What Do Civil & Environmental Engineers Do?

Our standard of living depends on our civil infrastructure, a sophisticated system of buildings, bridges, dams, airports, transportation networks, water and power distribution systems, and environmental protection systems.

Civil and environmental engineers are responsible for designing, maintaining and enhancing our civil infrastructure. They help to sustain the living standards and quality of life of the population. Civil engineers are also master builders. They create structures that stand as timeless symbols of our civilization. Environmental engineers identify and design solutions for problems involving the environment. To do so, they have to be broadly educated and technically trained to address a wide spectrum of issues.

Ashrant Aryal

Ashrant Aryal, a fifth-year doctoral candidate advised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber, seeks to improve the comfort, satisfaction, and well-being of office occupants by creating intelligent systems that learn occupant preferences for the indoor environment and control the surrounding microclimate using localized environmental control systems under different levels of automation. His work leverages advancements in sensing, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and the Internet of Things to improve the indoor environmental quality in buildings while maintaining energy-efficient operations.

Born and raised in Nepal, Ashrant received his undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering from the Technion Israel Institute of Technology before coming to USC. His research efforts at USC has resulted in the publication of six peer-reviewed journal articles and three peer-reviewed conference articles so far. He also received the Viterbi Undergraduate Mentorship Award in 2018 for his research mentorship of undergraduate students and outstanding researcher award from the CEE department in 2019

Sustainable Development

Sustainability in the context of civil engineering targets long-term viability of natural resources and engineered civil systems.

Water Quality, Access, and Distribution

Providing an adequate supply of potable water, considering population growth and climate variability.

Disasters and Extreme Events

All aspects of an event, from a fundamental understanding of the physical processes controlling its evolution to the resulting environmental and social reaction.

Coupling of Complex Systems

Efforts aim to integrate research across the Sonny Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, as well with all outside disciplines that interact with civil systems.