ASCE has honored Wenpeng Wu, Ph.D.; Jialong He; Lifeng Li; and Huihui Li with the 2025 Raymond C. Reese Research Prize for the paper “Numerical Simulations of Abutment PRB Structures with Post-Tensioned Unbonded Prestressing Tendons for Highway Bridges under Horizontal Seismic Loads,” Journal of Bridge Engineering, August 2024.
Conventional sacrificial concrete retaining blocks (CRBs) play a significant role in reducing the excessive transverse displacements of bridge superstructures and protecting the substructures from severe damage during seismic events. However, rehabilitating these CRBs after earthquakes is very difficult. There have been problems and uncertainty around methodologies proposed by previous studies. Subsequently, to fully utilize the mechanical merits of ultrahigh-performance concrete (UHPC), this paper proposes that the modified abutment UHPC-PRB structures and their hysteretic behavior and damage modes are compared with those of the original ones through numerical simulations and available test results in the literature.
The Raymond C. Reese Research Prize is awarded to the author or authors of a paper that describes a notable achievement in research related to structural engineering.
