Laboratory Director

Following graduation from the Faculty of Civil Engineering at NTU Athens Vassiliki N. Georgiannou obtained her Master of Science in “Soil Mechanics and Engineering Seismology” (with Distinction) in 1985 and her PhD at Imperial College with J.B. Burland, on “The Behaviour of Clayey Sands under Monotonic and Cyclic Loading”, in 1989.

Between 1989 and 1997 she worked as Research Assistant and Research Fellow at the Soil Mechanics Section of Imperial College. During this period she also worked (1990-1991) at the Soil Mechanics  Research Center of City University, London and as a visiting Lecturer (1989-1990 & 1992-1993) at the University of Rome “La Sapienza”. Since 1997 she has been a member of the academic unit of the Soil Mechanics Section at NTU of Athens, where she was instrumental in developing the research laboratory.

Her primary research activities comprise laboratory element testing to examine the fundamental behaviour of soils and weak rocks. In particular the study of the strength and deformation characteristics and liquefaction potential for natural and model granular deposits under static and dynamic loading conditions, the inter-relationship between geotechnical and seismic characteristics of sediments and the effect of sampling on the behaviour of stiff clays and sands. She has also developed a number of laboratory apparatuses and techniques. She has led many research projects in these areas and has worked as a specialist consultant on numerous engineering projects worldwide, the latter involving projects such as Jamuna Bridge and River Training Works, Muara Tawar Combined Cycle Power Station, Egnatia Odos, LPC Te Awaparahi Bay Reclamation.

She has published extensively on experimental soil mechanics and is the author and co-author of over 100 academic papers in the international literature on the above subjects. She has presented eleven invited lectures at various Academic Institutions. She was a member of the Geotechnical Engineering Advisory Panel between 2000 and 2010, and has been an Editorial Board member for Geotechnical Research since 2014. She has been also the Greek representative of the Technical Committees (TC) 29 and TC(34) and since 2014 is a member of (TC) 101 for Laboratory Stress Strength Testing of Geomaterials, under the auspices of the ISSMGE.