Vice President Europe - Professor Lyesse Laloui

Professor Lyesse Laloui

Prof. Lyesse Laloui is an active scientist at EPFL since 1994, where he directs the Soil Mechanics Laboratory as well as the Civil Engineering Section. In addition, he is the honorary director of the International Joint Research Center for Energy Geotechnics in China and until 2020 was an adjunct professor at Duke University, USA. He is also a full member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences. In 2022 Lyesse Laloui appeared in the Ranking of Top 1000 Scientists in the field of Engineering and Technology released by Research.com.

 

Prof. Laloui is a world-renowned scientist in his field and has dedicated much of his career to understanding the natural world for the benefit of society. His research and exploration of the mechanics of geomaterials and other geology has made significant contributions to our understanding of the physical mechanisms of these materials. From this, he has developed innovative and sustainable technologies for today and the generations to come. His efforts in areas such as sustainability, climate change, renewable energy and the optimisation of natural resources have been recognized and awarded by the European Research Council with an Advanced ERC Grant for his project BIOGEOS (BIO-mediated GEO-material Strengthening), followed by an ERC Proof of Concept Grant (PoC) in 2020. Prof. Laloui has also developed several projects for the European Commission as well as the Swiss National Science Foundation.

 

As founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Elsevier Geomechanics for Energy and the Environment journal, he is a leading scientist in the field of geomechanics and geo-energy. His research portfolio includes 13 written and edited books and over 350 peer reviewed papers; resulting in more than 9000 citations with an h-index of 49 (Scopus). Two of his papers are among the top 1% in the field of Engineering. Two of his books are widely used: Mécanique des sols et des roches and Energy Geostructures: analysis and design. Prof. Laloui has given keynote and invited lectures at more than 40 leading international conferences. He has won many awards in recognition of his work including the Excellent Contributions Award of the International Association for Computer Methods and Advances in Geomechanics in 2008, the 2012 Vardoulakis Lecture from the University of Minnesota, the 12th G.A. Leonards Lecture from the University of Purdue in 2014, the 2016 RM Quigley Award from the Canadian Geotechnical Society, the 30th Roberval Award at the French Academy of Science in 2018, the 2020 Kersten Lecture at the Geo-congress 2020 in Minneapolis and the Vienna Terzaghi Lecture in 2022. Prof. Laloui has four patents that he is developing in the context of three start-ups (MeduSoil, Enerdrape, Nesol). He is also a founding partner of the international engineering company Geoeg.