Tara Hutchinson

Associate Professor, Structural Engineering

Earthquake and geotechnical engineering, performance assessment of structural/nonstructural components, and machine learning and computer vision methods for damage estimation.

Professor Hutchinson is an earthquake engineering theoretician and experimentalist who has published significant papers in leading structural, civil, and earthquake engineering journals. In addition, she has creatively applied information technology to the evaluation of earthquake damage to structures, and her findings have been reported in publications that focus on computing, computer applications, instrumentation and measurement. Results from her soil-foundation structural analysis and seismic performance of non-structural building components have also helped in the design of these critical components.

Capsule Bio:
Tara Hutchinson received a Ph.D. degree in civil engineering from UC Davis in 2001 and was immediately named assistant professor at UC Irvine. Her research has focused on performance evaluation of structural and foundation components and systems. She also applies information technology to evaluate structural damage to civil infrastructure by earthquakes and other extreme environmental loads. An energetic educator, she received a Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Fostering Undergraduate Research, a Faribors Maseeh Teaching Award, and an Excellence in Undergraduate Education Award at UC Irvine. She was also a recipient of the National Science Foundation Career award in 2004.She serves on the board of directors of the Consortium of Universities for Research in Earthquake Engineering, and is an editorial board member of Earthquake Spectra, a professional journal of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute.

Institute Affiliation:
Charles Lee Powell Structural Research Laboratories »