Professor of Hydrodynamics

Academic Division: Civil Engineering

Telephone: +44 1223 7 64829

Email: dl359@eng.cam.ac.uk

Research interests

Prof Liang's research topics include hydrodynamics, water engineering, hydro-environment, sediment transport, water/soil/structure interactions and flood risk management. He has studied rapid shallow water flows, rainfall-runoff processes, ocean wave propagation and runup, scour and liquefaction around offshore structures, seepage and overtopping induced embankment failure, flow-like landslides, turbulent mixing and water pollution. 

Prof Liang has developed several mesh-based and meshfree computational models for his research, and has expertise in photogrammetry and digital image processing and their application in hydraulic engineering. He is the chairman of the local organising committee for the MPM2019 Conference (http://mpm2019.eu), and has been sponsored by the Cambridge Centre for Smart Infrastructure and Construction (https://www-smartinfrastructure.eng.cam.ac.uk) and Trimble Fund to apply advanced sensing technology to monitor floods and landslides. 

Strategic themes

Bioengineering

Prof Liang is collaborating with medical and electronic researchers to investigate the acoustophoretic separation of cancer cells in microchannels. 

Complex, resilient and intelligent systems

Prof Liang's research contributes to the sustainable management of water resources, the mitigation of flood risk and geo-hazards, and stability of underwater structures in hydraulic and ocean engineering.

Teaching activity

Prof Liang lectures Water Engineering and Engineering Surveying. He is a Fellow and Director of Studies at Churchill College. At the College, he teaches Mechanics, Structures and Thermofluids. 

Other positions

Prof Liang is a co-chair of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Cambridgeshire Branch, and is an associate editor of the Journal of Hydrodynamics, Maritime Engineering and Journal of Safety Science and Resilience. 

Biography

Prof Liang graduated in hydraulic engineering from Tsinghua University in China (BEng in 1998 and PhD in 2003). His PhD project involved the measurement of shallow water flows using the large-scale PIV (Particle Image Velocimetry) and PLIF (Planar Laser Induced Fluorescence) techniques. He then widened his research experience by concentrating on numerical methods while working in the University of Western Australia and Cardiff University, both as research associates. He joined the University of Cambridge in late 2006. 

Prof Liang visited Kyoto University as a Matsumae International Research Fellow in 2012, TU Berlin as a Humboldt Research Fellow for Experienced Researchers in 2013-2015, and Deltares as a Marie Curie Fellow in 2016. He was a Royal Academy of Engineering Industrial Fellow in 2015.