We are delighted to announce the appointment of Professor Houssam Toutanji as Associate Dean for Graduate Education and Research in the College of Engineering, effective August 14, 2013.

Dr. Toutanji is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and serves as Chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. He received his Ph.D. degree from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and BS and MSE degrees from Northeastern University. His research areas include FRP composites, cementitious composite materials, smart materials and smart structures, bridge engineering and lunar construction materials and design. He is the author/co-author of over 70 Journal articles and 100 conference proceedings. He has served as principal or co-principal investigator on research projects funded by NSF, DOD, NOAA, NASA, Army Corps of Engineers, ALDOT, and UTCA.

Professor Toutanji received the UAH Foundation Award for Distinguished Teaching and UAH Foundation Award for Research and Creative Achievement for 2004 and 2005, respectively. In 2003 he was appointed a visiting professor at the University of Gent, Department of Structural Engineering (Gent-Belgium). He is also a Research Visiting Scholar at Cergy-Pontoise University's Civil Engineering Department. Dr. Toutanji is a recipient of the National Science Foundation's CAREER award. He also received the NSF-EPSCoR Scholarly Productivity Award, for two years in a row, for research performance, intrinsic merit of research work, and for potential in research. He was selected by the National Science Foundation 14 times to be part of U.S. delegations participating in international conferences and workshops on FRP composites for repair and bridge design. He served as the Associate Director of the University Transportation Center for Alabama (UTCA) from 1998 to 2000 and 2008 to 2012. He served an Associate Editor of the *ASCE Material Engineering Journal *from 2004 to 2012.

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Toutanji on this appointment. Also, please join us in thanking our outgoing Associate Dean, Dr. Emil Jovanov, for his service to the College.