The Infrastructure Group
The Infrastructure group provides direct support to the Program Group, which performs ZAG’s combined research program. The research program is interdisciplinary, so that direct connections and well-coordinated work of the research infrastructure is of key importance for the performance of research. The research work foreseen by the program usually combines research into the behaviour of materials with research into the behaviour of structures. In this case the effects and loadings are not just static and dynamic loadings, but also consist of chemical and other effects, including those due to fire and various environmental factors. Infrastructural activities, including all
equipment assemblies, are essential in the case of applied research for industrial partners, which result in either improvements in production, or the development of new products. The infrastructure group also provides important support when attempting to find solutions to faults in products which occur during different stages of production, and when monitoring industrial processes. In this way leading Slovenian enterprises from the field of building and civil engineering, and the vehicle production industry, can, with ZAG’s support, more easily obtain corresponding certificates of conformity, as well as European and Slovenian Technical Approvals. This is because most of the results obtained in ZAG’s laboratories are recognized, due to ZAG’s high reputation, by notified bodies in other European countries, even when the national technical specifications of these countries are involved.
In the above-mentioned segment the following of ZAG’s activities are of particular importance:
- metrological work: calibration of instruments;
- research into the microstructure of materials;
- mechanical, i.e. static and dynamic tests of structures and their elements;
- fire tests (including the development of fumes);
- geomechanical tests.
It should be emphasized that the high level of training of ZAG’s personnel is of key importance for the best performance of tests, and for the interpretation of the results obtained. The results of tests performed at ZAG are thus frequently the basis for decisions made at some of the Republic of Slovenia’s ministries, e.g. the Ministry of the Infrastructure, the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology, the Ministry of Defence, and the Ministry of Culture, as well as the Slovenian Roads Agency, the Agency for Investments in the Public Railway Infrastructure, ARAO – the Agency for Radioactive Waste, the Agency for the Environment, inspection bodies, and other governmental bodies.
