Alexis Kwasinski, PhD
akwasins@pitt.edu

Research at the e-LEAdERS lab focuses on expanding the knowledge of critical infrastructures resilience characteristics and on developing technologies for improved resilience of energy delivery infrastructures, such as electric power grids, and of energy dependent infrastructures, such as information and communication technologies (ICT) networks. Main thrusts related with this research involves the development of resilience models and metrics for critical infrastructures and the analysis of dependencies and interdependencies among critical infrastructures and community services. In a practical context, research activities include conducting damage assessments after relevant natural or man-made disasters in order to document critical infrastructure performance. Examples of damage assessments conducted in the past include hurricanes Katrina, Gustav, Ike, Isaac (2012) and Sandy, the Bastrop fire in 2011, the earthquake and tsunami that affected Chile in 2010 and Japan in 2011, and the earthquakes that affected Christchurch, New Zealand in February 2011 and Napa, California in 2014. Data collected during these damage assessments are used not only to validate models and support critical infrastructures energy resilience characterization but also as drivers for the development of new technologies for enhanced resilience. Examples of such technologies include the study of microgrids as the basis for cyber-physical power systems designed for achieving highly resilient power supply of critical loads, such as communication networks.

Hong-Koo Kim, PhD

kim@engr.pitt.edu

In the Laser and Opto-Electronics Laboratories, directed by Hong-Koo Kim, PhD, facilities exist for research in nonlinear optics, materials, and devices. As part of the Department of Electrical Engineering, these laboratories emphasize facilities for maskmaking, lithography, dry-etching, evaporation and sputtering of metals or insulators, diffusion alloying, and wire-bonding are available. The structural and electrical characteristics of fabricated material and devices are evaluated using state-of-the-art test equipment. Semiconductor devices can be characterized at low temperatures in a continuous flow cryostat, capable of reaching temperatures as low as 5 degrees Kelvin. These laboratories contain argon, Nd:YAG (frequency doubled and tripled), carbon dioxide and Ti:sapphire lasers.