Materials Technology Research
At the Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center (TFHRC), research on materials technologies is an ongoing project.
We are constantly looking for new materials and methods to improve the quality of our nation's highway system. Our efforts involve in-house and contract-sponsored research on areas such as bridge coatings, asphalt concrete and asphalt binders, portland cement concrete, high-performance materials for bridge construction, and waste and byproduct materials, to name a few. Through the following programs, our commitment is to provide the highway community with field technical support and the most comprehensive source of information on materials technology.
Asphalt Technology
Our program specializes in the design, testing, and evaluation of asphalt materials (binders and mixtures) to prevent or anticipate long-term pavement damage and to optimize materials used in asphalt mixtures for specific paving applications and environments.
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Bridge Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE)
This project is focused on testing and development of implementable tools for the nondestructive evaluation of highways and bridges. Our goal is to test and evaluate research prototypes and commercially available instrumentation, develop innovative methods for using NDE, and field test new technologies to solve real problems faced by State DOT's...
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Bridge Coating
Our goal is to assist highway bridge owners in optimizing steel bridge corrosion control maintenance operations. We have targeted the key issues regarding the performance of coating material, surface preparation requirements, corrosivity of various environments, environmental compliance and impact, and containment and disposal of waste generated during bridge repainting jobs...
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Highway Operations
The purpose of our program is to provide effective solutions to restore optimum highway performance during events that interrupt service. The program consists of five components: construction, maintenance, weather, natural disasters, and incident management. Our approach is to analyze each of these areas and target and promote activities in terms of research and technology applications that will minimize traffic flow disruption, improve safety, and optimize highway operations.
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Recycling, Secondary Materials, and Waste Utilization
Our goal is to encourage widespread use of secondary materials (i.e., waste, byproducts, and recycled materials) and associated technologies in the construction and rehabilitation of the highway infrastructure. We disseminate information and practical knowledge on current technically sound uses, and we also encourage continued investigation of promising new secondary materials and technologies, including research and field trials...
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Portland Cement Concrete Pavements
(PCCP)
The Portland Cement Concrete Pavements (PCCP) program consists of a series of studies to systematically investigate various aspects of PCCP material properties and behaviors to enhance the construction and performance of concrete pavements in the field. Our objective is to develop and implement a set of guidelines to enable the industry to select materials, construct highway structures, design mixes, and perform recycling, repair, and rehabilitation of existing PCCP that will result in high performance concrete pavements...
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Simulation, Imaging, and Mechanics of Asphalt Pavement (SIMAP)
Our goal is to support the validation and improvement of existing mixture design procedures (including Superpave) and to provide pavement engineers with tools to design better performing pavements. Among the latest scientific tools and techniques being developed in our lab are: 3-D imaging and analysis of the aggregate structure in pavements, micro-mechanics modeling to link the aggregate structure to pavement properties, and advanced computer modeling to enable engineers design hot mixes to achieve a desired aggregate structure.
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