Lecturers

Carlos Fernandez

Dr. Carlos A. Fernandez is a Chief Scientist and Team Lead at U.S. Department of Energy’s (US-DOE) Pacific Northwest National Laboratory with over twenty years of experience in industrial and governmental R&D. Previous to joining PNNL, he worked as a researcher and consultant for the industry sector in the Center of Excellence for Products and Processes of Cordoba, Argentina. Since joining PNNL in 2006, Dr. Fernandez research has focused on the engineering of nanomaterials, porous materials, composites and smart fluids for environmental and energy applications. He has managed several multi-institution projects funded by the DOE’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy with a total funding volume of $16 million in the past five years.
Dr. Fernandez has over fifty publications (H Index 20), seven patent applications (four awarded), and is an editorial board member of Nature’s Scientific Reports. His research has been featured in several press releases including Energy.Gov, C&E News, Chemistry World, Scientific American, NBC Right Now, and ten journal covers. Dr. Fernandez’s work on StimuFrac™ was recognized as a potentially game-changing technology on C&E News and awarded with the Institute of Chemical Engineers 2015 Global Award for Outstanding Achievement in Chemical Engineering. Dr. Fernandez was nominated by the US-DOE’s Geothermal Technology Office as an Exceptional Individual for the 2015 Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers. Fernandez’s self-healing cement technology received a 2020 R&D100 Award and a silver medal for green technology.

Siavash Ghabezloo

Siavash Ghabezloo is a research scientist and professor at Ecole des Ponts ParisTech, France. He received a PhD degree in Geomechanics from Ecole des Ponts ParisTech. He has also a civil engineering degree from Shiraz university and a Master of Science in Soil Mechanics and Foundations from Tarbiat-Modarres university in Iran. His research works are mainly based on poromechanics theory, in its broad sense, with a particular emphasis on the characterization of the behavior of geomaterials. During the past ten years he contributed mainly to characterization of thermo-hydro-mechanical behavior of cement paste for oil-well integrity assessment and claystone for nuclear waste disposal. Siavash Ghabezloo is the vice president and general secretary of the French Rock Mechanics Committee.

Simon James

Simon James is a consultant for well cementing, product development and innovation and president of CS8 Consulting.  Prior to this he spent 27 years with Schlumberger in various R&D roles covering cementing, drilling fluids and stimulation.  His most recent assignment was as Cementing Advisor in the Schlumberger Product Centre in Clamart, France. Simon has co-authored more than 25 technical papers and is inventor or co-inventor on 38 US patents.  He holds a BA degree in natural sciences and a PhD degree in physics, both from the University of Cambridge, UK.

Maria Juenger

Dr. Maria Juenger is the L.B. (Preach) Meaders Professor of Engineering in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering and Associate Dean of Graduate Education Transformation in the Graduate School at the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Juenger’s teaching and research focus on materials used in civil engineering applications. She primarily examines chemical issues in cement-based materials, including phase formation in cement clinkering, hydration chemistry of cements and supplementary cementitious materials, and chemical deterioration processes in concrete. Her current research efforts emphasize the interaction of cement-based materials and the environment. This work encompasses the development and characterization of cementitious systems with lower carbon dioxide and energy footprints, as well as the capacity of cementitious materials to produce or remove airborne and waterborne pollutants. Dr. Juenger is a fellow of the American Concrete Institute (ACI) and the American Ceramic Society (ACerS). She currently serves on the Board of Directors of ACI. She has received several awards from ACI for her research, teaching, and service, including the Walter P. Moore, Jr. Faculty Achievement Award, the Young Member Award for Professional Achievement, the Wason Medal for Materials Research, the Delmar L. Bloem Distinguished Service Award, and the Concrete Sustainability Award. She has also received a Faculty Early CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation. She is an associate editor of Cement and Concrete Composites and is on the editorial boards of both Cement and Concrete Research and ACI Materials Journal. Dr. Juenger received her B.S. degree in Chemistry from Duke University and Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Northwestern University. After completing her Ph.D., she was a postdoctoral researcher in Civil Engineering at the University at California, Berkeley before coming to the University of Texas at Austin.
 

Konrad Krakowiak

Konrad J. Krakowiak (PI), Ph.D. holds an Assistant Professor position, in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department. Before joining UoH, he was appointed as a Research Scientist, and Postdoctoral Associate, in the Concrete Sustainability Hub (CSHub@MIT) at MIT, an interdisciplinary team of researchers from several departments across MIT working on concrete science and engineering. While at MIT he was a leading experimentalist in the research project focused on mechanical performance and durability of cement-based matrices for high-temperature and high-pressure applications (X-CEM). He has also actively collaborated on the synthesis of new cement-based matrices for applications in geothermal wells. He developed a novel characterization method of composite materials that allows direct correlation of nano-indentation mechanical properties with local phase composition. Dr. Krakowiak obtained his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from the University of Minho, Portugal, where he focused on the experimental micro-mechanics of construction materials. His current research activities include advanced experimental analysis and modeling of cement-based materials under thermo-chemo-mechanical loads including high temperature and pressure, cement geochemistry, development of novel reduced-aging and carbon-neutral cement-based materials. Results of his research have been published in various journals including Cement and Concrete Research, Nature Communications, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. He is an active member of the TRB Committee on Basic Research and Emerging Technologies Related to Concrete - AFN10, as well as ACI Committee 241 Nanotechnology of Concrete.

Barbara Kutchko

Dr. Kutchko is a research scientist with the National Energy Technology Laboratory specializing in wellbore isolation, well cementing, and subsurface materials characterization. She has a PhD from Carnegie Mellon University’s Civil and Environmental Engineering and a MS in Geology from the University of Pittsburgh.  She works with oil and gas companies, government agencies, and universities to evaluate cementing practices and research needs to ensure the safe placement of cement. Her research has informed federal policy and she served as an objective expert in the federal litigation over the Macondo incident.  She is the recipient of a 2016 Pittsburgh Women in Energy award and a 2015 Pittsburgh Energy Award in Upstream. In 2014, she received a Federal Executive Board (FEB) Excellence in Government Award for outstanding contributions to science.

Matteo Loizzo