Mr Thomas Reinke has been awarded a Doctorate of Engineering (Dr. Ing).

Mr Reinke was awarded the Doctorate on 28 November 2014 after passing the doctoral examination by the Faculty for Construction Engineers, Geo and Environmental Sciences having achieved the academic standard. The topic of his dissertation was: "Structural behaviour of steel poles with polygonal cross-sections whilst bending".

In the course of this work, the bending resistance of both polygonal cross-sections with any number of edges as well as round cross-sections was investigated. For this, the general stability problem is investigated numerically in a completely geometric and material non-linear analysis, taking into account imperfections (GMNIA) and then compared with some experimental results on structural components. In this way, it is possible to compare results for the masts with polygonal and round cross-sections, which makes it possible to obtain results for the bending resistance, regardless of the respective control value. It should be noted here that the current control value for this field of application, DIN EN 50341-1, does not give repeatable results in some areas.

All of these aspects are included in Mr Reinke's dissertation. He developed a consistent calculation concept, which reproduced the results from the tests and the non-linear calculations very well. On the basis of the extensive parameter studies the presented calculation concept is confirmed.

Furthermore, an expansion of the developed concept is possible, in order to also be able to record other load combinations and geometries. With the help of the introduced concept, the ultimate design proposals can be developed to clearly improve the current set of standards and clarify current inconsistencies.

Mr Reinke's dissertation was completed whilst he was employed at KIT's laboratory for steel, wood and masonry.

We would like to congratulate Mr Thomas Reinke for his exceptional work and we very much look forward to him joining in the team in Karlsruhe.