Associate Professor Daniel Hindman of the Department of Sustainable Biomaterials was recently named the editor of Wood Design Focus, a journal produced by the Forest Products Society that features articles on various aspects of wood engineering. “Being named editor recognizes the good research and teaching in wood engineering that has been done at Virginia Tech,” he said.

Each issue of the journal focuses on a specific theme related to design or engineering issues, and Hindman chose to concentrate the most recent edition on crosslaminated timber, a new building system that can be used to construct everything from housing to mid-rise commercial buildings to a proposed 30-story skyscraper in Vancouver, B.C. “This is a new system that’s coming to the United States,” he explained. “Cross-laminated timber can be a sustainable replacement for widely used building materials, like concrete.”

Hindman’s current research centers on fall protection for construction workers on residential projects. He recently received a grant from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to help support this work. “Falls represent close to one in three fatalities in residential construction projects, so it’s important we work to address this issue,” he said.

Contact: