News

Utility Members and CE112 Students Visit CSI

On the vibrant day of October 17th, the Center for Smart Infrastructure (CSI) labwelcomed members from Pacific, Nor-Cal, and Western TAG utilities, as well asenthusiastic students from CE112 – Water & Wastewater Systems Design andOperation on October 19th. During these visits, we performed tension tests on 8-inchiPVC pipes, incorporating fiber optic sensors. The pipes were subjected to testing until anotable failure and water leakage were… Read More »Utility Members and CE112 Students Visit CSI

ASCE New Technology Project of the Year

The New Technology Project of the Year award was presented for the EBMUD Summit Pressure Zone South Pipeline Replacement, Phase 1 project (EBMUD – Claremont Ave Pipeline Monitoring – Oakland, California) by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), San Francisco section. This award recognizes projects which advance more efficient and sustainable civil infrastructure through innovation and advancement in technology such as implementation of new methods and… Read More »ASCE New Technology Project of the Year

Marin Community Workshop of Smart and Connected Communities Project

The members of the Smart and Connected Communities Project hosted the Marin Community Workshop at the College of Marin, Kentfield Campus on October 26, 2023. In this workshop, we shared updates on the simulations related to wildfires and evacuations, findings from interviews, and initial directions for the games.

Pengshun’s Presentation at the 2023 INFORMS Annual Meeting

Pengshun, a Ph.D. student at the SRG, presented at the 2023 INFORMS Annual Meeting held on October 15-18, 2023, at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix. His presentation was entitled “Spatial-queue Based Mesoscopic Traffic Model and its Applications in Wildfire Evacuation Simulations”. To capture highly dynamic traffic situations, efficient mesoscopic models can deliver comprehensive yet fast results. Therefore, in this work, Bingyu and Pengshun developed… Read More »Pengshun’s Presentation at the 2023 INFORMS Annual Meeting

Model Bridge Tests for CE 170A: Infrastructure Sensing and Modeling (Fall 2023)

Students of CE 170A (Infrastructure Sensing and Modeling, taught by Professor Soga, Professor Kayen, and Professor Zekkos) had a lot of fun on September 6th. Model bridge tests were conducted as part of the Infrastructure Sensing module of the course, led by Connor and Shih-Hung. Three different bridges (control, member defect, connection defect) were instrumented with distributed fiber optic sensors, linear variable differential transformers (LVDTs),… Read More »Model Bridge Tests for CE 170A: Infrastructure Sensing and Modeling (Fall 2023)

Using fiber optic sensing to assess cast-in-steel-shell concrete piles

The Soga Research Group/Center for Smart Infrastructure, in partnership with Caltrans, is employing distributed fiber optic sensing and pore pressure transducers to monitor the geotechnical capacity of Cast-in-Steel-Shell (CISS) concrete piles in relation to soil plug thickness. This research seeks to analyze data across different construction phases, aiming to gain insights into this correlation and its comparison to conventional design practices. The study employs field… Read More »Using fiber optic sensing to assess cast-in-steel-shell concrete piles

USDOT – Distributed fiber optic sensing of pipelines affected by fault crossing and landslide

The Soga Research Group secured funding from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) to create a distributed monitoring system designed for steel pipelines transporting hydrocarbons through geohazard-prone areas. This innovative system has been implemented on a substantial PG&E steel pipeline, responsible for transporting natural gas across regions susceptible to potential faulting (the Calaveras Fault), and land sliding zones in Gilroy, CA. The installation… Read More »USDOT – Distributed fiber optic sensing of pipelines affected by fault crossing and landslide

Geothermal-based Optimized Energy System (GOES) Workshop

Soga Research Group (SRG) collaborated with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) to host the second workshop of the GOES project at the Berkeley campus from September 25 to 27, 2023. Participating research teams from various countries presented updates on a range of topics, such as the full-physics modeling framework, city-scale geothermal modeling, underground coupling, and the Platform-Based Design (PBD) framework. Notably, SRG showcased its ongoing… Read More »Geothermal-based Optimized Energy System (GOES) Workshop

Learning from the Ground Up (LeGUp)

In Framingham, MA, a pioneering “Networked Geothermal” project is underway to explore the potential of shallow geothermal for district heating and cooling, aiming to lower carbon emissions. During 2022 and 2023, SRG carried out four distributed thermal response tests to evaluate the geothermal capabilities of the site. Presently, SRG is collaborating with HEET to design and install a distributed fiber optic sensing (DFOS) system in… Read More »Learning from the Ground Up (LeGUp)

Deformation Monitoring of Tunnel using Phase-based Motion Magnification and Optical Flow

During construction, continuous monitoring of underground tunnels can mitigate potential hazards and facilitate an in-depth understanding of the ground-tunnel interaction behavior. Traditional vision-based monitoring can directly capture an extensive range of motion but cannot separate the tunnel’s vibration and deformation mode. Phase-based motion magnification (PMM) is one of the techniques to magnify the motion in target frequency bands and identify system dynamics. Optical flow (OF)… Read More »Deformation Monitoring of Tunnel using Phase-based Motion Magnification and Optical Flow