Kurt Beyer Prize 2023 awarded for outstanding theses

On July 26, 2024, the Kurt Beyer Prize was awarded at TU Dresden. Since 1996, this prize has been awarded annually for outstanding final theses by students and young academics in the fields of civil engineering and architecture. The sponsor of the prize, which is endowed with a total of EUR 5,000, is HOCHTIEF Infrastructure GmbH, Southeast Germany branch. The award ceremony took place in the carbon concrete building "Cube" on the TU Dresden campus.

The Kurt Beyer Prize for 2023 was awarded to Dr.-Ing. Lena Leicht from the Faculty of Civil Engineering for her dissertation "Characterization of mineral-bonded composites for impact attenuation" and to Dipl.-Ing. Elisa Kühne from the Faculty of Architecture for her thesis "Coexistence_Animal, Plant, Human".

Reinforcing layers against extraordinary loads are unfortunately becoming increasingly important, as accidents are becoming more frequent and wars are getting closer and closer. Extraordinary, sudden loads (so-called impact loads) can be caused, for example, by a vehicle collision, a rockfall, but also by explosive devices. Such impacts are characterized by the fact that very high forces act on buildings, bridges or power plants in a very short time - often with an impact duration of only a few milliseconds. in her dissertation, Ms. Leicht developed protective layers that can be applied on the side of the impact, and thus the danger. The protective layers undergo planned degradation and damage as a result of the impact. This process absorbs energy by converting the kinetic impact energy into frictional and internal energy. The magnitude of the load ultimately acting on the load-bearing structure is reduced and the impact time is increased. Such damping layers can significantly increase the load-bearing resistance of the structure to be protected with relatively little material.

© André Terpe

In his letter of recommendation for the award, Professor Manfred Curbach writes: "With her dissertation, Dr.-Ing. Lena Leicht has produced very convincing results in a very short processing time of only three years, which serve to protect our buildings from impact loads. The multi-stage approach to material selection and analysis - research, small-scale experiments and tests at component level - proved to be methodologically excellent and led to an outstanding result in an area that has hardly been researched to date. It is particularly impressive that the preferred variant developed by Ms. Leicht can completely prevent any damage to the test specimens, even with very fast and energy-intensive impulses. At the same time, Ms. Leicht clearly identifies the need for further research and closely scrutinizes her results. Ms. Leicht's conscientious work thus constitutes essential preliminary work for the further development of mineral-bonded reinforcing layers against extraordinary stresses. Thanks to the excellent preparation of the data, further use of the measurement series at the Institute of Concrete Structures, but also by other research groups, is possible without any problems."

Every year, HOCHTIEF lnfrastructure GmbH, Germany Southeast Branch, honors particularly outstanding scientific theses by students and early-career researchers at TU Dresden with the Kurt Beyer Prize. The prize is awarded for one or two theses - dissertations, diploma and master's theses or comparable work - in the fields of civil engineering or architecture.

Prize money
HOCHTIEF lnfrastructure GmbH, Germany Southeast Branch, sponsors this prize, which is endowed with €5,000. If two works are selected by the jury as worthy of the prize, the individual amount is halved to € 2,500 each.

Selection
The work should have been completed and defended between November of the previous year and the end of the current year. The Deans of the Faculties of Civil Engineering and Architecture at TU Dresden are entitled to nominate candidates.

Jury and award
Representatives of the founder and representatives of the Faculty of Architecture and the Faculty of Civil Engineering form the jury. The award ceremony takes place in a festive setting with representatives of the founder and representatives of the University Executive Board.