UIUC Alumni Spotlight: Erwin Kohler, PhD 2005

Erwin Kohler remembers his time at UIUC fondly, especially the drives out to ATREL. "During some of those trips, while driving and thinking about my research, I solved some of the problems and had some 'eureka' moments (probably not enough of those, but the ones I had were good!)" he says.

Erwin currently uses the skills he learned at UIUC and ATREL to conduct pavement engineering research for Dynatest Consulting, Inc. His areas of expertise are concrete pavement design and construction, accelerated load tests, and pavement surface characteristics. To stay informed of what is happening in his field, he has to read a lot, design and carry out experiments, and publish his results so that others can use them. Most of the research he does is through the University of California Pavement Research Center, to which Dynatest has been a consultant since 1993. His favorite part of pavement engineering is the combination of deskwork and field work. "I really like being literally 'on the road,' looking at good and bad pavements to figure out what we need to do better. People everywhere need good road infrastructure, and I'm happy that the work I do serves to improve the quality of these pavements."

Besides those trips to ATREL, another aspect Erwin appreciates about his UIUC experience was how close the professors were to the students. "As a student, one could always approach any professor in transportation facilities and get advice. I loved the fact that they always made themselves available to talk with grad students."

Erwin worked with Professor Jeff Roesler at UIUC on testing different designs of Continuously Reinforced Concrete Pavements (CRCP). He remembers, "We built ten test sections and loaded five of them with the ATLAS machine (from 2002 to the end of 2004). For my doctoral disertation I used data gathered from those sections on crack width in CRCP, and the results of the overall test were implemented by IDOT in the design of the Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago."

Erwin has worked at Dynatest since January 2008. Prior to that, he was a project scientist at the University of California at Davis. He still lives and works in Davis, where he says, "The weather is much nicer that in central Illinois, which allows for a lot of outdoor activities for the most part of the year. That is something that my wife and our three kids really appreciate."