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8/22/2025
The Penn State Advanced Vehicle Team (AVT) took home multiple wins, including fourth place overall, in its fourth year of the AutoDrive Challenge II, which took place June 1-7 at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Sponsored by SAE International and General Motors, the competition tasks student teams with developing and testing a fully autonomous passenger vehicle on a controlled urban driving course.
8/7/2025
Eric Donnell, senior associate dean of the Penn State College of Engineering and professor of civil and environmental engineering, and his collaborators at Penn State used a large data set of Pennsylvania crash statistics and roadway features taken from all state-owned, rural roads to compare the safety performance of roadway segments with passing zones to stretches without marked passing zones. Their analysis revealed 11% fewer total crashes, and 12% fewer crashes leading to significant injury or fatalities on sections of rural highway marked as passing zones compared to sections of road marked as no passing.
7/22/2025
Vikash Gayah, professor of civil and environmental engineering in the Penn State College of Engineering, has been named director of the Thomas D. Larson Pennsylvania Transportation Institute, effective July 1. He has served as interim director of the institute since 2023 and his involvement with the institute extends to when he was first hired as assistant professor of CEE in 2012.
7/2/2025
The Penn State Engineering Alumni Society (PSEAS) held its annual awards ceremony on June 20 at the State Theatre, building on its 53-year tradition of honoring excellence among engineering faculty, staff and alumni through the PSEAS awards. The award recipients were recognized in the categories of teaching, research, advising and service.
5/20/2025
Putting their classroom engineering skills to a practical test, a group of undergraduates designed, built and are currently testing a single-seat, open-cockpit racecar to prepare for the annual Formula SAE Electric competition, which will take place from June 17-21 at the Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn, Michigan.
4/10/2025
A rainy day in 1990 helped spark Pennsylvania’s dirt and gravel road maintenance program, aimed at protecting water quality by reducing sediment runoff from unpaved roads. What began as a concern among trout fishermen has grown into a nationally recognized environmental effort, balancing rural transportation needs with ecological preservation.
4/10/2025
A rainy day in 1990 helped spark Pennsylvania’s dirt and gravel road maintenance program, aimed at protecting water quality by reducing sediment runoff from unpaved roads. What began as a concern among trout fishermen has grown into a nationally recognized environmental effort, balancing rural transportation needs with ecological preservation.
3/24/2025
The Penn State College of Engineering’s Office of Corporate and Industry Engagement
invites engineering faculty to I-CONNECT: Intellectual Property and Innovation. The event will take place virtually and on campus at 504 Engineering Collaborative Research and Education
Building (ECoRE) from 12:30 – 2 p.m. ET on April 2.
1/6/2025
On Dec. 11-13, transportation professionals from around the country gathered at the Penn Stater Hotel & Conference Center for the 30th anniversary of the Thomas D. Larson Pennsylvania Transportation Institute’s biggest event, the Transportation Engineering and Safety Conference (TESC).
12/19/2024
Due to its massive scale of production, concrete’s environmental impact is significant: It
accounts for 8% of the globe’s total annual carbon dioxide emissions. In the Penn State
College of Engineering, researchers are working to make a dent in that number
through innovations in manufacturing and carbon capture and storage.
11/22/2024
Since 2001, the Penn State Center for Dirt and Gravel Road Studies, housed in the Larson Transportation Institute in the College of Engineering, has worked to reduce the environmental impact of dirt and gravel roads and undersized bridges and culverts. Most recently, the research center worked with the U.S. Forest Service to develop a standard to replace stream crossings in Pennsylvania. The first few stream crossings designed with this new standard were recently completed.
