Funding Available for Two Graduate Students at Texas A&M University at Galveston

Two half-time Graduate Research Assistantships are available in the areas of 1) Offshore Engineering, which will focus on offshore wind turbines, under the direction of  Dr Bert Sweetman, and 2) Coastal Engineering, which will focus on salt marsh erosion, under the direction of Dr Tom Ravens. Students beginning their Doctoral studies are preferred, though exceptionally well qualified Master’s students will be considered.

Texas A&M at Galveston is the Ocean arm of Texas A&M University.  Graduate students will begin their research at the Galveston Campus, then relocate to the College Station campus for their course work in the Civil Engineering Department.  After completion of required coursework, the students will return to Galveston to complete their engineering research.   PhD students generally require either two or three full-time semesters in College Station to complete required course work.

The successful applicant to the Offshore Engineering position will work predominantly on irregular loading on offshore wind turbine support structures.  The specific areas to be addressed are: characterization of the wave environment, wave forces acting on the structure, characterization of the wind environment, correlation between the wind and waves, and the dynamic structural response to these loadings. Most of this work is relevant to any near-shore structure.  The research plan combines several disciplines: offshore and near-shore engineering, wind engineering, hydrodynamics, aerodynamics, structural dynamics, applied probability and statistics, and structural reliability.

The successful applicant to the Coastal Engineering position will assist with the development of current, wave and sediment transport models.   These models will be calibrated using field data and applied to understand the environmental processes responsible for marsh erosion. Model application will focus on specific eroding marshes and design remedies such as wave redirection.

Interested students should submit curriculum vitae, college transcripts and a brief essay describing their background and interest the subject research area.  These materials should be mailed directly to Dr Sweetman for the Offshore position and to Dr Ravens for the Coastal Position at 200 Seawolf Parkway, Galveston, Texas 77553.  Additional information is available by email: Sweetman@tamu.edu or RavensT@tamug.edu .