EERI is pleased to announce that the 2024 Graduate Student Paper Prize has been awarded to Jingwen He and Ellen Rathje for their paper “Seismic capacity models for earth dams and their use in developing fragility curves," published in Earthquake Spectra Vol. 40, No. 3. The award recognizes a paper published in Earthquake Spectra that has a graduate student as the first author. According to the prize committee, the paper's "statistical approach to determine capacity curves from a robust dataset of earthquake case histories was unique, and filled a void in the literature. Furthermore, the application of performance-based methodologies for fragility analysis of earth dams was considered a new and novel application...[and] the paper was well-written such that its outcomes are clearly articulated to a wide audience."
Jingwen He (M.EERI 2023) is a geotechnical engineer at ExxonMobil in Spring, Texas, with expertise in earthquake engineering and soil liquefaction. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin, where she worked with Professor Ellen Rathje on developing fragility curves for earth dams using ground motions from both induced and tectonic earthquakes. The awarded paper originated from her research work. During her four years graduate school experience at UT Austin, Jingwen was able to attend EERI lectures organized by the EERI Student Chapter of UT Austin and network with other students with similar interest in earthquake engineering. Since joining ExxonMobil, Jingwen has worked on onshore, nearshore and deep water geotechnical projects and enjoys working on various challenging projects globally while learning more about geotechnical engineering. Jingwen feels greatly honored to receive this award, and she is committed to continuous learning and growth in geotechnical engineering.
Ishika N. Chowdhury (M.EERI 2017) was awarded an Honorable Mention for her paper “Implications of input ground-motion selection techniques on site response analyses for different tectonic settings,” published in Earthquake Spectra Vol. 40, No. 2 (pp. 1521-1551).
For more information about the Graduate Student Paper Prize, visit the EERI awards and honors page here.
