A Civil Engineering student of VIT University bagged a gold medal in the All India Design Competition for engineering students.



Aditi Palaspure, a third year student of B. Tech Civil Engineering had won the prestigious medal for her project on predicting compression index of clay for designing shallow foundations.
Participation



She had started working on the project last year for the university’s Project Based Learning programme and went on to participate in the competition.



The competition is organised annually by the National Design and Research Forum of the Institution of Engineers (India).
It invites entries from students studying in various engineering disciplines including aerospace, agricultural, chemical, civil, electrical, environmental, marine and textile, a press release said.
“Marine clay has a property to shrink in dry weather and it tends to swell during wet weather. Hence, buildings that come up on such clay can undergo damage. This can be predicted if the compression index of the soil is known,” she explained.



When force is applied to the soil, the changes that occur are measured with the help of compression index.
“However, the present methods to determine the compression index are carried out in laboratories and are expensive and time-consuming, she added.



Aim of project

“My project aims to explore how we can predict the compression index of soil using easily determinable properties of soil, in lesser time,” she said.
She received a gold medal and a certificate for the project at a ceremony held in Karnataka.