The Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics has access to some of the greatest engineering projects and companies in the world, here in NYC. Developing novel ways to monitor the safety of suspension bridges using sensors. Determining the effectiveness and efficiency of green roofs. Designing new building materials that have superior strength and at the same time are environmentally friendly and compatible with sustainable development. Defining the state-of-the-art in analyzing and designing structures using computers. Our department identifies emerging issues in the complex interactions between the built and natural environment.

The Carleton Strength of Materials Laboratory recently tested brick structures made from innovative 100% organic biomaterial for a project by Assistant Professor David Benjamin of Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation. This collaborative effort resulted in data essential to the design process and implementation of Hy-Fi—the winner of the Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1’s 15th annual Young Architects Program.

For the National Building Museum in Washington DC, Columbia Engineering runs a crush test on a prototype of “Hive,” an interactive installation that is part of a series of temporary structures inside the museum’s historic Great Hall. Civil Engineering's Carleton Lab worked with architects Studio Gang to measure the carrying capacity of an assembly of three 10-foot cardboard tubes interlocked with three 4’10” tubes — which topped out at nearly 15 feet. After building and placing the structure in the lab’s Southwark Emery Universal Testing Machine, the team put the structural limits of both the connections and tubes to the test.

Learn what makes Columbia Engineering's MS programs in civil engineering and engineering mechanics special, and find out how the curriculum is designed to suit each student's professional goals.