Drs. Zachary Grasley and Mary Beth Hueste of the Zachry Department of Civil Engineering at Texas A&M University received awards at the spring 2016 American Concrete Institute (ACI) Concrete Convention and Exposition in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Grasley, associate professor and the Peter C. Forster Faculty Fellow I, was awarded the ACI Young Member Award for Professional Achievement “for contributions to advancing the use of innovative materials and technologies in concrete construction through research, technology transfer, and mentoring of younger colleagues and students.” He is also a faculty member in the materials science and engineering department and has been with Texas A&M for eight years. Grasley also spent two years as a faculty member at Virginia Tech University.
Grasley’s research interests include concrete shrinkage, creep, durability and sustainability, nanomaterials, cryogenic concrete, poroelastic behavior, and early-age behavior. Grasley uses a combination of novel experiments and theoretical modeling in his research approach, with a focus on leveraging fundamental science. He has made contributions in uncovering new mechanisms for concrete creep and irreversible drying shrinkage and advanced the science of quantifying dispersion of nanomaterials in concrete. Additionally, he devised a novel method for quantifying concrete permeability. Grasley teaches classes on concrete, material science, and mechanics to students ranging from sophomore to Ph.D. levels.
Hueste, a professor in the department, was awarded the Delmar L. Bloem Distinguished Service Award “for outstanding leadership of Committee 352, Joints and Connections in Monolithic Concrete Structures, Joint ACI-ASCE.” She has been a member of the structural engineering faculty for 17 years, and is currently the major highway structures program manager and acting division head for the construction, geotechnical and structures division within the Texas A&M Transportation Institute.
Hueste has held leadership positions with ACI, including current chair of Joint ACI-ASCE Committee 352, Joints and Connections in Monolithic Concrete Structures, and past secretary of the Reinforced Concrete Research Council. She is a member of ACI Committee 374, Performance-Based Seismic Design of Concrete Buildings, and ACI Subcommittee 318-J, Joints and Connections.
Her research interests include behavior, analysis, and design of reinforced and prestressed concrete building and bridge structures; nonlinear analysis and probabilistic assessment of structures under extreme loads; earthquake engineering; and assessment of aging and historic infrastructure.