NHERI Network Coordination Office

Composition of the TTC

The TTC is appointed by the NHERI Council and will be composed of leaders in the engineering community with expertise in the behavior, design and construction practices using a diverse range of building materials and technical expertise. An ex officio member from the NHERI Network Coordination Office (NCO) Strategic Committee will be appointed to keep the NCO leadership apprised of committee progress and coordinate any needs of the committee with the rest of the natural hazard community. The User Forum (UF) will appoint one of its members to the TTC. The rest of the committee will consist of an additional 15-20 members with 2-year terms, with the opportunity of re-appointment by the NHERI Council. The TTC members will be selected from the following design communities with the intent of representing as many as practical:

1. Earthquake and tsunami
2. Wind
3. Coastal Engineering
4. Concrete design and construction
5. Masonry design and construction
6. Wood design and construction
7. Stone design and construction
8. Geotechnical design and construction
9. Architectural (building envelope)
10. Lifeline infrastructure (electric power, communications, water, wastewater, gas and liquid fuel, and transportation systems and components [including roads, bridges, railroads, and harbors])
11. Social sciences and policy

Organization

The committee will be led by a chair, initially a representative of the NCO Strategic Committee. Subsequent chairs will be elected from within the committee although a representative of the NCO Strategic Committee will always be on the committee. The committee will form four interest groups: Earthquake, Wind, Tsunami/Storm surge, and Geotechnical. Committee members may serve on several of these interest groups. Each interest group will have a leader, selected by the committee chair. The committee chair and the four interest group leaders will form an executive committee that will facilitate organized and coordinated reviews of NHERI research by the committee members.

Current Membership

• DeeDee Bennett (Social Science)
• David Bonowitz, SE (Earthquake, Wind)
• Graham Brasic (Flood, Wind)
• Joe Cibor, PE (Tsunami/Surge, Geotechnical)
• Kelly Cobeen, SE (Earthquake, Wind)
• Jim Harris (Wind, Geotechnical)
• Cherylyn Henry (Wind)
• William T Holmes, SE (Earthquake)
• Insung Kim, SE (Earthquake)
• Steve Kramer (Geotechnical)
• Phil Line (Earthquake, Wind, Tsunami/Surge)
• James O Malley, SE (Earthquake)
• Bonnie Manley (earthquake, wind, steel)
• Chris Rojahn (general)
• Seth Thomas, SE (Earthquake, Tsunami)
• Mike Valley, SE (Earthquake)

Questions? Comments?

If you have feedback for the Technology Transfer Committee or would like to contact them for any reason, the committee can be reached via the email address;

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Review Process

The primary objective of the TTC will be to identify key research projects that have been completed in recent years in the broad subject areas of wind, surge, tsunami, inundation, and earthquake that could lead to new design, construction, or assessment guidelines and/or standards that will reduce the risk to civil infrastructure.

Ongoing (or completed) NHERI research projects will be assigned to the appropriate TTC interest group or groups by the executive committee. Publicly available descriptions of the research will be reviewed to judge the potential for implementable findings. Since the direction and detail of many research projects could change during the life of the project, ongoing review may be necessary by following the Experimental Facility website, and reviewing papers or reports.

When appropriate, promising results or conclusions will be described by the interest group in an Initial Review Report (IRR) (e.g. one page), to include the site and Principal Investigator, the general nature of the project, the specific conclusions or finding that may be implementable and the logical group or committee that would interested in implementation. It is not anticipated that direct contact with the researcher will be made at this review level.

Twice a year (or more frequently if justified) the IRRs will be reviewed by the whole committee to decide 1) if the researcher should be contacted for further information or clarification, 2) if the research conclusions/findings should be forwarded to the appropriate implementers, and 3) the nature and extent of the material to be forwarded. These review efforts will be managed and coordinated by the TTC Executive Committee.

Other Activities

Other activities related to strengthening ties between NHERI researchers and the broader user committee will be identified and prioritized by the committee. These activities could include:

• Determining appropriate topics for webinars to the community and proposing day-long, by invitation, web-based workshops (or in-person workshop with support of the NHERI Council) with the purpose of reviewing the results of key projects,
• If requested, the TTC could review newly-awarded or ongoing projects to advise investigators on how the results of the project can be more-easily implemented into practice. This advice may include suggestions for new/revised experimental parameters, additional simulations, key presentation venues, etc. Such reviews could also be made pre-submittal.
• The TTC could also establish a database of practitioners willing to participate as industry partners on research projects. This database would be available for researchers wanting to include a qualified practitioner in their research proposal team. In this way, the TTC may become a critical resource for natural hazard researchers, especially for early-career faculty with less experience implementing research results into practice.