Civil engineering's Sharma earns Milton Pikarsky Award

Dr. Anuj Sharma, assistant professor of civil engineering at UNL, has received the 2008 Milton Pikarsky Award for Outstanding Ph.D. Dissertation in Science and Technology.

The award is conferred by the Council of University Transportation Centers, a national organization that promotes dialogue among its member institutions, and provides a forum for them to interact collectively with government and industry.

Sharma was honored for his doctoral thesis on integrated behavioral and economic framework for improving dilemma zone protection systems. He collected and analyzed a large set of real-time data (over 80,000 data points per day) from a signalized intersection to evaluate the performance of existing signal control logic. He developed and demonstrated methodology for searching optimal green-light thresholds to maximize the driver satisfaction and driver safety at isolated high speed intersections.

Sharma completed his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering, specializing in Infrastructural and Transportation Engineering, in August 2008 at Purdue University.

"This is a wonderful distinction for Dr. Sharma and a clear recognition of his achievement," said Dr. Mohamed F. Dahab, professor and chair with the UNL Department of Civil Engineering.