On November 16th personnel from the Airport Technology R&D Branch hosted an academic delegation from the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Architecture at the University of Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy. The group was comprised of five faculty members and fourteen graduate students.
 

The group toured the National Airport Pavement Test Facility (NAPTF) and the National Airport Pavement and Materials Research Center (NAPMRC) and the pavements material testing laboratory. Additionally, FAA personnel discussed the research projects in progress at the two facilities, and how research findings are incorporated into FAA standards and specifications for airport pavement design, materials, and construction. Visitors enquired about the availability of data from full-scale tests that can be used by their graduate students for their master’s and doctoral thesis. Visits such as these continue to maintain and promote FAA’s global leadership, and highlight the importance of the full-scale test data generated at the pavement facilities.