Dr. Malay Ghose Hajra is an associate professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering department at the University of New Orleans (UNO) in Louisiana. He is a registered professional engineer (P.E.) in multiple states including Louisiana.
Dr. Ghose Hajra completed his Ph.D. degree from Kansas State University in 2001 followed by a post-doctoral assignment at the Microscale Physiochemical Engineering Center at the University of Akron in Ohio. During the next ten years, he was employed as a consulting geotechnical engineer working on and managing several hundred geotechnical design and construction projects in Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi. These projects dealt with complex foundation and pavement systems in unpredictable and changing subsurface soil conditions. The engineering analyses also included deep foundation recommendations for highway bridges, slope stability and seepage analyses for levees and embankments, and settlement estimates of soft compressible alluvial coastal deposits. His professional experience also includes working with multiple Department of Transportation (DOT) agencies, US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), and Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA) in the analyses and design of new Hurricane and Storm Damage Risk Reduction Systems (HSDRRS) and coastal restoration and protection projects in south Louisiana.
At UNO, Dr. Ghose Hajra’s academic research interests are in the areas of geotechnical and foundation engineering, coastal restoration and coastal protection, energy foundations, in-situ and laboratory characterization of coastal sediment deposits, and sustainable coastal infrastructure systems. He teaches undergraduate and graduate level courses on Geotechnical Engineering and Foundation Design, Coastal Geotechnics, Shear Strength and Slope Stability, and Sustainability Principles for Engineers. He is a member of American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), ASCE Geo-Institute’s Engineering Geology and Site Characterization Committee, Deep Foundations Institute (DFI), and Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure (ISI).

Dr. Tonja Koob founded Gaea Consultants, LLC, 10 years ago. She has over 15 years of hydraulic engineering experience in Louisiana during which she directed hydraulic model development, performed the engineering analysis, and provided reports on several large budget projects. Prior to opening the doors at Gaea, Dr. Koob worked as a Senior Hydraulic Engineer at the US Army Corps of Engineers, specializing in sediment transport issues for the Hydraulic and Hydrological Branch of the New Orleans District. She designed complex coastal, estuarine, and riverine engineering projects for navigation, ecosystem restoration, flood control, beach erosion control, and shore protection. She prepared and presented engineering reports at Division level briefings and at public hearings. Dr. Koob is registered as a professional engineer in Environmental Engineering in the State of Louisiana as well as a LEED Accredited Professional. She has published over a dozen technical papers in peer reviewed engineering journals and in national engineering conference proceedings. In addition to her B.S. degree in Ecological Biology from Tulane’s Newcomb College, she received an M.S. degree in Environmental Toxicology from Tulane, a Ph.D. degree in Hydraulic Engineering from Washington State University and recently completed an M.B.A. degree from Tulane.