Pre-Congress Courses

•   Course 1

 Cement hydration, including supplementary cementitious materials

Prof. Karen Scrivener has been a Professor and the Director of the Laboratory of Construction Materials in the Department of Materials at EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) for the last 20 years. She is a Fellow of the UK Royal Academy of Engineering and the author of over 200 journal papers. Her research focuses on understanding the chemistry and microstructure of cement-based materials and improving their sustainability. In 2008, she came up with the idea for LC3 cement, a material with the potential to reduce CO₂ emissions related to cement production by more than 400 million tonnes per year. She received her bachelor’s degree in Materials Science from the University of Cambridge in 1979 and her PhD from Imperial College London in 1984.

•   Course 2

 Earthen construction (detailed content)

Christopher Beckett is a Senior Lecturer at The University of Edinburgh, Deputy Director of Civil and Environmental Engineering, the deputy Chair of the RILEM Technical Committee 319-MAE: Mechanical performance and durability assessment of earthen elements and structures, and chairs the Standards Australia Committee BD-083: Australian Earth Building. He has secured over £1M in funding to support earthen construction research, which explores the hydromechanical, thermal, embodied energy/carbon, and architectural use, behaviour, and characterisation of earthen construction materials around the world.

Quoc-Bao Bui received his PhD in 2008 at ENTPE (Ecole Nationale des Travaux Publics de l’Etat) Lyon, France, and his HDR (Habilitation) in 2023 at University Lyon 1, France. From 2011 to 2016, he worked as Associate Professor at Polytech Annecy-Chambery, University Savoie Mont-Blanc, France. Since 2016, he has joined Ton Duc Thang University (Vietnam) as Senior Lecturer. His research interests cover from materials to structures: non-conventional materials (soil-based materials, recycled materials, geopolymer, graphene-based nanosheets), energy-efficiency buildings and structural analyses (static and dynamic behaviour). He has published more than 60 articles in international journals, several books and book chapters. He has been coordinator or member of several international and national projects. He is Editorial Board member of two international journals.

Antonin Fabbri got his PhD in 2006 on physics and mechanics of freezing-thawing behavior of porous media at “Laboratoire Navier”. During his post-doctoral position at the "Ecole Normale Supérieure," he investigated the supercritical carbonation of oilwell cements. From 2007 to 2011, he managed projects related to CO₂ geological sequestration at the French Geological Survey (BRGM). Since 2011, as a research professor at ENTPE, he has focused on the hydrothermal and hydromechanical behaviors of earthen materials such as rammed earth and earth plasters, as well as their durability. He is Chair of the RILEM TC on Mechanical Performance and Durability Assessment of Earthen Elements and Structures. He serves as an executive board member of the French National Project on earthen construction.

Prof. Céline Perlot is a full professor at the University of Pau (France) and, PhDs in Civil Engineering from the University of Toulouse (France) and the University of Sherbrooke (Canada). As a specialist in the physical chemistry of construction materials, she conducts research into microstructural characterization and transfers in earthen materials. She is the head of a scientific innovation chair of the Institut Universitaire de France on the effect of raw earth biostabilization on indoor building comfort, and deputy chair of the TC BEC “Bio-stabilised earth-based construction”.

•   Course 3

 Asphalt Recycling (detailed content)

Dr. Eshan Dave is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Graduate Program Coordinator at the University of New Hampshire in United States. He is a Fellow of RILEM and the author of over 140 journal papers. His research focuses on improving the resilience of pavement infrastructure through the use of performance-oriented design and analysis coupled with use of life cycle assessment to make adaptation decisions. He received his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the Sardar Patel University of India in 2001 and his MS and PhD from the University of Illinois in 2003 and 2009 respectively. He is convener of the cluster F of RILEM and member of the RILEM Bureau.

Dr. Gabriele Tebaldi is an Associate Professor in Construction of Road, Railways, and Airport at the Department of Engineering and Architecture of the University of Parma (National Scientific Qualification for Full Professor Position awarded in November 2017), he is also a Visiting Research Professor at the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering of University of New Hampshire. Gabriele’s research interests include asphalt recycling, performance of bituminous materials, pavement performance evaluation, use of byproducts in asphalt mixtures. Gabriele is a RILEM Fellow, and in RILEM he is a member of the Development Advisory Committee and Chairman of TC 308-PAR Performance-based Asphalt Recycling. Gabriele is Chairman of the European Asphalt Technology, Fellow Member of the Association of Asphalt Paving Technologists, Editor in Chief of the journal Road Materials and Pavement Design, and Associate Editor of the journal Materials and Structures.

Dr. Hassan Baaj is a Professor and Director of the Centre for Pavement and Transportation Technology at the University of Waterloo, where he also serves as Associate Dean of Research and External Partnerships. He holds the Norman McLeod Chair in Sustainable Pavement Engineering.

Dr. Baaj earned a Master’s from the École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l’État (1998) and a Ph.D. from the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées in Lyon, France. In 2020, he completed a Master’s in Business, Entrepreneurship, and Technology (MBET) at the University of Waterloo. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Research Council of Canada, he joined Colas Canada in 2003, leading innovative road projects in collaboration with government and academic institutions. In 2008, he moved to Lafarge in France, managing R&D in infrastructure engineering.

Dr. Baaj chaired committees for the Transportation Association of Canada and RILEM and was elected a RILEM Expert in 2020 and a Fellow of the Canadian Society of Civil Engineering in 2025. Dr. Baaj holds three patents in sustainable pavement materials and recycling and his current research focuses on smart pavements, sustainable and innovative pavement materials, self-healing asphalt materials and 3D printing of concrete.

•   Course 4

 Durability of concrete

Professor Hans Beushausen studied civil engineering in Germany and South Africa and completed his PhD at the University of Cape Town (UCT) in 2005, working in the fields of repair and rehabilitation of concrete structures. In subsequent years at UCT, he broadened his scope of research and teaching from general fields related to structural engineering into service life prediction and performance-based design of concrete structures, steel reinforcement corrosion, and sustainable concrete technology. He is an active member of RILEM and fib and involved in a range of international research activities. At UCT, he is the Deputy Dean for Research and Strategic Innovation of the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment, Director of the Concrete Materials and Structural Integrity Research Unit, and the Convenor of the postgraduate programme on Civil Infrastructure Management and Maintenance.