The International FORUM of Fire Research Directors selected the recipients for the 2015 – 2016 Sjölin and mid-career researcher awards.
THE FORUM SJÖLIN AWARD
The FORUM Sjölin Award recognizes an outstanding contribution to the science of fire safety or an advance in the state of the art in fire safety engineering practice of extraordinary significance. It is presented to the individual or group whose efforts are primarily responsible for or traceable to the specified advance. The prize consists of a plaque and an honorarium. Recipients of the award are selected annually and the awards are delivered at the triennial symposia of the International Association for Fire Safety Science, IAFSS.
The FORUM selected Prof. Arnaud Trouvé, University of Maryland, as the recipient of the 2017 Sjölin Award in recognition of his outstanding contribution to fire science and engineering through research in combustion science for over 25 years. Prof. Trouvé has produced numerous improvements of combustion models working with fire modelling including Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), zone modelling, direct numerical simulation (DNS) and large eddy simulation (LES) of turbulent reacting flows. His work also includes high-performance (parallel) scientific computing, cyber-infrastructure and application of data assimilation to fire and combustion. Prof. Trouvé’s interest in the physical modeling of fire-related phenomena has spanned the following areas: buoyancy-generated turbulence; turbulent combustion; soot formation and oxidation; combustion-generated toxic products; radiation heat transfer; wall surface heat transfer; water-based fire suppression systems; pyrolysis, material flammability and flame spread; flash fires, fireballs, and explosions; and wildfires propagation.
The FORUM selected Dr. Esko Mikkola as the recipient of the 2016 Sjölin Award. With this award the FORUM is recognizing more than three decades of outstanding contributions to fire safety engineering practice, in particular as it pertains to evaluating the fire performance of materials, products and structures, the comprehensive fire risk assessment of challenging construction projects such as multi-story timber frame buildings and underground structures, and the development and interpretation of fire safety regulations. One aspect of Dr. Mikkola’s work that was highlighted is the development in the late 1980s of thermal ignition models for combustible materials, which are widely referenced in the literature until today. Over the years, Dr. Mikkola has conducted cutting-edge research on reaction-to-fire performance and charring of wood-based materials, the effect of fire retardants on the fire performance of materials and products, the analysis of toxic smoke gases, the evaluation of the fire performance of façades and timber structures through large-scale experiments, wildland-urban interface fires, and the application of performance-based fire safety approach to demonstrate compliance with fire safety requirements.
The FORUM selected Dr. William Parker as the recipient of the 2015 Sjölin Award. The FORUM selected Dr. Parker in recognition of his outstanding contribution to fire science and engineering through the creation of innovative methods for accurately measuring heat release rate in fire experiments; initially by developing an isothermal heat release rate calorimeter, for which Dr. Parker was awarded the U.S. Department of Commerce bronze medal in 1976; and more recently by deriving and implementing the equations for measuring heat release rate based on the oxygen consumption technique, which is now used in fire research and testing laboratories throughout the world. Other aspects of Dr. Parker’s work that were highlighted are the development of a comprehensive computer model to predict the heat release rate of wood, which accounts for the effects of contraction of and fissures developing in the char; extensive research on the flammability of upholstered furniture, the results of which are described in numerous publications, including a book co-authored with Dr. Vytenis Babrauskas and Dr. John Krasny; and his role in the development the “Phi Meter,” an instrument for monitoring combustion equivalence ratio in room fires independent of the fuel.
THE FORUM MID-CAREER RESEARCHER AWARD
The FORUM Mid-Career Researcher Award recognizes exceptional achievement and demonstrated leadership in the fields of fire safety science or fire protection engineering made by those in mid-career. It is intended to honor an individual, who is between the ages of 35 and 50 at the time of nomination. The prize consists of a plaque and an honorarium. Recipients of the award are selected annually and the awards are delivered at the triennial symposia of the IAFSS.
The FORUM selected Dr. Randall McDermott, National Institute of Standards and Technology, NIST, as the recipient of the 2017 Mid-Career Researcher Award. With this award, the FORUM is recognizing McDermott’s outstanding contributions over the last decade as a lead technical developer of the Fire Dynamic Simulator (FDS) software and the architect of the latest versions of FDS. He has led technical efforts on the hydrodynamics and combustion solvers as well as the Verification Guide. FDS is most important in terms of use by practicing engineers, education, fire investigations, design of fire protection systems, etc. all over the world.
McDermott’s specific contributions are numerous and have led to dramatic improvements in FDS’s performance. Specific improvements include eliminating spurious vorticity at mesh boundaries and dispersion error in species transport, implementing the Deardorff turbulence model, near-wall stress models, the Turbulent Batch Reactor model, and developing the infrastructure for users to utilize detailed chemical kinetic mechanisms.
