Civil Engineering for Risk Mitigation

Social/economic context

Mobility and related services are a central element of the current socio-economic context. Mobility underpins human relationships and social connections and facilitates access to goods and services, including trade, work, health, culture and education. In the near future, in a post-pandemic social and economic framework, current studies suggest that the demands on mobility by land, air and sea will grow even more than in the past and will relate in particular to efficiency, speed, connectivity and accessibility of means of transport. Technological innovation is essential in defining how and what the mobility of the future will look like. The new frontiers of technology (e.g. autonomous devices, artificial intelligence or ultra-light materials) can provide important opportunities to transform the mobility system as a whole, creating new business models and new services.

In this context, the air transport sector, in its most general sense, has a bright future ahead of it. It has always been a sector with a very high technological content, often at the cutting edge, while at the same time being able to deal with issues of reliability and safety managed through consolidated certification processes. The aeronautics industry can therefore occupy an ideal and privileged position in supporting innovation and its potential impact on mobility in the coming decades. Despite the sharp contraction due to the pandemic, the aviation industry is set to expand again in the coming years. It has been and will continue to be one of the main drivers of globalisation, generating economic growth, creating jobs and supporting trade and tourism. This massive and continuing development poses major challenges, particularly with regard to growth models that are responsible and therefore sustainable. The growth of the sector can be positively supported by specific approaches and targeted technological solutions and will require a significant increase in highly qualified specialised professionals.

The aeronautical sector has always been considered at the forefront of engineering and is often at the forefront of the development and implementation of frontier technologies. This characteristic also derives from the stringent requirements of efficiency and high performance of aircraft, where the optimisation of every aspect of the project is fundamental if the result is to lead to a competitive solution. It is fair to say that the balance between a conservative and an innovative approach is at the heart of civil aviation technology. Beyond seemingly conservative geometries and configurations that are essentially unchanged from the designs of the 1950s and 1960s, aircraft technology has nevertheless changed and improved in many respects and is still under continuous development. Research into ever more high-performance materials makes aircraft lighter and more comfortable, the development of ever more efficient engines makes them quieter and more economical, and the development of ever more powerful, pervasive and reliable avionics makes them considerably safer.

Historically, aeronautical engineers have been sought after by companies operating in the sector for their application-specific knowledge and technical skills. However, they are also highly sought after in all areas of industry where aerodynamics, lightweight structures, innovative materials and complex system design are important. In the last two decades, other specialisations are rapidly gaining ground. The sector is in fact characterised by significant changes and rapid evolution, involving the contamination of various disciplines and the integration of different skills and competences. Partly because of this, the aerospace industry continues to invest heavily in research and development staff, who are the lifeblood of technological innovation. In order to be able to keep up with the development of the sector, the aeronautical industry will need in the coming decades both aeronautical engineers with the skills and specialist knowledge to solve advanced technical problems related to continuous improvement in traditional aerospace technologies and aeronautical engineers with the ability to interact and integrate between different aerospace technologies and between aerospace disciplines and those of other engineering sectors, in particular in the field of ICT.

Evolution of the educational offer

The significant presence of aeronautical industries in Lombardy has led to the spread of an aeronautical mentality and culture, which has provided the natural breeding ground for the establishment of a school of aeronautical engineering at the Politecnico di Milano. After the introduction of an initial aviation course in 1909 and a minor but qualified presence until after World War II, the first graduates from the aeronautical section of the Mechanical Engineering course of study date back to 1952. Shortly afterwards, the Degree Course in Aeronautical Engineering was officially launched, later becoming the Degree Course in Aerospace Engineering following the inclusion in the course of study of specific knowledge and skills in the space area, in response to emerging needs in the sector. Finally, the change in the university study system forced a redesign of the educational offer, differentiating the course into a three-year Bachelor's Degree in Aerospace Engineering and two separate two-year Master's Degrees, one in Aeronautical Engineering and one in Space Engineering. The current aerospace training offered by the Politecnico di Milano therefore represents the evolution of a historical path, which also includes a third cycle of training consisting of a PhD in Aerospace Engineering. The various courses of study are now well-established in the national and European panorama of aerospace education.

The Mission

The Mission is to prepare engineers capable of successfully addressing multi-inter-disciplinary contexts in dynamic and highly international environments, combining solid scientific and engineering foundations with specific aerospace engineering concepts which, according to the education level,  should make an engineer well capable of analysing, understanding and managing problems typical of the sector as well as of related scientific and technological areas.

From the technical and scientific point of view, such a Mission implies pursuing three levels of  improved  knowledge and understanding of typical aerospace engineering issues.

A Bachelor Degree in Engineering, Architecture or Land Use Planning.

The programme links the fundamental disciplines of Civil Engineering (design and construction of civil and environmental structures and infrastructures) with a broad overview of the most advanced Risk Management tools, with particular attention to forecasting and prevention issues concerning structures and infrastructures and soil, on which they are built or embedded, due to natural and anthropic causes.

1^ST YEAR

1^st semester: Numerical Methods for Partial Differential Equations, Soil-Structure Interaction, Tools for Risk Management, Flood Risk, Structural Analysis, Fundamentals of GIS. 

2^nd Semester: River Hydraulics for Flood Risk Evaluation, Computational Mechanics, Structural Dynamics, Theory of Plasticity

2^ND YEAR

Three modules to be chosen among: Engineering Structures for the Environment, Geo-Engineering Techniques for Unstable Slopes, Emergency Plans for Hydro-Geological Risk, Structure Retrofitting, Transport Management in Emergency Planning, Geospatial Data Processing to Support Seismic Emergency Management.

The final project is devoted to the solution of a field case.

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Know more about the Tracks and courses and the Programme description