With the recent quest for developing sustainable infrastructure materials, there is a need for more advanced material characterization techniques at different length scales that can provide insight to the nature and fundamental behavior of the new classes of cementitious materials as they are becoming available. These methods can be used to predict the mechanical properties, microstructural aspects, and long-term performance of different cementitious systems. Recently, major progress has also been made in the development of novel cement-based systems such as C-S-H/polymer nanocomposites and self-healing materials.

This Special Publication aims at providing a treatise on the current research in the areas related to innovative characterization methods and analytical techniques used in the cement and concrete research, as well as the development of novel basic and composite cementitious materials. This Special Publication is developed to honor the significant contributions made by Dr. James J. Beaudoin over the past four decades to the advancement of cement and concrete science. The papers included in this Special Publication were presented in two sessions in ACI Fall 2014 Convention, Oct 26-30, 2014.