Dr. Dallas Little, Snead Chair Professor and Regents Professor in the Zachry Department of Civil Engineering at Texas A&M University, was selected by the Transportation and Development Institute to receive the 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Francis C. Turner Award for his work on asphalt technology and chemical stabilization of soil and aggregate systems. The committee cited his work to identify the reality and importance of chemo-mechanical processes that impact microdamage and microdamage healing in asphalt concrete composites that comprise the large majority of the multi-trillion dollar pavement infrastructure.
Little will accept the award, consisting of a plaque and cash prize, during the International Conference on Transportation and Development, June 26-29, in Houston.
The board of governors of the institute also named Little chief editor of Part-B (Pavements) of the ASCE Journal of Transportation Engineering (JTE).
The Journal of Transportation Engineering contains technical and professional articles on the planning, design, construction, maintenance and operation of air, highway, rail and urban transportation.
Little is a senior research fellow at the Texas A&M Transportation Institute (TTI) and was the first researcher named to that position. He has served as principal investigator over an array of national research projects for such sponsors as the Federal Highway Administration, National Cooperative Highway Research Program, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the National Science Foundation. He has also served as principal investigator on numerous projects for the Texas Department of Transportation and private industry. He recently served as principal investigator for Texas A&M’s role in the $30 million Asphalt Research Consortium (ARC) project focused on advancing the state of knowledge in the fundamental and applied design and analysis of asphalt materials and pavements. He has published over 200 journal articles and given over 450 invited lectures.
Little has extensive design, analysis and forensic engineering experience with companies on a worldwide basis. As a consultant he has been involved in numerous major projects including: Denver International Airport; proposed Qatar-Bahrain Causeway; airfield design reviews for the Central Command in Iraq and Afghanistan; The new Doha, Qatar Airport; airfield design projects for Houston Airport Systems; design-build toll highway systems such as the widening of IH 635 between Fort Worth and Dallas; the SH 130 south Texas project; preliminary engineering investigation of subgrade design for the Grand Parkway in Houston; the New Mexico City Airport; the Texas high speed rail project between Houston and Dallas; and soil stabilization implementation projects in Australia, New Zealand and Canada.