Clarkson University Professor Pier Marzocca reviews one of the 11 volumes of the new 7,000-page Encyclopedia of Thermal Stresses. Marzocca contributed to four volumes.

POTSDAM – Clarkson University Professor Pier Marzocca helped write a book about and contributed to four of the 11 volumes of the new 7,000-page Encyclopedia of Thermal Stresses.

An associate professor in Clarkson's Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering, Marzocca is no stranger to the subject matter, and he's among a group of 30 section editors who devoted three years to the project.

The result is an impressive interdisciplinary reference work, the largest single publication devoted to the field of thermal stresses ever published.

“I am glad I had the opportunity to contribute to this titanic endeavor. It is good for Clarkson, as well,” Marzocca says. “Libraries and schools will get copies of this extensive reference,” he added.

The encyclopedia is aimed at both undergraduate and graduate students, researchers, and engineers. In addition to entries on thermal stresses, it includes related topics, such as the theory of elasticity, heat conduction, and thermodynamics, along with entries on applied mathematics and numerical methods.

“It's high quality. It can serve as a one-stop resource for anyone wishing to explore the thermal stresses discipline and its myriad of applications,” Marzocca says of the finished tome, which is published by Springer.

Marzocca has extensive relevant research experience in design and modeling, including fluid-structure interactions problems, structural dynamics, advanced composite structures, engineering system reliability, and wind turbine technologies.

He and his fellow editors collaborated with editor-in-chief Richard B. Hetnarski, a professor emeritus from Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Rochester Institute of Technology. The idea for the encyclopedia project was born during one of the international congresses on thermal stresses, which are organized every two years on a different continent.

Marzocca helped organize one of these congresses in 2003 at Virginia Tech and a subsequent one in 2009 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

“People who study thermal stresses can make thermal protections, using modeling, simulations, and experiments, to learn how structures react to temperature, or to make a performance evaluation. The subject covers problems of relevance for many technologies, from furnaces to electronic packaging, to spacecraft thermal protection systems and solar radiation thermal effects in space,” he adds.

Bear in mind that thermal stress can mean extreme heat or profound cold, so there is truly a lot of material to cover. The information relates to the effect of extreme temperatures on traditional or advanced material, such as that which is used in a new engine or a nuclear reactor, the professor said.

As the scientific gatherings grew, the publishing company became involved. So did Marzocca and the other thermal stress experts. These sectional editors pulled double duty as writers on the project, and Marzocca personally contributed 13 entries.