Caltrans awards $1.5 million research grant to UCLA to establish Seismic Geohazard Research Program

The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) awards a $1.5 million research contract to the UCLA Natural Hazards Risk and Resiliency Research Center (NHR3) to establish a Seismic Geohazard Research Program. The three-year project will focus on advancing seismic hazard characterization, use of recorded earthquake ground motions in performance-based bridge seismic design, and improving the assessment of liquefaction hazard.  NHR3 is a multidisciplinary and multi-campus research center with headquarters at the Garrick Institute for the Risk Sciences, UCLA Samueli School of Engineering.

“Caltrans has been a key supporter of earthquake engineering research for a long time. We are very pleased that Caltrans has selected NHR3 to coordinate the Geohazard Research Program,” states project’s Principal Investigator, Yousef Bozorgnia, a UCLA Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director of NHR3. He also states, “The goal of the Geohazard Research Program is to address complex seismic hazard issues which are essential components for any seismic risk and reliability assessment of our infrastructure.”

Director of the Garrick Institute and UCLA’s Evalyn Knight Professor of Engineering, Ali Mosleh states, “This research initiative awarded by Caltrans, along with other major recent research projects funded by the CA Energy Commission and CA High-Speed Authority, establishes NHR3 as a major research hub of the seismic risk analysis of lifelines and infrastructure.”

For more information about the project and its progress please visit:  https://www.risksciences.ucla.edu/nhr3