Abiral Dangol is a rising junior in mechanical engineering at UH and a member of the Honors College. His work explores how advanced sensing technology could help improve the monitoring of offshore platform foundations.
Offshore platforms are essential to global energy production, supporting both traditional oil and gas extraction and the growing offshore wind industry. These platforms rely on stable foundations, yet nearly 30% of their failures are linked to anchorage or foundation problems. While structural health monitoring is well established for the upper platform, the foundation itself is rarely monitored.
Under the mentorship of Dr. Gangbing Song and Dr. Yi-Lung Mo, Dangol’s research targets this gap by developing a stress-based monitoring system to detect early anchorage debonding in offshore foundations. Using piezoceramic (PZT) sensors, he examines stress-wave behavior to identify deterioration at the anchorage–concrete interface.
Dangol’s research findings demonstrate the sensitivity of PZT sensors to changes in anchorage bond conditions and highlight their potential for detecting and monitoring bond degradation and slip in offshore foundation systems.
Building on this model, he aims to engineer a monitoring device that can be retrofitted onto in-service offshore platforms as well as integrated into new projects, improving the safety and long-term reliability of offshore energy infrastructure.
Dangol is also a 2026 Energy Scholar, part of the Energy Scholars program under the Office of Undergraduate Research and Major Awards (OURMA) at UH.
Dangol describing his research