X-Ray Computed Tomography Technique in Civil Engineering

Abstract

Radiation can be used to observe microstructure of any material in different sectors or study fields. At this juncture, civil engineering is one of the major fields of engineering due to the use of a variety of materials in construction. The evaluation of microstructure of materials is vital for a number of reasons based on observing mechanical and electrical properties of materials which can give shape to the design or production of them in engineering. For that reason, the microstructure of commonly used civil engineering materials such as concrete, soil, asphalt or metal should be investigated in detail to improve the performance of structures. The determination of the changing mechanical properties of materials can be readily done using many destructive experiments; however, there is limited nondestructive method. At this point, a nondestructive and practical method has come into this research area, which is X-ray computed tomography technique. In this chapter, information about the major use of X-ray computed tomography method in civil engineering is aimed to transfer to all readers.