In the framework of the next European Geosciences Union General Assembly, to be held in Wien, Austria, from the 22nd to the 27th of April 2012, we are organizing the GI3.1 Session, entitled "Civil Engineering Applications of Ground Penetrating Radar" (http://meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU2012/session/9126).

This Session will be a prestigious forum for a promising discussion and for a wide exchange of experiences and results related to the Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) use in civil engineering problems. We hope that it might be of potential interest for you and we would like to encourage you, and your co-workers, to participate, submitting your contribution.

Topics will include: electronics and hardware; software and data processing; numerical modeling, direct and inverse electromagnetic scattering problems; inspections for management and safety; constructions and maintenance; material and geometry characterizations; novel applications and recent developments; trade-offs between GPR and other nondestructive testing techniques.

We already organized the Session at EGU General Assembly 2011, with great success. After the event, a selection of high-quality contributions dealing with the theme of our Session has been selected to be published, as extended papers, on a special issue of the Taylor & Francis journal “Nondestructive Testing and Evaluation”. We hope that, even for the 2012 event, we will receive many interesting contributions. It is foreseen that contributions presented during the Session will be selected for a special issue on an international journal, where extended articles will be published.
The deadline for one-page abstract submission is the 17th of January 2012.
In case you would like to apply for a financial support (http://meetings.copernicus.org/egu2012/support_and_distinction/financial_support.html), please submit no later than the 15th of December 2011.
Detailed information on how to submit an abstract can be found here: http://meetings.copernicus.org/egu2012/abstract_management/how_to_submit_an_abstract.html. Our Session webpage shows a link to the Abstract Submission System. Using this link, you are asked to log in to the Copernicus Office Meeting Organizer, and you may submit your abstract. The text of your contribution may be written as plain text, in LaTeX, or by using MS Word. Please pay attention to the First Author Rule. An Abstract Processing Charge (APC) of € 40 has to be paid for each submission.

You may find further information on the conference at http://meetings.copernicus.org/egu2012/. For doubts or questions, please contact us at pajewski@uniroma3.it.

Please feel free to forward this information to colleagues who might be interested.
We are looking forward to see you in Wien!!
Best wishes and regards,

Andrea Benedetto, Andreas Loizos, Lara Pajewski, and Evert Slob

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GI3.1: Civil Engineering Applications of Ground Penetrating Radar
Convener: Lara Pajewski
Co-Conveners: Andrea Benedetto, Andreas Loizos, Evert Slob

This Section is focused on the application of Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) to civil engineering problems.
The GPR is extremely useful in producing high-resolution images of the subsurface, typically from 0 to 10 m depth, through wide-band nonsinusoidal electromagnetic waves. The employed frequencies range from 10 MHz to 4 GHz.
This survey method is effective, rapid, nondestructive and noninvasive. In fact, the GPR has become an established and powerful tool for the inspection of road and highway pavements, bridges, tunnels, and for detecting subsurface cavities and voids. It is also used to perform detailed quality controls of reinforced concrete. The GPR is very often employed for the
analysis of geological structures, for the mapping of soil, rock or fill layers in geotechnical investigations, and for foundation design, besides being a valuable monitoring technique of buried utilities as conduits, electricity cables, gas and water pipes.
Radars solve inverse problems, to estimate the electromagnetic properties of a target from field measurements. At present, different algorithms are employed to post-process collected GPR experimental data: most of them need a fast and accurate forward-scattering solver, to perform repeated evaluations of the scattered electromagnetic field due to known targets, and to be used in combination with some optimization techniques.
To obtain the best results, the GPR has to be correctly applied by qualified personnel, familiar with both the physical principles of the method and its limitations. The interpretation of resultant data is a difficult problem and should be carried out consciously and carefully, combining the relevant information of above ground and subsurface features.
In this framework, the Session is concerned with the state of art, research activity, and progress of GPR techniques in civil engineering. In particular, novel georadar instrumentation will be presented. The outcomes of performed surveys will be reported. How to correctly plan experimental campaigns and conduct field measurements will be discussed. Direct and inverse electromagnetic scattering techniques will be a subject of interest, data processing methods and approaches for the interpretation of results will be proposed. Trade-offs between GPR and other nondestructive testing techniques will be considered. The merits and limitations of current GPR systems in various civil engineering applications will be highlighted.