Zdeněk Bažant

Education, career and academic positions

Born in Prague on December 10, 1937, Bažant received the degree of Civil Engineer from the Czech Technical University (CTU) in Prague in 1960. While employed as Bridge Designer he earned in 1963 (as an external student) a PhD in engineering mechanics from the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences; in 1966, he earned a postgraduate diploma in theoretical physics from Charles University, Prague. During 1964–67 he was research assistant professor at CTU working on fiber composites, and obtained the degree of Docent habilitatis in Concrete Structures from CTU in 1967. After postdoctoral fellowship at CEBTP Paris (1966–67) and Ford Foundation fellowship at University of Toronto (1967–68), he was during 1968–69 Associate Research Engineer at the University of California, Berkeley. In 1969 he joined Northwestern University as an Associate Professor and became Professor of Civil Engineering in 1973. During 1981–87 he served as the founding Director of Center for Geomaterials. During 1974-1994 he was simultaneously a Staff Consultant at Aragonne National Laboratory. Since 1990, he has held the Walter P. Murphy Chair in Civil and Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, and since 2002 simultaneously the chair of McCormick Institute Professor. Bažant served as the president of the Society of Engineering Science (1993); was the founding President (1991–93) of the International Association of Fracture Mechanics of Concrete Structures (IA-FRAMCOS); and the founding President (2001-2002) of the International Association of Concrete Creep and Durability Mechanics (IA-CONCREEP). He served as Division Director in IA-SMiRT (Struct. Mech. in Reactor Technology), as member of the US Nat. Comm. on Theor. and Applied Mech., and as editor-in-chief of Journal of Engrg. Mechanics of the Am. Soc. of Civil Engers. (ASCE). He has been the US regional editor of Int. J. of Fracture.

Research contributions and impact

Bažant, who is "generally regarded as the world leader in research on scaling in the mechanics of solids", is the author of six books dealing with concrete creep, stability of structures, fracture and size effect, inelastic analysis and scaling of structural strength. He is an Illinois registered Structural Engineer, and is one of the original top 100 ISI highly cited researchers in engineering (of all fields, worldwide). As of June 2015, his H-index is 103, i10 is 496, and total citations 46,000 (on Google, minus self-citations).

Honors and awards

Bažant was elected to US National Academy of Sciences in 2002, US National Academy of Engineering in 1996, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2008. He is a foreign member of the Royal Society of London (2015), Austrian Academy of Sciences, Academy of Engrg. of Czech Rep., Italian National Academy (dei Lincei, Rome), Spanish Royal Academy of Engrg., Istituto Lombardo (Milan), Academia Europaea (London) and European Acad. of Science and Arts. His honors include 7 honorary doctorates: CTU Prague (1991), TU Karlsruhe (Fredericiana, 1997), UC Boulder (2000), Politecnico di Milano (2001), INSA Lyon (2004), TU Vienna (2006), and Ohio State University Columbus (2011). He is a Honorary member of Am. Soc. of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), Am. Soc. of Civil Engineers (ASCE), Am. Concrete Institute (ACI), RILEM, Paris (Int. Union of Res. Lab. In Mat. & Str.), Czech Soc. of Mechanics, Czech Soc. of Civil Engineers, Czech Concrete Society, and Building Res. Institute of Spain. He has given almost one hundred plenary lectures at major conferences and over thirty distinguished university lectures. His honors include:

Books

Selected Papers

Selected Recent Papers