Research Interest:

• Hurricane mitigation under sustainability constraints
• Wind/structure and wind/built environment interaction studies through one or a combination of the following:
  • wall of wind - WoW (full-scale tests),
  • boundary layer wind tunnel - BLWT (model-scale tests), and
  • computational approaches such as computational fluid dynamics - CFD.
• Wind farm assessment, topgraphy effect, urban wind farms
• Sustainable building engineering (building science principles useful for passive arichtectural designs in order to achieve a more sustainable performance of buildings for thermal, wind, and other environmental loads; and use of renewable energy alternatives for buildings)
• Wind driven rain intrusion through building envelopes
• Natural ventilation
• Codification of wind loads

Active Research:

• Experimental Wind Engineering:
  • WoW (full-scale) and BLWT (experimental)
• Computational Wind Engineering:
  • Modelling (CFD, AI, Statistical); Frequency and time domain analysis.
• Combined Experimental/Computational Wind Engineering:
  • BLWT-CFD; WoW-CFD; CFD-AI (Artificial Intelligence)

CFD research example (Sponsor: NSF CAREER, Dagnew, Bitsuamlak and Merrick, 2009). Acknowlegment: The BLWT data used to validate (left column) the CFD model is conductued at RWDI wind tunnel, Mirarmar, FL by the third author.

WoW research example - Assessment of roof secondary water barrier effectivenss (Sponsor: FLDEM; Bitsuamlak, Chowdhury and Dhawal 2009)

 

RESEARCH GRANTS

Multi-scale computational evaluation of wind loads on buildings, (NSF-CAREER, $400,219, Active) (PI)

Phase I: Development of new aerodynamic database and mitigation techniques for roof-top equipment and roof- and ground-mounted solar panel arrays, (FL Center of Excellence sub-project, $250,000, Active) (PI)

An Open-Source Integrated Computing Infrastructure to Support the Life Cycle Design and Engineering of High Performance Building, (FIU Faculty Research Support Program (FRSP), $24,935) (Co-PI)

Tesla Supercomputer Upgrade, FIU technology fee proposal award (FIU Division of Inormation Techonlogy, $75,000) (CoPI)

MRI: Acquisition of Instrumentation to Create a Transformative Large- and Full-Scale Wind Testing Capability in Support of Sustainable Windstorm-Resilient, Energy-Efficient Community (NSF, $300,715, Active) (CoPI)

Wind pressure and resistance evaluation for Hip and Ridge tiles and attachments (Full-scale study), Florida Department of Emergency Management –FLDEM, $191,974, Compeleted) (PI).

Wind load evaluation for solar panels: Phase II- Full scale experiment. (Corning Inc., $29,000, Completed) (PI).

Wind load evaluation for solar panels: Phase I- Full scale experiment. (Corning Inc., $26,000, Compeleted) (PI).

Computational evaluation of wind loads on roofs (FIU 2008 Faculty Research Support Program, $17,000, Compeleted), (PI)

Full-scale measurement of external and internal pressures in residential buildings (Florida Department of Emergency Management--FLDEM--, $175,000, Compeleted), (PI)

Phase I: Exploratory full-scale Wausau Tile lockdown system wind pressure study (Wausau Tile Inc., $29,000, Compeleted) (PI)

Roof/soffit/wall corner suction aerodynamic mitigation studies at full-scale (FLDEM, $75,000, Completed) (PI)

Assessing effectiveness of roof secondary water barriers-- full-scale -- (FLDEM, $75,000, Completed) (PI)

Roof secondary water barriers research -- full-scale -- (IBHS, $15,000, Completed) (PI)

6-fan Wall of Wind