Recent Research on Geotechnical Engineering, Remote Sensing, Geophysics and Earthquake Seismology

This book is based on the accepted papers for presentation at the 2nd MedGU Annual Meeting, Marrakesh 2022. With five parts spanning a large spectrum of geological and geophysical topics, this book presents a series of newest research studies that are nowadays relevant to Middle East, Mediterranean region, and Africa. The book includes the latest research studies on seismic hazard and risk assessment, earthquake geodesy, seismotectonics, archeoseismology and active faulting, well logging methods, geodesy and exploration/theoretical geophysics, geological engineering, geotechnical engineering, numerical and analytical methods in mining sciences and geomechanics, and geo-informatics and remote sensing.

Mourad Bezzeghoud
School of Sciences and Technology, University of Évora, Portugal

Mourad Bezzeghoud is a full professor at the Physics Department of the School of Sciences and Technology and a researcher at the Institute of Space and Earth Sciences, University of Évora. He was in charge of several positions of responsibility in several institutions as, i.e., the founder and director of the Department for Study and Seismic Monitoring of CRAAG (Algiers, Algeria), director of the School of Sciences and Technology (University of Évora, Portugal), or member of the Management Council of the University of Évora. Presently, he is the president of the Scientific Council of the School of Sciences and Technology (University of Évora) and coordinator of the Institute of Space and Earth Sciences (University of Évora).  He has published dozens of articles in specialized revues and journals, and several books and chapters in books. He works in the area of Earth Sciences (Solid Earth Geophysics) with an emphasis in Seismology.

Zeynal Abiddin Ergüler
Kutahya Dumlupinar University, Geological Engineering Department, Kutahya, Turkey

Prof. Dr. Zeynal Abiddin Erguler is a full professor at the geological engineering department at Kutahya Dumlupinar University (Turkey). Dr. Erguler holds a B.Sc. (1998), an M.Sc. (2001), and a Ph.D. degree (2007) in Geological Engineering from Hacettepe University (Turkey). His research interests mainly focus on rock mechanics, engineering geology, environmental geology, and soil mechanics. His current investigation is to understand and model the thermo-hydro-mechanical behavior of shale rocks in the area of shale gas production. In addition to performing many types of research and industry-funded projects, he has also taught and supervised undergraduate and graduate students. In 2017, Dr. Erguler joined the Arabian Journal of Geosciences (AJGS) as an editor responsible for evaluating submissions in the fields of rock mechanics, engineering geology, environmental geology, and soil mechanics.

Jesús Rodrigo-Comino
University of Granada, Spain

Ph.D. DEng Jesús Rodrigo-Comino is a member of the Department of Regional and Physical Geography at the University of Granada (Spain). He completed his first Ph.D. in Geography at the University of Málaga (Spain) and Trier (Germany) in 2018 and the second one in the engineering of Geomatics and Topography at the Polytechnic University of Valencia (2023). His current research interests include soil geography, regional geography, and land degradation. He coordinates the Terra Lab 2 EGEMAP (Environmental Geography and Mapping) www.egemap.eu.

Mahesh Kumar Jat
Malaviya National Institute of Technology Jaipur, India

Dr. Mahesh Kumar Jat is a professor of Water Resources at Malaviya National Institute of Technology (MNIT) Jaipur (India). He is teaching and doing research in the area of hydrological modeling, integrated water management, geo-spatial technologies, and land use land cover change modeling. He has published more than 100 research articles in ISI/Scopus Journals and conferences (total citations: 2330; h-index – 21; i-index 30).  He has completed 12 research projects amounting to more than 65 million Indian rupees. He is a member of many national and international professional bodies such as the European Geosciences Union (EGU), ASCE, IWRS, IAH, IRS. He sits as a member of the board of studies of many Institutes in India.  He is the associate editor and editorial member in 2 ISI journals. He has delivered 40 keynote and invited talks at international and national conferences.

