Vipulanandan Cumarswamy

Cumaraswamy Vipulanandan is an endowed professor of civil and environmental engineering and has clearly demonstrated his skills over the past 40 years with experiments at the laboratory level and in the field with real-time monitoring systems and also developed analytical models that are being used around the world. He is the Director of the Center for Innovative Grouting Materials and Technology (CIGMAT) and the Texas Hurricane Center for Innovative Technology (THC-IT) at the University of Houston. He was the Department chairman from 2001 to 2009. 
==Education ==
In 1984, Cumaraswamy Vipulanandan completed his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering with a GPA of 4.0 from Northwestern University. Prior to that, in 1981, he obtained his M.S. in Civil Engineering with a GPA of 4.0 from the same university. His B.Sc. in Civil Engineering, with a First Class distinction, was earned from the University of Moratuwa in Sri Lanka in 1980.
==Research==
After the Macondo oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in the year 2010, the worst in the U.S. history, the Department of Energy (DOE) funded the project with $2.6 million to develop the smart cement which was developed and tested in the laboratory and also a smart cemented field well with the monitoring is ongoing for over seven years very successfully. 
==Patents==
He was the Inventor of Smart Cement with an integrated Real-Time Monitoring System (chemo-thermo-piezoresistive highly sensing U.S. Patent 10,481,143). The smart cement can be made from any type of cement and is a 3-dimensional bulk sensor (3D) with less than 0.1% carbon fibers making it a very cost-effective material (no buried sensors or no nanoparticles) and it can detect stress changes, cracks, gas leaks, dynamic loading, and earthquakes. The smart cement piezoresistivity strain (new monitoring parameter) is over 1,000 times (100, 000%) higher than the failure strain of cement. There are several publications in the Journals (ASCE, ASTM, JPSE) and Conferences (OTC, AADE). 
In 2020, he also developed a new nondestructive two-probe electrical method, “Corrosion Detection and Quantification of Surface and Bulk Corrosion and Erosion in Metals and Non-Metallic Materials with Integrated Monitoring System” (U.S. Patent 10,690, 586).
==Models==
Several analytical models were developed by him, including the following:
The Vipulanandan Rheological Model, which imposes a limit on the maximum shear stress and strain rate for shear thinning and shear thickening fluids. While over 10 models exist in literature, including the Newtonian model with no shear stress limit for shear thinning fluid, the Vipulanandan model is widely used and cited in journal publications around the world (as evidenced by Web of Science results).
The Vipulanandan Failure Model, which sets a limit on the maximum shear stress or strength for a variety of materials such as soils, rocks, grouted soils, cement, and concrete. This model is an improvement over the Mohr-Coulomb Model and Drucker-Prage Model, which do not have shear strength limits. Like the Rheological Model, the Vipulanandan Failure Model is also widely used and cited in journal publications.
The Vipulanandan Fluid Flow Model, which limits the maximum discharge per unit area or velocity for porous media for both liquids and gases. This model improves upon Darcy's Model, which has no discharge limit for materials. High pressures can modify porous materials, while pressure can also affect the density of liquids and gases.
The Vipulanandan Fluid Loss Model, which imposes a limit on the fluid loss from cement slurries and drilling muds. This model improves upon the API Model (American Petroleum Institute).
The Vipulanandan Curing Model, which uses resistivity as the parameter for cement and concrete.
The Vipulanandan p-q Stress-Strain Model, which applies to soils, cements, and concretes.
The Vipulanandan p-q Stress-Piezoresistive Strain Model, which applies to chemo-thermo-piezoresistive smart cement.
==Awards and honors==
He was a Principal Investigator or Co-Principal Investigator for 80 funded projects by DOT, NSF. NCHRP, EPA, TATRP (Texas Advanced Technology Research Program), TxDOT, THWRC (Texas Hazardous Waste Research Center), City of Houston, TCSUH and several construction industries and Oil and gas industries amounting to over $13 million dollars. Graduated 35 Ph.D. and 90 M.S. students with thesis.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) funded him to commercialize the smart cement and a new company (Sensytec) is marketing it with also real-time monitoring of concrete curing by measuring the resistivity (new idea from smart cement research) and temperature with wireless transmission of the data. Also a new book has been published on Smart Cement: Development, Testing, Modeling and Real-Time Monitoring (440 pages).
Category:Northwestern University alumni
Category:Professors
Category:Director