ENGIN 780 Mechanics of Materials
Advanced topics related to mechanical behavior of structural materials.

NOTE: SPIRE is the OFFICIAL source for all current course descriptions, prerequisites, and registration information