EDUCATION

Executive Summary

Dr. Ri Na is an Associate Professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering at the University of Delaware. She holds a Ph.D. in Engineering with a focus on Construction Engineering and Management, as well as an M.S. in Construction Management from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and a B.E. in Construction Estimating from Chang’an University, China. Since joining UD in 2018, she has been actively engaged in teaching, research, and mentoring, contributing to curriculum development, innovation and ABET accreditation efforts.

Dr. Na’s research focuses on Building Information Modeling (BIM), Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), and energy-efficient building design. She also specializes in aerial and infrared thermography for structural health monitoring and non-destructive evaluation (NDE) of civil infrastructure, leveraging deep learning techniques for automated defect detection and predictive maintenance. Her work integrates cutting-edge technologies such as drones, laser scanning, augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR) to enhance construction engineering education and practice.

She serves as the faculty advisor for the Construction Engineers of America (CEA) student club and coaches student teams for the Associated Schools of Construction (ASC) competitions. Dr. Na is an editorial board member of the Journal of Sustainable Marine Structures and the Journal of Construction Research, a guest editor for the Journal of Built Environment, and an active peer reviewer for several engineering conferences and journals.

Research Areas

• Construction
• Infrastructure
• Sustainability