The fabric of present-day societies is interwoven with a complex system of water management: human communities rely on a fairly sophisticated use of water that includes food production, industrial manufacturing, transportation and energy production.
Human communities are also exposed to water-related hazards (river floods, landslides triggered by intense precipitation, sea storms) and, in the course of their industrial development, have created new hazards and increased their own exposure (dam safety issues, building in floodplains and seashores, pollution).
Hydraulics and Hydrology are the key disciplines that allow for tackling the technological issues associated to the need for efficient usage of water and protection against related hazards. They contextualize the fundamental sciences of fluid mechanics, hydrodynamics and atmospheric physics for the purpose of achieving water-related technological advancements with positive impacts on human communities.
Improving knowledge in Hydraulics and Hydrology is thus imperative in modern societies and a responsability of R&D institutions.
The main objective of this PhD programme addresses this responsibility: to promote research beyond the state-of-the-art in both fundamental and applied aspects of Hydraulics and Hydrology. In particular, the following key themes are envisaged:
(a) surface hydrology,
(b) pressure flows,
(c) hydraulics structures and renewable energy,
(d) river hydraulics and morphodynamics,
(e) maritime/coastal hydraulics and morphodynamics and
(f) ecohydraulics.
The present PhD programme is implemented by a highly connected international network of academics and practitioners benefiting from public funding. Such network is composed by a Portuguese higher education institution, IST/UTL, two Portuguese R&D units – the Portuguese state laboratory LNEC and CEHIDRO – and a non-Portuguese university, EPFL. It is a natural follow-up of decades of fruitful collaboration between CEHIDRO and LNEC and CEHIDRO and EPFL.
Those institutions have based their relation on a complex structure of complementarities and mutual enhancement, expressed in the type of laboratory facilities, instrumentation and research traditions. To maximize synergies and the benefits of complementarity, students of EPFL’s track will carry out research on all key themes, except on maritime/coastal hydraulics. Those of LNEC’s track will address maritime/coastal hydraulics and, in a smaller extent, pressure flows, hydraulics structures, renewable energy, river hydraulics and morphodynamics.
Dual PhD degrees will be granted in the IST-EPFL track; IST diplomas will be granted in IST-LNEC track.