Department of Civil Engineering
Indian Institute of Technology, Palakkad was established in the academic year 2015-16 and Civil Engineering (CE) has been part of the institute since its inception. Over the years, the discipline has developed in terms of academics, research, R & D projects, industry collaboration and laboratory development. The discipline integrates comprehensive areas including Building Materials and Construction Management, Environmental Engineering, Geotechnical Engineering, Transportation Engineering, Structural Engineering, Water Resources Engineering. The academic programmes include curriculum in B. Tech, M.S. and Ph.D. Recently, an M.Tech program was inaugurated in the area of Geotechnical Engineering. Civil Engineering discipline in IIT Palakkad accentuates the intense realization of fundamental principles, emphasizes on expanding the analytical ability and develops the practical sense to deal with the real-life problems in Civil Engineering. For more details...
The faculty in Civil Engineering come with academic training from various reputed institutes in India and abroad. The diverse background of the faculty helps to bring in different perspectives to teaching and research to the students in Civil Engineering.
Areas of Research
Building Materials: The research in Building materials and construction technology at IIT Palakkad is focussed on the development of sustainable and modern construction materials for building systems and its implementation. The research laboratory facilities developed are generic with respect to materials research and can be used for physical and mechanical characterization of all construction materials. The near future plan is focussed on developing a laboratory for durability testing with emphasis on concrete and corrosion. Some of the current work includes improving robustness characteristics of special concretes such as self-compacting concrete (SCC), design and prototype applications of fibre reinforced concrete (FRC) and improving the durability characteristics of textile reinforced concrete (TRC). Another recent area of research being pursued is the utilization of low grade clay in building materials including its classification as per usage potentia.
Faculty: Sunitha K Nayar
Environmental Engineering: Research in Environmental Engineering at IIT Palakkad broadly focuses on understanding physical, chemical, and biological processes in the environment, various water quality issues, process development of water and wastewater treatment system, and groundwater remediation.
Faculty: Dr. Praveena Gangadharan
Geotechnical Engineering: The geotechnical engineering group in IIT Palakkad is focused on areas like Reinforced Soil & Ground Improvement Techniques, Geosynthetics: Geotechnical and Geo-environmental applications, Green Geotechnics, Physical and numerical modelling in Geotechnical Engineering, Deep Foundations, Soil Stabilisation and Soil-Structure Interaction.
Faculty: Dr. Divya P.V., Dr. Rakesh J. Pillai, Dr. Sudheesh T. K.
Structural Engineering: The research potential includes the theoretical and experimental research related to the following areas: Buckling and post-buckling behaviour of steel structure, Concrete filled steel tubular (CFST) members, Reinforced, and prestressed concrete structures, Structural evaluation of deteriorating structures, Non-destructive testing and evaluation, Structural dynamics and Earthquake engineering with an emphasis on vibration control of structures, Passive, active and semi-active feedback control of structures, Nonlinear dynamic behaviour of structures and Sub structure shaking table test.
Faculty: Dr. Anil Kumar M. V .,Dr. Madhu Karthik M., Dr. Sanjukta Chakraborty, Dr. Gokulnath C
Transportation Engineering: Transportation engineering is the application of science and mathematics to enable safe and efficient transport of people and goods. The specific research areas in which the faculty at IIT Palakkad work are pavement materials, design, maintenance, and rehabilitation; pavement forensic evaluation; life cycle assessment; sustainable infrastructure; road network analysis, urban and regional transport planning, traffic engineering, transport safety etc.
Faculty: Prof. Tom V. Mathew, Dr. B. K. Bhavathrathan, Dr. C. V. Veena Venudharan
Water Resources Engineering: The research capabilities of Water Resources Engineering group include both simulation and field scale studies in the mentioned areas. Watershed management and developing best management practices using hydrologic models; ungauged basin predictions; groundwater and stream-aquifer interactions; climate and land use change projection and impact assessment on hydrology and water resources; quantification of uncertainty in regional scale climate change studies; forecasting and mitigation studies of hydro-climatic extremes such as droughts and floods; utilizing climate oscillation information for long term prediction and planning of water resources availability; exploring advanced statistical techniques for simulation and analysis of hydro-climatic datasets; teleconnection and impact analysis of large scale ocean atmospheric phenomena with food-water-energy nexus.
Faculty: Dr. Athira P., Dr. Sarmistha Singh, Dr. Subhasis Mitra
Construction Engineering and Management: The Construction Engineering and Management at IITPKD is involving in the research activities covering a wide range of topics related to Construction, such as in the areas of Building Information Modeling, Reality Modeling, Smart City, Technology Adoption, Policy Making, Innovative Infrastructure Procurement Systems such as IPD, PPP etc., The group has a laboratory with 3D Laser Scanner and Mixed Reality Environment, which offers high end workstation equipped with necessary software tools with potential to simulate and analyze various applications in Smart City and other Built Environment Systems.
Faculty: Dr.V. Senthilkumar
Programs
B.Tech in Civil Engineering: Civil Engineering is one of the four B.Tech disciplines that has been in existence in IIT Palakkad, since it opened its doors in August 2015. The faculty in Civil Engineering have academic training from various reputed institutes in India and abroad. The diverse background of the faculty helps to bring in different perspectives to teaching and research to the students in Civil Engineering.
M.Tech in Geotechnical Engineering: The major objective of the program is to train and prepare students for a career in Geotechnical Engineering in accordance with the current industrial needs. It is also intended that the programme develops a passion and a firm base for research at doctoral level. The program offers courses in various specialised areas of Geotechnical Engineering, such as soil mechanics, geotechnical investigation, foundation engineering, ground improvement techniques, environmental geotechnics, slope stabilisation, retaining structures, and soil dynamics, to name a few. The course work is broadly divided into core and elective courses. While the core courses are meant to provide a solid foundation to the M.Tech. students in Geotechnical Engineering, the elective courses offer the students the flexibility to choose courses that best suit their future career aspirations. The elective courses include advanced topics that are relevant to current industry requirements. The program has also been planned meticulously to have a good blend of theory and practice, wherein, in addition to the theory courses, students are exposed to experimental methods and the computational/modelling aspects of geotechnical analysis and design. The faculty in Geotechnical engineering specialization are Dr. Divya P. V., Dr. Rakesh J Pillai, Dr. Sudheesh T. K.
M.S. (by Research) and Ph.D: The different areas in which the research programs are offered include Structural Engineering, Geotechnical Engineering, Water Resources Engineering, Building Materials and Construction Management, Transportation Engineering and Environmental Engineering.
Teaching Labs
Large Infrastructure Testing Laboratory, Construction Material Testing Laboratory, Advanced Geotechnical Engineering Laboratory, Environmental Engineering Laboratory, Water Resources Engineering Laboratory
