Oleg Shiryayev, Ph.D., assistant professor of mechanical engineering in UAA’s College
of Engineering has developed a solution to prevent corrosion on North Slope pipes.
Shiryayev’s core concept is to use a combination of fiber optic strain sensors and
a magnetostrictive material, such as an alloy called terfenol-d, to monitor the magnetic
flux that leaks out of a pipe as its walls becomes thinner due to corrosion or other
forms of damage. Magnetostrictive materials are any substance that can be mechanically
deformed by the presence of an external magnetic field. Magnetic flux is a measurement
of the total magnetic field passing through a given area.
To put this another way, Shiryayev’s fiber optic sensors report any deformities that
happen to the magnetostrictive materials. Those deformities can only happen if a pipe
is damaged enough that its magnetic field is leaking. For an undamaged pipe, its magnetic
field remains almost entirely inside the pipe wall. If the terfenol-d (or other magnetostrictive
material) is stretched even a tiny bit, the fiber optic strain sensors will alert
technicians, letting them know that it’s time to give that section of pipe a closer
inspection, and maybe even replace it.
CONTACT: Joe Selmont
UAA’s School of Education (SOE) has been hitting the proverbial reset button for the
last four years. With the announcement of the B.A. in early childhood education (ECE),
the Council for the Accreditation of Education Preparation (CAEP) granting accreditation
at the advanced level in 2021 and the recent hire of Tonia Dousay, Ph.D., to serve
as SOE dean, the university’s education program is hitting its stride. She was hired in July 2022.
Dousay spent much of the fall semester relationship-building and surveying faculty
and staff to see what holes needed to be filled. She also initiated one-on-one meetings
with educational stakeholders from school districts and programs across the state
to learn more about educator workforce needs in Alaska. Her boots-on-the-ground approach
paid off with renewed enthusiasm and partnerships with SOE.
Within the next four years, Dousay is hopeful that CAEP will reinstate the lost accreditation
licenses. She said SOE is currently going through the process to provide state and
federal agencies with the correct data and paperwork needed to reinstate those licenses.
To put it simply, SOE needs to go back and check all the correct boxes, and once that
process is complete, she is fully confident that licensing will not be an issue going
forward.
With new programs, partnerships and a new dean willing to roll up her sleeves and
keep a “door is always open” policy, UAA’s SOE is back on track and looking forward
to welcoming Alaska’s future educators back to their programs.
CONTACT: Catalina Myers
|
