The School of Engineering at the Cochin University of Science and Technology is providing an opportunity to aspirants who would like to step up their skills in geotechnical engineering.
It has come up with an M.Tech in Geotechnical Engineering to equip the students develop the skills required and to produce engineers with good understanding who can take up this challenging profession with confidence.
“Geotechnical engineering is one of the specialisations within civil engineering that involves investigating and understanding what lies beneath the ground’s surface and it is concerned with the soil and rock that support civil engineering systems,” said P. S. Sreejith, Principal of the School of Engineering.
Stating that geotechnical engineering is a discipline literally supporting all major architectural marvels, Dr. Sreejith said that skyscrapers would crumble into rubble without a solid foundation obtained through geotechnical engineering principles.
“Concepts in geology, mechanics, hydraulics and material science become important as geotechnical engineers examine project requirements, investigate project sites, assess risks and design foundations. Geotechnical engineers design and build foundations, excavations and slopes,” he said.
Dr. Sreejith said that the prospects of geotechnical engineers are very good, as every construction project involves foundation work.
Key activities
“The work of a geotechnical engineer includes five key activities: research into existing information, ground investigation (gathering new data), interpretation (understanding new data), analysis and design, and finally construction (or remediation).Geotechnical engineers require a wide variety of skills and, in general, need to be smarter than other kinds of engineer.
Whereas most engineers have the luxury of specifying the materials they use, the geotechnical engineer has no choice but to work with the natural soil and rock as he or she finds it,” he said.
Specific course topics included as part of the M. Tech programme include advanced soil mechanics, soil behaviour, soil dynamics and machine foundations, deep and shallow foundations, support systems for excavation, ground improvement techniques, stability of slopes and site investigation, computational techniques, earthquake geotechnical engineering, environmental geotechnical engineering, soil structural interaction, reinforced earth, geosynthetics etc.
More details can be had from www.cusat.ac.in.
Keywords: geotechnical engineering, M.Tech, post graduation, Cochin University
