New CCLab member

Niloufar Vahedi completed her Master degree in 2015 at the University of Tehran, Iran. Niloufar has joined the CCLab for her PhD, in which she will work on the SNSF project entitled “Composite Sandwich Bridge Decks on Fire”.

In bridge construction, the use of fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) sandwich decks with complex core assemblies may result in durable and economic solutions. However, this new type of sandwich bridge decks has to meet the same requirements as traditional concrete decks do. In particular, their behavior during a fire incident has to be known and predictable. Although fire is an accidental action according to Eurocodes, it has to be taken into account in the design of bridges and should not lead to a premature collapse. The knowledge about the combined thermo-mechanical behavior during a fire of these new sandwich decks is therefore crucial, in particular since the polymer matrix of the FRP material and the Balsa core are sensitive to high temperatures and combustible.