Erfan Amiri, PhD

Erfan Amiri completed his PhD in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, under the supervision of Dr. James R. Craig. Amiri's research is primarily focused on computational analysis and software development for engineering problems. His current research concentrates on the numerical analysis of permafrost and the impact of heterogeneity on permafrost thaw patterns. Amiri earned his MSc at Sharif University of Technology in Iran between 2012 and 2015, under the supervision of Dr. Amir R. Khoei. His work during this period involved the extended finite element (XFEM) modeling of hydraulic fracturing in naturally fractured reservoirs, utilizing equivalent anisotropic permeability and compliance tensors.

Education

Doctor of Philosophy

2015 - 2020, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Master of Science

2012 - 2015, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Bachelor of Science

2008 - 2012, Babol Noshirvani University of Technology, Babol, Iran

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Research

Summary of research interests

  • ● Numerical analysis of phase-change in porous media

  • ● Numerical solution approaches to unsaturated and saturated flow systems

  • ● Heat transfer in soils

  • ● Computational mechanics

Interested in computational analysis and software development regarding engineering problems.

Previous research

Master's thesis: on "an extended finite element approach to modelling hydraulic fracturing in fractured rock masses using equivalent anisotropic compliance and permeability tensors", under the supervision of Dr. Amir R. Khoei.

PhD research: on numerical modelling of permafrost in heterogenous media, under the supervision of Dr. James R. Craig.

Journal and conference publications

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R., and Hirmand, M. R. (2019). A trust region approach for numerical modeling of non-isothermal phase change. Computational Geosciences. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10596-019-09846-3.

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R., and Kurylyk, B. L. (2018). A theoretical extension of the soil freezing curve paradigm. Advances in Water Resources, 111(November 2017), 319–328. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.advwatres.2017.11.021.

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R. (2019). Effect of soil thermal heterogeneity on permafrost body evolution. 18th International Conference on Cold Regions Engineering. https://doi.org/10.1061/9780784482599.057.

Conference talks and other presentations

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R. (August 2019). Effect of soil thermal heterogeneity on permafrost evolution. 18th International Conference on Cold Regions Engineering, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R., Devoie, E. G. (July 2019). Soil freezing point heterogeneity and talik formations. IUGG General Assembly, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R., Hirmand, M. R., Quinton, W. L. (June 2018). Numerical simulation of lateral permafrost thaw in the Northwest Territories. 5th European Conference on Permafrost, Mont-Blanc, France.

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R., & Devoie, E. G. (June 2018). Controlling factors on lateral permafrost thaw in the Northwest Territories: a numerical study. 2018 Joint Meeting of CGU, CSSS, CIG, ES-SSA and CSAFM, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada.

● Amiri, E. A., Craig, J. R. (November 2018). Numerical simulation of permafrost. Cold Regions Research Centre Day, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

Teaching

Certificates

  • - Certificate for University Teaching (CUT) - ongoing

  • Centre for Teaching Excellence (CTE), University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON

  • - Fundamentals of Univeristy Teaching (FUT), November 2016.

  • Centre for Teaching Excellence (CTE), University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON

Experience

Teacher's Assistant for the following courses:

  • - Differential Equations and Balance Laws (Winter 2017 and 2018)

  • - Linear Algebra (Fall 2016, 2017, and 2018)

  • - Advanced Calculus (Winter 2016)

  • - Environmental Resource Management (Summer 2016)

SIMPER

SIMPER is a 2D FEM-based code written in C++ for modelling thermal problems with non-isothermal phase-chage with a specific application in permafrost modelling. The goal of this software is to capture the short- and long-term feedbacks of permafrost to climate change via an impelementation of a robust mathematical model. A powerful numerical scheme has been implemented in SIMPER to avoid convergence and stability issues due to the level of the nonlinearity of the problem. The solutions obtained from this model is verified against the existing analytical solutions. SIMPER is also linked with GSLIB (a geostatistical program), which allows us to run simulations in a spatially correlated heterogeneous soil domain.

Other software developments

● Finite element based Matlab Toolbox

This toolbox, developed for analyzing 2D solids and structures, solves the following problems:

- Nonlinear solver:

1- Material nonlinearity: bulk response including elasto-plastic behavior of materials in both small deformation and large deformation assumptions.

2- Geometrical nonlinearity: Large deformation analysis in updated and total Lagrangian procedures.

- Quasi-static frictionless contact problems regarding both small deformation and large deformation assumptions using Penalty, Largrange multipliers and Augmented Lagrange methods.

Contact

Erfan Amiri, PhD

University of Waterloo

Email:

eabedian@uwaterloo.ca

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