Each year, the Fire Protection Research Foundation recognizes a project that best expresses the safety mission, commitment to overcome technical challenges and collaborative execution approach that is the hallmark of Foundation projects with the Fire Protection Research Foundation Medal. NFPA is proud to announce the project, “Pathways for Building Fire Spread at the Wildland-Urban Interface” […]
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Resources for Designing WUI Communities
We have posted several resources from our presentation today at the NFPA Conference. They can be read here or downloaded via PDF. A copy of the final presentation will also be posted soon. Resources for Designing WUI Communities (PDF) Presentation from NFPA 2016 (PDF) Resources for Designing WUI Communities Fire Modeling BEHAVE Plus: https://www.frames.gov/partner-sites/behaveplus/software-manuals/ A […]
New paper published on Pathways for Building Fire Spread in the Wildland Urban Interface Part I: Exposure Conditions
Our recent paper was just published online in Fire Technology: Review of Pathways for Building Fire Spread in the Wildland Urban Interface Part I: Exposure Conditions Sara E. Caton, Raquel S. P. Hakes, Daniel J. Gorham, Aixi Zhou, Michael J. Gollner Abstract While the wildland–urban interface (WUI) is not a new concept, fires in WUI communities have rapidly expanded in frequency and severity over the past […]
Prof. Gollner receives NSF CAREER Award
Michael Gollner is the recipient of a 2016 National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award for “Understanding the Mechanisms of Wildland Fire Spread.” The project’s main objective is to understand the previously-unexplored role of intermittent heating that is driven by reacting-flow instabilities on wildland fire spread, in the hope that this knowledge may lead […]
PhD Student Colin Miller Awarded Green Fellowship for Collaborative Research on the Environment
Mechanical Engineering PhD student Colin Miller, advised by Professor Michael Gollner in Fire Protection Engineering and Geographical Sciences PhD student Kristofer Lasko were recently selected to receive the ‘Green Fellowship for Collaborative Research on the Environment’ awarded by the University of Maryland’s Council on the Environment. Their proposal entitled, “A bottom-up approach to characterize […]
PhD Student Colin Miller accepted into UMD Future Faculty Program
Mechanical Engineering Ph.D. student Colin Miller, advised by Professor Michael Gollner in Fire Protection Engineering was recently accepted into the Future Faculty Program! The A. James Clark School of Engineering’s Future Faculty Program prepares doctoral students for career-long success in the academic world as mentors and researchers. Participants build skills in areas such as technical and grant […]
Wildland Fire Course Lab Day – Fire Spread
Last week Dr. Gollner’s course, Wildland Fires: Science and Applications got to spend the day in the lab studying how the rate of spread is affected by fuel loading and wind. We used excelsior, just shaved Aspen wood to simulate different fuel loading by changing the density and compaction of the fuel. We found spread […]
New Article on WUI Fire Spread Published in SFPE Emerging Trends
Prof. Gollner recently published a short article on Pathways for Building Fire Spread in the Wildland Urban Interface in the Society of Fire Protection Engineers’ Emerging Trends Newsletter. The article covers some of the recent work from the group, with contributions by undergraduates Sara Caton, Kyle Kohler and Raquel Hakes as well as opinions on where research in […]
New JFSP Research Grant on Ember Generation with UNC Charlotte, IBHS and UT Austin
Sponsored by the Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP), the $420,000 “Fire Ember Production from Wildland and Structural Fuels” project will bring together researchers from seven institutions. UNC Charlotte’s portion of the project is $219,000 for laboratory testing research and the University of Maryland is assisting with interpretation and analysis of data. “This is a major […]
New Paper Published on Upward Flame Spread over Discrete Fuels
A new paper was published by Colin Miller and Prof. Gollner on Upward Flame Spread over Discrete Fuels in the Fire Safety Journal. By using slices of PMMA we were able to vary the amount of fuel covering a wall while a flame spread upward. We found that when the fuel coverage reduces somewhat, there […]