Roohollah Kalatehjari
Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand

Dr. Roohollah (Roo) Kalatehjari is a highly accomplished academic and researcher with over 15 years of experience in geotechnical engineering. He is a senior lecturer in Geotechnical Engineering, Associate Head of School―Learning and Teaching at the School of Future Environments (SoFE) at Auckland University of Technology (AUT), director of the Advanced Construction Research cluster, and founder and director of the Geotechnical Engineering Laboratory. His research focuses on preserving the environment and finding sustainable and environmentally friendly solutions for soil stabilization and slope stability. Roo is also an active member of several professional engineering and education organizations, including Engineering New Zealand, the New Zealand Geotechnical Society, and the International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering. He is a fellow of HEA, UK, and a member of Life Cycle Assessment New Zealand.

Deepak Singh Bisht
National Institute of Hydrology, Roorkee, India

Dr. DS Bisht is working as Scientist “B” in National Institute of Hydrology, an autonomous society under Ministry of Jal Shakti, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, Government of India. He did his Ph.D. and Masters from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur in the domain of hydrology and climate change. His research interests primarily include, but not limited to, hydrological modeling, urban drainage, flood modeling, climate change impact analysis, remote sensing applications, and springshed management.

Haroun Chenchouni
Higher National School of Forests, Khenchela, Algeria

Dr. Haroun Chenchouni is an associate professor and research scientist (Ecologist) at the Higher National School of Forests (Khenchela, Algeria). He is a former associate professor at the University of Tebessa (Algeria). He holds a doctorate degree in Ecology and Environment from the University of Batna 2 (Algeria) and a M.Sc. (Magister) in Dryland Ecology from the University of Ouargla (Algeria). He graduated as an engineer in Plant Ecology and Forest Ecosystems from the Department of Biological Sciences (University of Batna, Algeria). His research interests are fairly broad; he uses statistical modeling approaches to understand how natural environments, mainly climatic and edaphic factors, and anthropogenic perturbations influence biological interactions, shape trends in population dynamics, and influence community diversity. He uses various biological models to investigate biological interactions and community ecology of arid and semiarid ecosystems of North Africa.

Arkoprovo Biswas
Banaras Hindu University, India

Dr. Arkoprovo Biswas is an assistant professor at the Department of Geology, Institute of Science, Banaras Hindu University (BHU), Varanasi. He received his B.Sc. (2002) in Geology from Presidency College, University of Calcutta, M.Sc. (2004) in Geological Science, M.Tech. (2006) in Earth and Environmental Science from IIT Kharagpur, and P.G. Diploma (2009) in Petroleum Exploration from Annamalai University. He joined Geostar Surveys India Pvt. Ltd as a geophysicist in 2006 and later joined WesternGeco Electromagnetics, Schlumberger, as an On-Board Data Processing Field engineer/geophysicist in 2007 and served there till 2008. In 2013, he received his Ph.D. in Exploration Geophysics from IIT Kharagpur. Later, he joined the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Bhopal as a visiting faculty in 2014 and completed his tenure in 2015.

Attila Ciner
Istanbul Technical University, Turkey

Attila Çiner is a sedimentology and quaternary geology professor at the Eurasia Institute of Earth Sciences at Istanbul Technical University, Turkey. After graduating from the Middle East Technical University in Ankara (1985), he obtained his M.Sc. degree at the University of Toledo, USA (1988) and his Ph.D. at the University of Strasbourg, France (1992). He works on the tectono-sedimentary evolution of basins and quaternary depositional systems such as moraines, fluvial terraces, alluvial fans, and deltas. He uses cosmogenic nuclides to date these deposits. He primarily focuses on the glacial deposits and landscapes and tries to understand paleoclimatic and paleoenvironmental changes since the Last Glacial Maximum. Lastly, he was part of the Turkish Antarctic Expedition. He spent two months working on the site recognition and decision of the future Turkish scientific research station to be implemented on the continent.

