Biography

Dr Boulent Imam graduated with an Honours B.Sc. degree from the Middle East Technical University in Ankara, Turkey. He obtained his M.Sc. in Structural Engineering with Distinction from the University of Surrey in 2002. His M.Sc. dissertation was on the probabilistic fracture assessment of the Northridge moment resisting connections and led to the publication of two papers. Dr Imam continued his studies at the same university where he successfully defended his PhD in June 2006. Dr Imam’s PhD work focused on the fatigue analysis of riveted railway bridges and was funded by EPSRC and Network Rail. He developed a general methodology for the fatigue assessment of riveted railway bridges, through finite element (FE) analysis, by concentrating on the fatigue behaviour of their primary connections.

Following the completion of his PhD in June 2006, Dr Imam continued his research as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Surrey. He expanded his experience in load modelling by investigating the effect of future load evolution scenarios on the remaining life of riveted railway bridges. Parallel to this study, he also investigated, as a continuation of his PhD work, the application of novel assessment methods for more reliable remaining fatigue life estimation of riveted bridge connections.

In November 2007, Dr Imam was appointed as a Lecturer in Civil Engineering at the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences in the University of Surrey.

Research Interests

Fatigue and fracture of structural components and systems

•   Fatigue of metallic bridges
•   Probabilistic fatigue analysis, probabilistic traffic models and response spectra
•   Hot-spot and critical distance methods for fatigue assessment
•   Fracture mechanics and probabilistic fracture analysis

Risk and reliability assessment of structural systems

Bridge management

•   Assessment, inspection and repair procedures for steel bridges
•   Direct & indirect costs on transportation networks
•   Life cycle assessment and whole-life management of assets

Climate change effects on built infrastructure

•   Impact of changing environmental conditions on structural deterioration
•   Probabilistic assessment of flood risk and scour of bridges

Consequence Modelling

•   Modelling of human, economic, environmental, social consequences from structural failures

Structural dynamics

•   Dynamic analysis of bridges
•   Blast & impact loading, damage assessment

Hydraulic loading on structures

•   Scour assessment of bridges

Progressive collapse and robustness of structures

Research Collaborations

•   Bridge Reliability under the Influence of Changing Environmental and Loading Demand Conditions -     EPSRC project (Principal Investigator)

         The overall objective of the project is to quantify the impact of climate change on the bridge infrastructure through a risk-based framework. Individual objectives are as follows: (I) Development of a novel probabilistic methodology for the estimation of risk of collapse of bridges under changing environmental and load demand conditions. (II) Evaluation of the effect of increased river flooding, arising from climate change, on the scour risk ranking and reliability of bridges. (III) Evaluation of the effects of climate change and increasing live loading on material deterioration and bridge reliability. The proposed work is carried out in collaboration with a mix of organisations: Network Rail, HR Wallingford, TGP and TRL. 

•   Maintenance, Renewal and Improvement of Rail Transport Infrastructure to Reduce Economic and   Environmental Impacts (MAINLINE) - FP7 European project (Principal Investigator on WP5)

         The objective of WP5 is to create a life cycle assessment tool that can compare different maintenance/replacement strategies for track and infrastructure based on a life cycle evaluation. The evaluation shall quantify direct economic costs, availability (delay costs/user cost/benefit from upgrade etc.) and environmental impact costs. Project partners include Network Rail, UIC, COWI, Mouchel, TWI, University of Minho, Turkish Railways and Lulea Technical University.

•   Bridge Fatigue Guidance (BriFaG) - RFCS European project (Principal Investigator on WP2 & WP4)

       Have contributed towards the development of a probabilistic fracture mechanics (PFM) methodology for fatigue assessment and inspection & maintenance planning of steel bridge structures. Further work involved development of guidelines for modelling of steel bridges for fatigue assessment and dynamic analysis. Project partners included CTICM, Chalmers University of Technology, Aachen University and Ramboll.

•   Eurocodes and Design of Plated Structures - KTP Project with PAFA Consulting Engineers (Academic          Supervisor)

       Work involved the development of a reliability tool for the design of plated structures according to Eurocodes.

•   Robustness of Structures - European COST Action TU0601 (Research Member)

       Work involved the development of models for predicting failure consequences for buildings and bridges. Consequences have been categorised into human, economic, environmental and social. 

•   Investigation into Solar Sail Technology - Surrey Space Centre project funded by Astrium (Co-Investigator)

       Providing assistance in the dynamic testing of structural elements of the solar sail for the purposes of investigating their dynamic characteristics. 

Publications

Journal Publications

[12] Imam B.M., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Causes and Consequences of Bridge Failures. Structural Engineering International, 2012, 22(1): 93-98.

[11] Imam B., Rafiq I., Kumar P. Improving student learning in engineering discipline using student- and lecturer-led assessment approaching. European Journal of Higher Education, 2011, 1(2-3): 233-248.

[10] Imam B.M., Chryssanthopoulos M.K., Frangopol D.M. Fatigue system reliability analysis of riveted railway bridge connections. Structure and Infrastructure Engineering: Maintenance, Management, Life-Cycle Design and Performance, 2011, DOI:10.1080/15732479.2011.574817.

