BRIGHT SPARKS LECTURE - 5TH INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM FOR FRONTIERS IN OFFSHORE GEOTECHNICS (ISFOG 2025), NANTES, FRANCE
The YMPG in collaboration with the Organising Committee for the 5th International Symposium for Frontiers in Offshore Geotechnics (ISFOG 2025) in France would like to announce the winners of the Bright Spark Lecture Award to two distinguished young geotechnical engineers/academics listed below. They were invited to give keynote lectures on 9-13 June 2025.
Christelle Abadie, Academic researcher, Université Gustave Eiffel
Bright Spark Lecture Title: "Shared anchor pile response to multi-directional lateral cyclic loading"
Shengjie Rui, Marie Curie research fellow, Norwegian Geotechnical Institute
Bright Spark Lecture Title: "Mooring line & anchor-seabed interaction for floating wind turbines"
The Bright Spark Lecture Award was established to promote young members of the ISSMGE to play a major role in various international and regional conferences. Recipients of this award are invited to give a keynote lecture at ISSMGE conferences. All Technical Committee conference organisers and Member Society conference organisers are encouraged to select Bright Spark Lecturers at their conferences. Details regarding the award can be found on the ISSMGE website: https://www.issmge.org/the-society/awards/bright-spark-lecture-award.
We invite everyone, especially young geotechnical engineers, to come and enjoy the lectures. We hope these lectures can inspire and motivate us further to excel in our beloved field, geotechnical engineering.
Winners Bio
Christelle Abadie
Dr. Christelle Abadie graduated in 2011 with a double degree from ENSTA Paris and an MSc in advanced structural design. She pursued a PhD at the University of Oxford, focusing on offshore geotechnics and developing a novel model for monopile foundations under cyclic lateral loading. She then continued research as lead PDRA on the PISA2 project at Oxford.
In 2018, Dr. Abadie became an Assistant Professor at the University of Cambridge, where she was the youngest member of the permanent academic staff in Engineering and the first woman fellow in Engineering at Fitzwilliam College. She also served as the academic representative for the British Offshore Engineering Society, the UK representative for the European Large Geotechnical Institutes Platform, and a corresponding member of TC209.
In 2023, she joined the University Gustave Eiffel, where she focuses on advancing next-generation offshore wind turbine foundations. She continues her role with TC209 and serves as lead editor and cogeneral secretary for the upcoming ISFOG conference. As an active member of the offshore geotechnical community, Dr. Abadie collaborates closely with leading offshore wind energy companies and was recently invited to author the foundation chapter for the ICE book on civil engineering aspects of offshore wind farms.
Shengjie Rui
Shengjie Rui, Marie Curie Research Fellow. He works at the Norwegian Geotechnical Institute (NGI) in Norway, focusing on research related to marine new energy development, offshore geotechnics, and ocean engineering. He leads a European Union-funded project (MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowship 2022 with full marks) and participates in two large projects (Tailwind in the European Union and SFI BLUES in Norway). With over 45 published papers, including 35 in SCI journals and one highly cited hot topic paper, he also holds 5 US invention patents. He serves as a corresponding/nominated member of the International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE) in TC209 (offshore geotechnics), TC104 (physical modelling), and TC213 (scour and erosion). Additionally, he is the Associate Editor of the SCI journal 'KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering' and a Guest Editor for 'Frontiers in Marine Science', 'Sustainability', and 'Journal of Marine Science and Engineering'. He reviews more than 20 SCI journals, including 'Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering' and 'Marine Structures'. He has won more than 25 honors and awards, such as Excellent PhD Thesis Award of the Chinese Society for Rock Mechanics & Engineering (CSRME) and Zhejiang University, China National Scholarship, outstanding graduate student of Zhejiang University.
