The University of Sheffield
Department of Civil and Structural Engineering

Academic Competition Winners

Vulcan Wins Two National Software Awards

Recipients of two British Computer Society Awards

Members of the Structural Fire Engineering Research Group were the delighted recipients of two awards by the British Computer Society. At the Annual Awards Dinner the group won first the Technology Applications category and then the BT Innovation Flagship Award for Technology for their Vulcan Software.
Vulcan software has been developed by Dr Zhaohui Huang of the Structural Fire Engineering Research Group and Dr Paul Shepherd of Buro Happold Ltd.

Structural Fire Engineering Research Group

IStructE Sir Arnold Waters Medal

Jon Carr (SKM Anthony Hunt Associates) and Dr Paul Reynolds have been awarded the IStructE Sir Arnold Waters Medal for a joint presentation given on the Hull Kingston Communications Stadium during an evening meeting here at Sheffield. The award is made every year for the best paper presented at a branch meeting.

They collected the award during the sessional awards lunch on 8 June 2005.

Raymond C Reese Award for Research

Dr Zhaohui Huang and Profs Ian Burgess and Roger Plank won this annual prize for the best research paper in the American Society of Civil Engineers Journal of Structural Engineering.

The winning pair of companion papers were on some developments to modelling of the behaviour of composite buildings (which includes most reasonably modern multi-storey steel- concrete buildings) in fire conditions.

The software Vulcan which was developed in the course of this research is now about to be marketed commercially by a university spin-off company called Vulcan Solutions.

Zhaohui Huang and Roger Plank collected their certificates and plaques at what Roger describes as an Oscar Ceremony (Presentation Dinner) in New York in April at the ASCE Annual Congress.

Prof Roger Plank and Dr Huang receiving their awards in New York

The prize winning papers were: