RESTOR 

Asaad Faramarzi is a professor of civil engineering and head of Civil Engineering Department at the University of Birmingham, with >15 years of experience in computational modelling of structural and geotechnical engineering problems. He earned his PhD from the University of Exeter in 2011 and worked as a research fellow on several projects before joining Birmingham in 2014. He has led numerous research projects on development of novel machine learning based computational procedures applied to non-destructive testing and gravity cartography. 

Dr Samir Dirar is Associate Professor at the University of Sharjah, UAE. He has over 15 years of research experience is structural engineering, including over ten years dedicated to sustainability and resilience of civil engineering structures. His research interest range from fundamental material behaviour to overall system response. He has a research portfolio of over £3 million funded by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, The Royal Society, Horizon 2020 and the international construction industry.  

Dr Marios Theofanous is an Associate Professor in Structural Engineering. He has received funding of over £ 2M as PI or Co-I in several research projects funded by EPSRC (EP/P006787/1, EP/W018705/1, EP/W019701/1 - £1.85m), UKIERI (IND/CONT/G/17-18/25 - £50k) and industry (£300k) and has supervised 10 PhD students to completion. His research findings on local buckling of stainless steel cross-sections have led to significant amendments in Eurocode 3: Part 1.4, 2015 and AISC Design Guide 27. He is member of the editorial panel of the IStructE research journal “Structures”.  

Dr Mohammad Ali Mahdavipour is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Birmingham. Dr Mahdavipour defended his Ph.D. thesis titled “Failure prediction of steel components under the coupled effect of excessive plastic deformations and pitting corrosion” at the University of Agder, Norway in 2022. His published research includes the following topics in structural engineering: probabilistic and reliability-based assessment of structural systems, steel structures under extreme loads, seismic evaluation of structural systems, experimental mechanics and digital image correlation system, corrosion in steel structures. 

Shima Jowhari Moghadam received her doctorate from Loughborough University, where she worked on “Inflation behaviour of free-form inflated thin-walled steel structural members”. In 2024, she joined the University of Birmingham as a research fellow. She is part of a research team which focuses on the reuse of structural steel in construction. Her research interests include steel structures, steel reuse, materials and structural testing, sustainable construction, and finite element analysis. 

Qixian Feng is currently undertaking doctoral research within the RESTOR project, concentrating on the prediction of reused steel's structural behaviour. This research integrates experiments, nonlinear finite element analysis, and non-destructive evaluation techniques to advance the reuse of steel, aiming to lower the carbon footprint associated with construction materials. The primary objective is to bolster the sustainability measures within civil engineering to foster a low-carbon economy.