Election to the National Academy of Engineering is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer. Academy membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to “engineering research, practice, or education, including, where appropriate, significant contributions to the engineering literature” and to “the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in traditional fields of engineering, or developing/implementing innovative approaches to engineering education.” PEER colleagues newly elected to the National Academy of Engineering are:
Norm Abrahamson, chief engineering seismologist at Pacific Gas & Electric Company, Adjunct Professor of Geosystems in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley and at UC Davis, and PEER researcher, has been elected as a new member to the National Academy of Engineering “for contributions to seismic hazard assessment and for leadership in engineering seismology and earthquake engineering.” Norm is an active PEER researcher in the Lifelines Program, and he has participated in PEER Annual Meetings.
Peter Fajfar, professor of structural and earthquake engineering, Faculty of Civil and Geodetic Engineering at University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia, has been elected as a foreign member to the National Academy of Engineering "for leadership in the development of nonlinear structural analysis methods for earthquake engineering." Peter is a colleague of PEER and former co-editor of the "Earthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics," the journal of the International Association for Earthquake Engineering.
Norm and Peter are in the class of 83 new members and 16 foreign members announced by the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) on February 7, 2018. The newly elected members will be formally inducted during a ceremony at the NAE's annual meeting in Washington, D.C., on September 30, 2018.