Dr. Erol Tutumluer

Dr. Erol Tutumluer is Abel Bliss Professor specializing in Transportation Geotechnics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). Dr. Tutumluer has research interests and expertise in characterization of highway/ airfield pavement and railroad track geomaterials, geosynthetics, advanced imaging techniques and applications of artificial intelligence and deep learning techniques to transportation infrastructure, structural health monitoring of transportation facilities using sensors, sustainable use of foundation geomaterials and construction practices for transportation infrastructure, discrete element analysis of ballast, and dynamic response measurement and analyses of track systems. Professor Tutumluer has served as an investigator on over 120 research projects, graduated 25 PhD and 46 MS students, and authored/co-authored over 380 peer reviewed publications from his research projects. Dr. Tutumluer is a Founding Editor-in-Chief of the Transportation Geotechnics Elsevier journal and the immediate past Chair of the ISSMGE Technical Committee 202 on Transportation Geotechnics. As a Council Member (2020-2026) of the International Geosynthetics Society (IGS), Dr. Tutumluer currently serves as Chair of the Technical Committee on Stabilization. He is an Executive Board Member of the Transportation Research Board’s (TRB’s) Transportation Infrastructure Group. Dr. Tutumluer was the 2000 recipient of the TRB’s Fred Burgraff award for Excellence in Transportation Research. He was selected and honored with Yangtze River Scholar Award by China Ministry of Education in 2016. He received Qiushi Distinguished Professor title bestowed upon him by Zhejiang University and delivered the Zeng Guoxi honor lecture in China in 2019. Dr. Tutumluer is the 2020 recipient of the ASCE T&DI James Laurie Prize in recognition of his career accomplishments for promoting Transportation Geotechnics field and the 2021 recipient of ASCE Geo-Institute’s Carl L. Monismith Lecture Award. In 2023, Dr. Tutumluer received an IGS Award in recognition of his significant contributions towards the use of geosynthetics in roadways, railways, and airfields. Dr. Tutumluer is scheduled to deliver ASCE T&DI’s Francis Turner and ISSMGE Proctor Lectures in 2024.