Afroz Ahmad Shah
Universiti of Brunei Darussalam, Brunei

Shah Afroz is a senior assistant professor of Structural Geology at the Department of Geosciences, Universiti of Brunei Darussalam (UBD). He graduated from IIT Kanpur India in 2006 and then completed Ph.D. at James Cook University, Australia, in 2010, a post-doctorate at Earth Observatory of Singapore in 2013 and joined his first academic job as a senior lecturer of Structural Geology at Curtin Sarawak, Miri, Malaysia, before joining UBD. His research mainly involves the brittle deformation of lithospheric plates, focusing on earthquake-causing faults in South and Southeast Asia. It also includes floods, landslides, and land subsidence hazards. Shah works on earthquake science education and outreach and frequently writes in newspapers, magazines, and blogs. He is a National Geographic explorer, and his work on earthquake hazards in Kashmir has been featured in the National Geographic Magazine. He loves writing and has been involved in writing about geological and climatic hazards.

Ahmed Radwan
Institute of geological sciences, Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland

Dr. Ahmed E. Radwan is an adjunct professor at the Institute of Geological Sciences of the Jagiellonian University (Poland). Dr. Radwan has academic and industrial experience, since he obtained his Ph.D. in geophysics at Sohag University, Egypt, besides his proficient work in the oil and gas industry as section head at the exploration department of the Gulf of Suez petroleum company (Gupco), Egypt. As a post-doctoral research scientist, he attended Innsbruck University in Austria in 2019. In 2020, he joined the Jagiellonian University in Poland. Despite his youth, he has received numerous awards from international organizations such as the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS), the Geochemical Society (GS), the Clay Minerals Society (CMS), the Austrian Forschungsgemeinschaft (FG), the Narodowa Agencja Wymiany Akademickiej (NAWA), the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science, and Research (BMBWF), and petroleum companies.

Jasper Knight
University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

Jasper Knight is a geoscientist with research interests in the spatial and temporal variability in morphosedimentary system responses to rapid hemispheric-scale climatic and environmental changes during the late Pleistocene and Holocene. I focus thematically on glaciers, rivers, coasts, and mountains. Jasper Knight focuses geographically on Africa, Ireland, northwest USA, Australia, the European Alps, and various places in Asia and South America.

Dionysia Panagoulia
National Technical University of Athens, Greece

Dr. Dionysia G. Panagoulia is an associate professor at the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, with expertise in hydrology, hydroclimatology, and water systems. She is the author of more than 145 published research works, including being the co-editor of the book “River Basin Management - Under a Changing Climate” and lately has extended her research work to water economics theory and complex time/dark matter approaches. She has over 30 years of research experience in floods and their risk and hazard, extreme events, precipitation, global climate contribution to localclimate, climate change, low flows, droughts, maximum/minimum temperatures, sediment transport, groundwater/streamflow interaction, ANN, WEF Nexus, and water economics and management. She has cooperated in joint research with the University of Stuttgart, Germany; CNRS Laboratory of Oceanology and Geosciences Wimereux, France; Wageningen University, Netherlands; and McGill University, Canada.

Veysel Turan
Bingol University, Turkey

Veysel Turan is currently an associate professor at the Faculty of Agriculture, Bingöl, Türkiye. His research focuses on the interactions among soil science, environmental remediation, food chemistry, and climate change.   His Google Scholar H index is 38, Web of Science ESI top papers (13 as “highly cited papers” and 4 as “hot papers”). He was awarded an Excellence in Reviewing for the Journal of Environmental Management, Resources, Conservation and Recycling and Best Reviewer Award  Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology in 2022.

Matteo Gentilucci
University of Camerino, School of Science and Technology, Geology division, Camerino, Italy

Matteo Gentilucci had his B.Sc. degree in “Geological Sciences” from University of Camerino, Italy, in 2009 and then earned M.Sc. degree in 2012 from University of Camerino, Italy, in “Geoenvironmental Resources and Risks.” He earned a first-level master degree in GIS for the governance of the territory in 2012 and a Ph.D.  in “Sciences and technology: Earth Science” from the University of Camerino in 2017. From February 2017 to October 2018, he was a researcher at the Experimental Geophysical Observatory of Macerata, and in 2018, he became honorary fellow in Advanced GIS. In 2018 and 2019, he was a contract professor of the University of Camerino. Since 2022, he has been a researcher at the University of Camerino and holds courses in meteorology, climatology, and GIS.