Professor Stephen Foster recognised for global contribution
At the recent 5Th fib International Congress held in October in Melbourne, Professor Stephen Foster was awarded the 2018 fib Honorary Membership. The award is given in recognition of significant personal contributions to the work of the fib.
The fib, (Fédération internationale du béton), is a not-for-profit international association formed by 45 national member groups and approximately 1000 corporate and individual members. Its mission is to develop at an international level the study of scientific and practical matters capable of advancing the technical, economic, aesthetic and environmental performance of concrete construction.
Professor Foster is a member of the fib Presidium and Head of the fib Australian National Delegation. He is a member of the fib journal Structural Concrete Editorial Board since 2017, Deputy Chair of the fib Technical Council since 2015 and a member of numerous fib working groups. He was the former Chairman of fib Commission 4 “Modelling of Structural Behaviour and design”.
Throughout his career Stephen has been involved in a number of research projects involving the use of technology in the development of concrete structures and infrastructure. In the field of High Strength, High Performance, Concrete, he has undertaken extensive research at both the materials and structural levels and has won a number of competitive grants in the field.
His research on Strut-and-Tie Modelling and on High Strength Concrete Columns, much of which was funded through ARC Large and Discovery project grants, now forms the basis of many of the design rules in the Australia Concrete Structures Standard, AS3600-2009. This has impact on many thousands of structures built throughout Australia each year. Similarly, his works on high strength and high performance concretes has provided significant impact on the construction industry through incorporation in the fib Model code draft 2010.
In addition to his experience in testing of high performance, high strength concrete, Professor Foster has developed a powerful non-linear finite element program for the modelling of concrete structures, which has assisted in the development of numerous experimental programmes and in the post analysis of the results. He has considerable research experience on strength and ductility in reinforced concrete structures and has published widely in the field.
He has a strong track record in research publishing over 300 papers and reports, including 4 books, 2 edited books, 10 book chapters, and 121 journal papers. He has graduated 23 PhD students and is currently supervising or co-supervising 12 more.
Stephen is a former Director of the UNSW Centre for infrastructure, Engineering & Safety (CIES), and Head of the UNSW School of Civil & Environmental Engineering since 2012. He is currently Acting Head, School of Minerals & Energy Resources Engineering
In 2015 Stephen was awarded honorary membership Concrete Institute of Australia, 20
