ILEE director Prof. Xianglin Gu and vice director Prof. Ying Zhou were invited to visit three research institutes in Switzerland, including Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (EMPA), Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) through January 29 to February 3, 2019. The visit was intended to develop and strengthen mutual collaborations between Tongji University and the institutes in Switzerland on academic interaction and talents cultivation.

At the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering of ETH, Prof. Gu and the group members visited Prof. Božidar Stojadinović, who is the chair of Structural Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering in the university department and also serves as the member of scientific committee of ILEE. During the visit at ETH, the group visited ETH structural laboratory, and Prof. Gu invited Prof. Stojadinović to revisit Tongji University and ILEE in near future.

On February 1, the Tongji group visited Prof. Dimitrios Lignos and Prof. Thomas Keller at EPFL. Prof. Lignos is currently an associate professor and the chair of Resilient Steel Structures Laboratory, and Prof. Keller is a full professor of Composite Construction Laboratory at EPFL. On behalf of ILEE, Prof. Gu extended his acknowledgement and gratefulness to Prof. Lignos for his contributions and supports for ILEE international review on collaboration projects.

Prof. Xianglin Gu, Prof. Ying Zhou and Prof. Božidar Stojadinović at ETH

Prof. Xianglin Gu and the group with Prof. Thomas Keller and Prof. Dimitrios Lignos at EPFL