Classifieds

A group of researchers from MIT, Harvard University, and facilities in Italy and Switzerland has made significant progress in uncovering ancient concrete-manufacturing processes that included numerous crucial self-healing features.
The findings were reported in Science Advances in an article co-authored by MIT professor of civil and environmental engineering Admir Masic, former doctoral student Linda Seymour, and four others.
For years, scholars have concluded that the key to the ancient concrete’s longevity was pozzolanic material, such as volcanic ash from the Pozzuoli area on the Bay of Naples. This particular type of ash was even brought all the way across the vast Roman empire to be utilized in construction, and was identified as a major element for concrete in accounts written at the time by architects and historians....