CEE doctoral candidate Alejandro Martinez has been tapped to receive an academic scholarship from Anchor QEA, a Seattle-based environmental science and engineering firm that focuses on shoreline and river projects.
A native of Mexico, Martinez expects to earn his doctorate in geotechnical engineering in the spring of 2015. His advisor is Dr. David Frost.
Martinez was recently elected president of the Georgia Tech chapter of the Geotechnical Society and has been recognized with other honors since coming to Georgia Tech, including the 2012 Master’s Tower Award, and the James S. Lai Outstanding Master’s Student Award.
Martinez earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Texas. At Georgia Tech, his research focuses on the in-situ characterization of geomaterials, with an emphasis on developing new modules for the Cone Penetration Test (CPT)
“My research focuses on improving the ability to accurately and efficiently characterize the behavior of marginal soils. A series of modified modules for CPT exploit the opportunity for site characterization improvement by providing useful and high quality-information regarding the soil’s frictional, mechanical and hydraulic characteristics in a single sounding during field testing. Improving the design of maritime infrastructure will be possible by means of a new and robust capacity prediction model for deep foundations, a new modified module for CPT with improved sensing capabilities and the study of the behavior of these soils under dynamic loading."