Majed Karam (CivE MASc 2T0) won first place at the American Concrete Institute’s poster competition with Assessing the Differential Fluid-Penetration Resistance in the Concrete Cover Through Formation Factor Mapping. Karam presented his poster during the ACI 123 Concrete Research Poster Session at the Fall 2020 ACI Virtual Convention.
Currently, Karam is working in Dubai, United Arab Emirates as Concrete materials & NDT engineer at e.construct.
Here is some info regarding the poster:
Event: American Concrete Institute Fall Convention- Session: Research in Progress (a session where research in progress is presented, not a formal competition)
- Link to the ACI website with the virtual “award ceremony”: https://concrete.org/news/newsdetail.aspx?f=51729362
- Goal of research work: There is a lack of rapid test methods for accurately assessing the impact of curing on the differential hydration through the depth of the concrete cover as well as the impact on chloride penetration resistance. In the absence of adequate performance assessment tools, prescriptive curing specifications have been adopted for concretes exposed to chlorides and other exposures. There is a desire to switch to a performance specification for curing, particularly by the precast concrete industry, that could be used to assess the impact of using of accelerated heat curing methods widely used to obtain high early-strength gain and maturity. The work presented presents an electrical-impedance-based approach forquantifying curing effects in the concrete cover. The analytical formulations and experimental validations lay the ground for a potential real-time concrete production optimization tool.
