Duke University 2009-2010 - Office of the Registrar - Duke University

targets; cryostats, superconducting magnets, and associated equipment for research in condensed matter physics; a
scanning electron microscope with electron beam lithographic capability and other materials processing equipment is
housed in the Shared Materials Instrumentation Facility (SMIF); several computers for data collection and
processing in all of the research groups; a massively parallel computer system for particle, nuclear, and condensed
matter theory; desktop computers are typically provided for all grad students.
The Physics Building is located near Bostock Library, which contains a large selection of books and scholarly
periodicals. Located in the Physics Building are an appropriately staffed instrument shop and information technology
support staff.
Engineering Research Laboratories. The laboratories of the four departments of the Pratt School of Engineering
contain extensive state-of-the-art equipment that may be used in several specialized fields. With the Fall 2004 opening
of the Fitzpatrick Center for Interdisciplinary Engineering, Medicine and Applied Science (FCIEMAS), an extensive
new infrastructure exists for interdisciplinary laboratory and teaching activities. Departmental facilities already present
in Hudson Hall are now complemented by extensive new infrastructure facilitating interaction involving all Pratt
departments and research centers and also working in close proximity to units from medicine and the sciences. Facilities
available for instruction and research are suggested by the following representative listing of equipment found in each
department:
Biomedical Engineering. Biomechanics laboratories: hydraulic testing system, IBM PS/2 microcomputer, micro
VAX II computer, optical displacement measuring system, silicon graphics/GE graphcon system, Sun micro systems
SPARC station, Zonic modal analyzer. Biomedical materials and surface interactions laboratories: air- and water-cooled
Argon lasers, air convection oven, capillary rheometer, FTIR infrared spectrometer, gamma counter, gel permeation
chromatograph, Langmuir-Blodgett trough, liquid nitrogen cooled CCD camera, Nikon inverted microscope with phase
contrast and epifluorescency, Ultimage image analysis system and Macintosh II, vacuum oven, Zeiss axioplun
microscope, electrophysiology and neurophysiology instrumentation. Ultrasound imaging and transducer laboratories;
CAD/CAM stations for circuit development, diamond tip dicing saw, high-speed video system, image processing
system, laminar flow hood, multiple PCs and work station, PC board maker, ultrasound mechanical scanner, VAX 11/
780.
Civil and Environmental Engineering. Faculty in Civil and Environmental Engineering routinely design, construct,
and adapt laboratory equipment for specialized teaching and research tasks in engineering mechanics, environmental
engineering, geomechanics, structural engineering, and water resources engineering. In addition, arrays of standard
laboratory facilities are available to support each research area.
Research and teaching facilities in engineering mechanics, structural engineering, and geomechanics include
four independent closed-loop electrohydraulic dynamic loading systems (MTS), with a frequency range up to 100 Hz,
and ranges of load to capacity 6,000, 35,000, 50,000 and 220,000 lbs. The 6,000 lbs. actuator can develop a constant
crosshead speed up to 50,000 in./min. For teaching and research, the department has a 10,000 lb. universal testing
machine and a 10,000 lb. torsion machine both fully instrumented with computer data storage, as well as a Kistler
force plate with 10 decades of sensitivity. Equipment is available for fabricating specimens and testing fiberreinforced
polymer composites. An environmental chamber tests in the temperature range of -100º to +350º F;
equipment for spectral and modal dynamic analysis, and an ultra-high pressure triaxial shear apparatus is available
for confining pressures up to 100,000 psi. Rock-testing facilities, model-testing equipment for anchored walls and
penetrometer studies, a large-aperture research polariscope, a reflective photoelastic polariscope, and a sustainedloading
facility for long duration in studies of prestressed concrete are routinely used in teaching and research
procedures.
Research and teaching facilities in environmental engineering include wet and dry laboratories equipped to study
a range of physical, chemical, and biological processes. A fully integrated resource recovery pilot plant, calorimetry
for the measurement of heat values of secondary fuels, air classifiers interfaced with computer monitors, as well as
indoor and outdoor water resources monitoring devices including flumes, Venturi meters, and digital computation
hardware are available. The biotechnology and physical-chemical laboratories are equipped with autoclaves, a media
preparation room, walk-in environmental rooms, numerous fume hoods, a biohazard containment facility for
cultivation of genetically engineered microorganisms, fully instrumented bioreactors with online control, and various
analytical instrumentation including liquid scintillation counting, autoradiography, atomic adsorption spectroscopy,
total carbon analysis to ppb levels, gas chromatographs equipped with ECO, FID, and TCD detectors, HPLCs,
computer-assisted image analysis microscopes, and a recently acquired fourier transfer infrared spectrometer facility.
Computer resources available to Civil and Environmental Engineering students include a multitude of personal
computers distributed through departmental research facilities. Additionally, the department houses and maintains its
own computing facility, providing UNIX workstations and IBM-compatible PC’s. This particular facility is dedicated
to graduate student research and special undergraduate projects. Most of the computer resources are networked with
the Pratt School of Engineering’s ethernet backbone and are easily accessible from several locations in the
department and across the campus. Depending on the specific application, students can successfully investigate
problems in computational fluid and solid mechanics, rigid-body dynamics, particle and mathematical optimization
as well as transportation and environmental systems engineering research topics. Several BEOWOLF computing
Resources for Study 240