Role
My main teaching areas are geotechnical engineering, including soil mechanics, geotechnical testing of soils, ground investigation & geohazards (e.g. landslides, subsidence, etc.) and engineering materials.
My main roles at NTU include:
- Module Leader for Ground Engineering (UG).
- Module Leader for Sustainable Engineering Materials (UG).
- Module Leader for Geophysical & Geotechnical Investigation and Design (PG).
- PhD supervision.
- Final year undergraduate & masters project (dissertation) supervision.
- Admissions Tutor for all undergraduate civil engineering courses
Lead Tutor for undergraduate civil engineering open days.
Career overview
Education:
- BSc Geophysics & Planetary Physics (University of Newcastle, UK).
- MSc Environmental Geotechnics (University of Newcastle, UK).
- EngD (Doctorate) in ‘Optimising the use of ground penetrating radar (GPR) for road pavement assessment’ (Loughborough University, UK).
Employment:
- 5 years as a Research Engineer in the Ground Engineering section of TRL.
- 2 years as a Research Fellow in the Geohazards Group of Nottingham Trent University.
- 1 year as a Lecturer in Civil Engineering at Nottingham Trent University.
- 5 years as a Pavement Engineer at Jacobs.
Since 2010: Senior Lecturer in Civil Engineering at Nottingham Trent University.
Research areas
I currently have research and practice interests in the areas of ground penetrating radar (GPR), geotechnical soil assessment & testing, non-destructive pavement (road) assessment and slope stability (landslides).
Some of the main research and practice activities I have worked on include:
- Ground penetrating radar (GPR) investigation of the building features of historic churches. Some of my work, on Sir Christopher Wren designed churches in London, was used to inform the Sustainability Toolkit for zero-carbon churches: see “An Inter-disciplinary Toolkit for Exploring Passive Zero Carbon Transition Pathways for Wren’s City Churches” at https://squaremilechurches.co.uk/resources/toolkits/.
- A Study of Rainfall Infiltration on Slope Stability using Sand Piles to Reinforce Slopes. Director of Studies for PhD project on laboratory and computer modelling of the influence of rainfall and drainage on landslides. https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/51885/1/Sohaib%20Naseer%202023.pdf
- Advancing Soil Assessment: Vision-Based monitoring for subgrade quality and dynamic modulus. Co-Investigator for British Geotechnical Association (BGA) Research Development Funded project on an innovative method for in-situ subgrade stiffness evaluation.
- Earthworks & soils testing appreciation. I delivered a series of 1-day laboratory-based training courses for engineers from Winvic Construction, on geotechnical soil testing & properties.
- The Commercial Geotechnical Laboratory. I am part of the team, led by Dr Paul Beetham (NTU), that secured funds and conducted a successful trial of commercial soils testing in the NTU Geotechnical Laboratory, collaborating with Socotec & GRM.
I have collaborated on projects with numerous external partners such as Van Elle, Laing O’Rourke, Winvic, Mears Architects, the Diocese of London, Socotec, GRM, Highways England, Transport Scotland, the General Directorate for National Roads and Motorways (GDDKiA) of Poland, Appleyard & Trew, the British Geotechnical Association (BGA), and Pulse Surveying.
External activity
- Technical Committee Member & Reviewer for 7th Conference on Sustainability in Civil Engineering (CSCE’25), organized by the Department of Civil Engineering at Capital University of Science and Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan, August 2025.
- Technical Committee Member & Reviewer for the 9th International Conference on Modelling, Simulation and Applied Optimization (ICMSAO 23), Marrakesh, Morocco, 2023.
- Reviewer for 6th Conference on Sustainability in Civil Engineering (CSCE’24), organized by the Department of Civil Engineering at Capital University of Science and Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan, August 2024
- Reviewer for NDT&E International journal.
- Fellow of Advance HE (FHEA).
Sponsors and collaborators
Previous research collaborators and clients Rob has worked with have included:
- The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, EPSRC (Engineering Doctorate research, 2004-2009)
- The Highways Agency (various research projects, 1996-2000)
- The European Commission 4th Framework ('ALT-MAT' research: Alternative materials in road construction, 1998-2000)
- Loughborough University (Engineering Doctorate research, 2004-2009)
- Jacobs UK Ltd (various consultancy and research projects, 2004-2010).
Rob has also conducted consultancy work for a number of clients including:
- Transport Scotland
- British Airports Authority (BAA)
- The Transport Directorate of Poland (GDDKiA)
- Babcock Marine (for the MoD)
- UK Water Industry Research (UKWIR)
- Various local authorities.
Publications
Selected publications include:
Evans, R. 2023. The use of ground penetrating radar (GPR) to improve sustainability in pavement engineering projects. Keynote presentation at 5th Conference on Sustainability in Civil Engineering (CSCE’23), Islamabad, Pakistan, August 2023.
Naseer, S., and Evans, R. 2022. Effect of rainfall intensity and duration on stability of natural slopes of unsaturated fine soils. In: proceedings of the 4th Conference on Sustainability in Civil Engineering (CSCE’22), Islamabad, Pakistan, pp. 405-411. ISBN 9789692334433.
https://www.csce.cust.edu.pk/archive/CSCE_22_conference_proceedings/Paper%20ID.22-601.pdf
Naseer, S., and Evans, R. 2020. Stability analysis of slopes using limit equilibrium and finite element methods. In: proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Sustainability in Civil Engineering (CSCE’20), Islamabad, Pakistan, Capital University of Science and Technology, pp. 364-371. ISBN 9789692334419.
https://csce.cust.edu.pk/archive/Conference%20Proceedings.pdf (p364)
Al-Ameen, Y., Ianakiev, A. and Evans, R., 2018. Recycling construction and industrial landfill waste material for backfill in horizontal ground heat exchanger systems. Energy, 151. ISSN 0360-5442.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360544218305048?via%3Dihub
Al-Ameen, Y., Ianakiev, A. and Evans, R., 2017. Thermal performance of a solar assisted horizontal ground heat exchanger. Energy, 140. ISSN 0360-5442.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360544217314664?via%3Dihub
Evans, R., 2015. Sustainable assessment of structures and materials using ground penetrating radar (GPR). Contemporary Trends in the Regenerative and Sustainable Built Environment: Technical and Managerial Aspects: workshop proceedings. Istanbul Technical Uni. ISBN 9780992887803.
https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/27128/1/Evans.pdf
Evans, R., Morrow, R. and Nash, J. 2014. The use of ground penetrating radar to investigate a Churchyard Burial Plot. Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR 2014), Brussels. ISBN 9781479967896.
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6970382
Evans, R., and Rahman, M. 2012. The influence of moisture on the detection of de-bonding in asphalt pavements using ground penetrating radar (GPR). In: Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference in Transportation Geotechnics, Sapporo, Japan.
Press expertise
- Geotechnical engineering
- Ground penetrating radar
- Recycled materials
- Assessing of road conditions