News


2024 RILEM Colonnetti medallist

Each year, RILEM assigns up to two Gustavo Colonnetti Medals to researchers under 35 years old who have performed high-level scientific research in the field of construction materials and structures. For this medal, already being a member of the Association is not a requirement.
For the 2024 Gustavo Colonnetti medals, 20 applications from researchers working in 10 countries in 3 different continents were received.

One of the 2024 Gustavo Colonnetti Medals was awarded to Dr. Zhenming Li, our former colleague from Dr Guang Ye’s group from the Materials & Environment section. 

Dr Zhenming Li has been a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Sheffield, UK, after receiving his PhD at TU Delft, Materials & Environment section and working as a postdoc from 2015 to 2023 in Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands. He will be working in Harbin Institute of Technology (Shenzhen) as Professor from 2024. His research activity mainly focuses on understanding, predicting and mitigating the autogenous shrinkage of alkali-activated materials by combining sophisticated experiments and numerical modeling. The impact of his research is documented by the high number of citations received by his numerous high-quality publications, as well as by the fact that he has been invited to give lectures at several international events. His involvement in RILEM includes his participation in several technical committees, for one of which he also serves as executive secretary, and his activity as a lecturer within a doctoral course organized during an annual RILEM week.
 


Smart Mobile Factories: The Future of Sustainable Infrastructure Development

From September 4-5, 2023, Bolzano, Italy played host to a workshop that brought together a diverse group of interdisciplinary researchers, including civil engineers, architects, computer scientists, and industrial engineers. The primary focus of this gathering was the Smart Mobile Factory for Infrastructure (SMF4Infra) Project, a groundbreaking initiative aimed at revolutionizing i infrastructure construction.


Student Scholar Award SFPE 2023 for Zhuojun Nan

Zhuojun Nan MSc, who will join our department as of December and will be working on the field of Fire Safety won the 2023 Student Scholar Award of the Society of Fire Protection Engineers. She was awarded because of the high quality of her PhD research and leadership and volunteerism she showed in the past years.
In her PhD research Dr Nan established a practical workflow for structural analysis under realistic fire scenarios, which involved conducting full-scale fire spread tests with non-uniform fuel distribution, developing a natural fire model with travelling behaviour of localised burning in OpenSees, and integrating the fire models with the Integrated Simulation Environment (GiD+OpenSees) for heat transfer and thermomechanical analysis. This research highlights current challenges as well as potential areas for future research that could enhance building fire safety through the development of an integrated approach for structural fire analysis, design, and collapse prediction. Next to this, Zhuojun, amongst others, acted as a member of the organizing committee of the 12th International Conference on Structures in Fire (SiF22).


The Executive Board has appointed Hans Ramler as TU Delft Fellow Construction Technology at the faculty of Civil Engineering & Geosciences (CEG).


Energy from concrete potentially best Tech idea 2021

Waves battering the coast generate energy. Researchers Branko Šavija and Yading Xu from Delft University of Technology want to capture this energy using a special type of concrete, thus creating an alternative energy source. The Dutch popular science journal KIJK has selected the idea for their competition Best Tech Idea 2021. The winner will be determined by the public. You can vote from 14 September to 15 October 2021.


New research shines light on future directions for cities on sustainability and climate action

What’s in a word?  ‘Smart’, ‘eco’ or ‘future’ cities? Around the world, numerous city initiatives have sprung up in recent years to signal their engagement with sustainable development and global climate change action. But what is the difference between these and other city labels? Are some more important than others? And how will they develop in the coming 50 years? Scottish and Dutch academics have carried out a global study across 35 different city labels revealing that the term ‘sustainable city’ has been the most popular and overarching one in policy and academic research until five years ago.


Brank Šavija receives Open Mind grant

During a special online edition of the annual innovation festival TEKNOWLOGY, NWO has announced the winners of the annual Open Mind funding round. Five scientists with surprising ideas for improving the world will each receive 50,000 euros to further elaborate their plan within one year.

Harvesting energy from waves breaking against the coast or from a vibrating bridge that lorries travel across. That is what dr. Branko Šavija and his team want to make possible with the new, lightweight and sustainable 3D printed concrete they have developed. For this idea, he received a k€50 Open Mind grant from NWO. Quoting the jury assessment: ‘Completely original idea to explore an interesting new source of energy.’ A short explanation of this innovative idea is given in this video.


Paul Korswagen awarded the best paper 17th International Brick and Block Masonry Conference

On the 8 of July, at the inauguration session of the 17th International Brick and Block Masonry Conference, Paul Korswagen was awarded with the first place in the competition for the best paper submitted to this online edition of the conference. The paper, about the difference in the behaviour between baked-clay and calcium-silicate walls subjected to light damage, which was deemed by the jury to have very high scientific value and/or concern important practical aspects, was written by the researcher of the department of Materials, Mechanics, Management and Design (3MD) at the group of Structural Mechanics. The topic was based on the work performed by the team looking at the light damage vulnerability of masonry walls which was composed at the time by Michele Longo, Edwin Meulman, and Paul and guided by prof. Jan Rots.

Paul’s prize consists of a book about the history of Kraków and a tour of the city, which is fortunately valid all throughout next year.

Paul Korswagen (right) with colleagues in front of a calcium-silicate wall, one of the last to be tested.


Branko Šavija awarded the Gustavo Colonnetti Medal

We like to congratulate dr. Branko Šavija with being awarded the Gustavo Colonnetti Medal of the International Union of Laboratories and Experts in Construction Materials, Systems and Structures (RILEM). Each year, max. 2 young researchers of less than 35 years, who have made an outstanding scientific contribution to the field of construction materials and structures receive this award. Branko was awarded for his high-level scientific research in the field of construction materials and structures. Apart from the medal, he will be invited to give a lecture during the RILEM Spring Convention in March.


Djonno Bresser is TU Delft Best Graduate 2019

At the TU Delft Best Graduate Award Ceremony 2019 eight recently graduated engineers presented their research and results of their excellent master thesis. Djonno Bresser, graduate of the department Materials, Mechanics, Management & Design (3MD), received the prestigious title TU Delft Best Graduate 2019. The TU Delft Best Graduate Award Ceremony is organized annually by Delft University Fund. His Graduation committee consisted of Prof. Dr. Ir. J.G. Rots, Dr. Ir. M.A.N. Hendriks, Ir. M. Pari, Dr. Ir. G.M.A. Schreppers and Ir. L.J.M. Houben.


The Delft approach to Forensic Engineering

Karel Terwel together with Michiel Schuurman (AE) and Arjo Loeve (ME), won a prestigious ICE Publishing Award for their joint work on ‘Improving reliability in forensic engineering: the Delft approach’. In the article, they describe the three main elements of the Delft approach, which in turn are based on insights gained from their respective fields of civil engineering, aerospace engineering and biomechanical engineering. Starting 19 November 2019, the MOOC ‘Forensic Engineering: Learning from Failures’ will run for the third time. This MOOC takes its lead from the insights described in the article on the Delft approach.


Research Jaap Weerheijm and Tiziano Li Piani considered among the best collaborations with European Commission

Research on mechanics of adobe structures, a joint research project of TU Delft, TNO and the Dutch Ministry of Defense, has been considered among the best collaborations with the European Commission. Both dr. Weerheijm as mr. Li Piani were interviewed on this occasion.


Erik Schlangen gives lecture at the University of the Netherlands

Can a concrete house repair its own cracks?
Erik Schlangen lectures in this course at the University of the Netherlands how he develops self-healing concrete with the help of special bacteria.