Ningbo Municipal Key Laboratory of Structural Engineering
The Fire Laboratory of Ningbo University is the municipal key laboratory of Ningbo. It was jointly built by municipal government and the university in 2006 and put into use in 2008. The lab is of good equipment and has an area of more than 300 square meters. It has the hyperthermia and material properties experimental furnace with multifunctional fire-resistant experimental system that all are the one and only within the Province. The fire-resistant experimental furnace (4 × 1.5 × 3.5m) can carry out the experimental research in beam column joints, single story frames, different loading conditions and fire environment, and the highest temperature can reach 1,200℃. The material properties experimental furnace can carry out the corresponding fire-resistant test of materials. The laboratory owns more than 20 sets of instruments such as fire testing furnace, material testing furnace, temperature detector, condensing machine, atomizing device, temperature control computing system, hydraulic jack and hydraulic oil pump, which cost more than one million Yuan.
The laboratory is mainly responsible for the teaching and research experiments of graduates, and the scientific and technological services to the society. It has completed more than 10 graduate projects in structural engineering. In recent years, it has undertaken a number of projects including the National Natural Science Fund and the natural science fund of province and city. The research in progress include:
(1) National Natural Science Foundation Project: Fire response whole-process analysis and failure mechanism research of long-span cable prestressed steel structure;
(2) Ningbo Natural Science Foundation Project（2009A610138）: Study on fire behavior of connecting node of “H” steel beam that light aggregate concrete filled steel column.
Since its establishment, the laboratory has jointly completed the relevant experimental research with Shanghai Jiaotong University on the response of the steel truss under fire and cultivated 3 post-graduates. At present, there are still 2 doctoral students and 5 graduate students in the experimental research and theoretical analysis of fire resistance on structure, and they have completed more than 10 terms of research on in-fire and after-fire performance of steel structure, light aggregate concrete composite structure and others.
There are 3 regular researchers. Among then, there is one senior researcher and one intermediate researcher. Prof. Wang Xintang, the director of the laboratory, is also responsible for the master program of structural engineering in Ningbo University.