Civil Engineering’s Piervincenzo Rizzo recognized by ASNT for Best Paper on nondestructive testing

PITTSBURGH (April 6, 2017) … Piervincenzo (Piero) Rizzo, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Pittsburgh’s Swanson School of Engineering, was awarded the 2017 Outstanding Paper from the American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT), for the paper “ Fractal Analysis Applied to Laser Spot Thermography” published in the journal Materials Evaluation [Volume 74, Issue 3, pgs. 409-417, March 2016].

The ASNT Outstanding Paper in Materials Evaluation Award is presented to a person or persons for a manuscript published in Materials Evaluation, which, in the opinion of the Awards Committee, is an outstanding contribution to the advancement of nondestructive testing. Nominations may only be made by reviewers, Associate Technical Editors or Editors of the Journals, or Outstanding Paper Awards Committee Members. Dr. Rizzo will be recognized at the 2017 ASNT Annual Conference in Nashville, October 30-November 2.

Dr. Rizzo’s academic and professional interests include nondestructive testing/evaluation, structural health monitoring, signal processing and automatic pattern recognition for real-time prognosis of structural and biological materials, and implementation of embedded sensor network for the health monitoring of civil, mechanical and aerospace structures. Current research is focused on the development of guided wave-based SHM methodologies for pipes, and the investigation of highly-nonlinear solitary waves for the noninvasive assessment of structural and biomaterials including structural buckling. In 2015 the International Workshop on Structural Health Monitoring recognized him as the Structural Health Monitoring Person of the Year. In 2016 he received the Chancellor’s Distinguished Research Junior Scholar Award, the Pitt’s most esteemed award given to young faculty.  

Dr. Rizzo earned his laurea (MS) in aeronautical engineering from the University of Palermo, Italy, and his Master and PhD in structural engineering from the University of California – San Diego.

About Pitt’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Founded in 1867, the Civil and Environmental Engineering program at the University of Pittsburgh’s Swanson School of Engineering is one of the oldest engineering programs in the U.S. Civil engineering students at Pitt have the opportunity to engage in undergraduate and graduate programs in a broad range of topics, including environmental engineering and water resources, geotechnical and pavements, structural engineering and mechanics, and sustainability and green design. 

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