[9] Kaliyaperumal G., Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. Advanced dynamic finite element analysis of a skew steel railway bridge. Engineering Structures, 2011, 33(1): 181-190.

[8] Kumar P., Rafiq I., Imam B. Negotiation on the assessment of research articles with academic reviewers: application of peer-review approach of teaching. Higher Education, 2010, 62(3): 315-332.

[7] Imam B.M., Righiniotis T.D. Fatigue evaluation of riveted railway bridges through global and local analysis. Journal of Constructional Steel Research, 2010, 66(11): 1411-1421.

[6] Righiniotis T.D., Imam B., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Fatigue analysis of riveted railway bridge connections using the theory of critical distances. Engineering Structures, 2008, 30(10): 2707-2715.

[5] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Probabilistic fatigue evaluation of riveted railway bridges. Journal of Bridge Engineering (ASCE), 2008, 13(3): 237-244.

[4] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Numerical modelling of riveted railway bridge connections for fatigue evaluation. Engineering Structures, 2007, 29(11): 3071-3081.

[3] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. and Bell B. Analytical fatigue assessment of a typical riveted UK rail bridge. Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Journal – Bridge Engineering, 2006, 159(3): 105-116.

[2] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Fatigue assessment of riveted railway bridges. International Journal of Steel Structures, 2005, 5(5): 485-494.

[1] Righiniotis T.D. and Imam B. Fracture reliability of a typical Northridge steel moment resisting connection. Engineering Structures, 2004, 26(3): 381-390.

Conference publications

[16] Kaliyaperumal G., Imam B., Righiniotis T., Chryssanthopoulos M. Dynamic FE analysis of a continuous steel railway bridge and comparisons with field measurements. In: 12th International Conference on Metal Structures (ICMS), Wroclaw, 2011.

[15] Chryssanthopoulos M.K., Janssens V., Imam B. Modelling of failure consequences for robustness evaluation. In: IABSE-IASS 2011 Symposium, London, 2011.

[14] Imam B.M. Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Consequences of Failure: Bridges. In: Proceedings of the Final Conference, Prague, 2011.

[13] Imam B.M., and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. A review of metallic bridge failure statistics. In: 5th International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS’10), Philadelphia, USA, 2010.

[12] Imam B.M., Chryssanthopoulos M.K., Frangopol D.M. System effects on the fatigue reliability of deteriorating riveted railway bridges. In: 10th International Conference on Structural Safety and Reliability (ICOSSAR 2009), Osaka, Japan, 2009.

[11] Imam B.M., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Failure statistics for metallic bridges. In: 2nd Working Group Meeting, COST Action TU0601: Robustness of Structures, Timisoara, Romania, 2008.

[10] Imam B.M., Righiniotis T.D. Fatigue evaluation of riveted bridge connections using the theory of critical distances. In: 6th National Conference on Metal Structures, Ioannina, Greece, 2008.

[9] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Global-local finite element analysis of riveted railway bridge connections for fatigue evaluation. In: 4th International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS’08), Seoul, Korea, 2008.

[8] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Probabilistic fatigue load spectra for riveted railway bridges. In: 10th International Conference on Applications of Statistics and Probability in Civil Engineering (ICASP10), 2007.

[7] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Fatigue reliability of riveted railway bridges. In: 2nd International Symposium on Bridge & Infrastructure Research in Ireland, Dublin, Ireland, 2006.

[6] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Fatigue reliability of riveted connections in railway bridges. In: 3rd ASRANet International Colloquium – ASRANet 2006, Glasgow, UK, 2006.

[5] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Fatigue crack initiation in riveted railway bridge connections. In: 1st International Conference on Fatigue and Fracture in the Infrastructure, Bridges and Structures of the 21st Century, Philadelphia, USA, 2006. (Student award recipient).

[4] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D., Chryssanthopoulos M.K. and Bell B. Probabilistic fatigue life estimates for riveted railway bridges. In: 3rd International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS’06), (CD ROM) Porto, Portugal, 2006.

[3] Righiniotis T.D. and Imam B. Effect of fracture on the reliability of a moment resisting frame under earthquake loading. In: 9th International Conference on Structural Safety and Reliability (ICOSSAR 05), (CD ROM), Rome, Italy, 2005.

[2] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Remaining fatigue life estimates for riveted railway bridges. Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Bridge Management, Guildford, Surrey, UK, 2004.

[1] Imam B., Righiniotis T.D. and Chryssanthopoulos M.K. Connection fixity effects on stress histories in riveted rail bridges. In: 2nd International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS’04), (CD ROM), Kyoto, Japan, 2004.

Teaching

Level 1 Integrated Design A (ENG1014)

Level 2 Structural Steel Design (ENG2014)

Level 2 Engineering Laboratories (ENG2015)

Level 3 Bridge Engineering (ENG3145) (Fatigue of Bridges)

Level M Bridge Management (ENGM029) (Fatigue of Bridges)

Departmental Duties

Examinations Officer for the divisions of CCE and MMA

Academic Misconduct Panel Member

PG Open Days

Fire Marshall for the AA building