Laboratory Overview

The China–Netherlands Joint Laboratory for Advanced Civil Engineering Materials was jointly established by Microlab at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and the Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Durability for Marine Civil Engineering at Shenzhen University under an agreement signed on December 23, 2013.

The Joint Laboratory aims to strengthen inter-university cooperation in science and technology, develop collaborative activities in teaching and research, promote and support academic exchanges and student mobility at all levels, conduct joint research, and share experimental and numerical simulation facilities.

Development and Collaborative Achievements

The Joint Laboratory was approved as an official project by the Department of Education of Guangdong Province in January 2015, and its inauguration ceremony was held on April 9, 2016.

To date, the Joint Laboratory has secured a Major International Cooperation Project funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. 51120185002. It has jointly trained three doctoral students, co-authored a number of research papers, and obtained several patents.

The two parties have jointly organized more than four workshops and mini-symposia. They also jointly initiated the establishment of a technical committee on self-healing materials under RILEM, the International Union of Laboratories and Experts in Construction Materials, Systems and Structures, and have assumed leadership roles within the committee.

The two institutions have undertaken varying levels of cooperation in resource recovery, comprehensive resource utilization, and sustainable development. They also plan to jointly apply for bilateral China–Netherlands research projects in civil engineering materials and to further promote faculty exchange and other collaborative activities.

Delft University of Technology and Microlab

Delft University of Technology is the oldest, largest, and most comprehensive university of technology in the Netherlands and is one of Europe’s most renowned technological universities. It possesses world-class teaching facilities and research equipment, while its civil engineering discipline enjoys a leading position and an outstanding international reputation.

Together with Imperial College London, ETH Zurich, and RWTH Aachen University, Delft University of Technology forms the IDEA League. The University is internationally recognized for the high quality of its teaching and research and has received recognition from numerous international professional and technical organizations.

Microlab is an independent laboratory within the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences at Delft University of Technology. It is also an important component of the Delft Centre for Materials and provides experimental, modelling, and analytical support for fundamental research across a wide range of fields.

Microlab plays an indispensable role in research on microstructural evolution, material structure formation, and material performance. It coordinates research related to self-healing materials across Delft University of Technology and is internationally recognized as a leading laboratory in the field of self-healing concrete.

Several Microlab researchers hold important positions in national and international academic organizations. These include leadership roles such as Chair of the Dutch Expert Committee on Concrete Repair and Chair of the RILEM Technical Committee on Self-Healing Materials.