In summary, his work has been critical to the technical rigor and sophistication manifest in recent FDS developments, which are having a big impact on international fire safety.
The FORUM selected Professor Stanislav Stoliarov, University of Maryland, as the recipient of the 2016 Mid-Career Researcher Award. With this award, the FORUM is recognizing Dr. Stoliarov’s outstanding contributions to improving our understanding of the complex physical and chemical phenomena involved in the heat transfer through and thermal decomposition of materials and products exposed in a fire, and to establishing quantitative connections between standard fire test results and the fundamental thermo-physical properties and structure of the material. More specifically, the FORUM is recognizing Dr. Stoliarov’s contributions to the creation of the Microscale Combustion Calorimeter described in ASTM D7309; his development of one of the first generalized comprehensive pyrolysis models, ThermaKin; his efforts to develop a systematic methodology for pyrolysis model parametrization, which relies on a combination of new experimental methods and inverse modeling; and the design of a new experimental method, Microscale Flame Calorimetry, for quantitative assessment of relative activity of gas-phase flame retardants using mg-sized solid samples.
The FORUM selected Professor Kazunori Harada, Kyoto University, as the recipient of the 2015 Mid-Career Researcher Award. With this award, the FORUM is recognizing Dr. Harada’s outstanding contributions in the areas of fundamental fire research, development of practical fire design methods, and university education in fire engineering. More specifically, the FORUM is recognizing Dr. Harada’s contributions to computer modeling of heat and mass transfer in concrete elements during fire in relation to spalling; the development of a glass breaking model; the development of a set of simplified calculation methods of temperature response of structural elements, which have been adopted in the performance verification methods for fire resistance in the Building Standards Law of Japan and are being used for practical design calculations; experimental evaluation and modeling of the burning behavior of combustible items in realistic conditions, e.g., accounting for the thermal feedback in an enclosure and location effects for an object near a wall or in a corner; and the development of engineering tools for performance based fire safety engineering, e.g., methods to calculate the flow rate of fire smoke through a horizontal opening and the charring rate of structural timbers during all phases of a fire, including cool-down.
Marc L. Janssens, Ph.D., FSFPE
Chair of the FORUM Award Committee (2016)
Björn Sundström, adj. prof., Ph.D.
Chair of the International FORUM for Fire Research Directors (2017)
Dr Natalia Flores-Quiroz is a researcher with experience in fire safety engineering. She worked for five years as a fire safety engineer in the mining industry before joining academia. She holds a MSc in fire safety from Ghent University, and her PhD focused on Fire investigations in Informal Settlements. Currently she is a lecturer at Stellenbosch University, where her main research areas are reconstruction of incidents in low-income settlements (i.e., informal settlements, refugee camps) and wildland urban interface (WUI) fires.
Bronwyn Forrest is a 3rd year PhD student at the University of Waterloo, conducting multi-disciplinary research investigating human physiological response to fire exposure. Bronwyn graduated in 2017 with a BSc. Honours Kinesiology and in 2020 with a MASc. Mechanical & Mechatronics Engineering (Heat Release Rate in Ventilation-Limited Furniture Fires) before merging her two degrees in her PhD research. As a senior graduate student in the Fire Research Group, Bronwyn spear-heads large-scale fire experiments, mentors junior graduate and undergraduate students, and has recently set-up a new ‘human exposure lab’ at the Fire Research Facility where she leads new research in that area. Since her induction into the world of fire science, Bronwyn has grown more and more passionate about the multi-faceted nature of emerging fire safety challenges. Through innovative research, she hopes to make meaningful contributions that help shape changes to fire safety over the course of her career.
Dr. (HDR) Eric Guillaume has worked in fire sciences since 1998. He formerly led the fire behaviour department of SNCF (French Railway), then changed company in 2005 to join LNE (The French National Laboratory for Testing and Metrology) as head of Fire safety studies department, and later as head of research for whole testing activities of LNE. Nowadays (since 2015), he works for Efectis France, first as Technical Director and more recently as General Manager of the company, leading one of the most important fire testing and fire safety engineering companies in Europe (With approx. 180 people and 28 M€ turnover)
Dr. Albert Simeoni is Professor and the Department Head of Fire Protection Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). He is the WPI site director of the Wildfire Interdisciplinary Research Center (WIRC), an Industry-University Cooperative Research Center (IUCRC) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) in the United States. Dr. Simeoni has served IAFSS by being chair or co-chair of the Wildland Fire track (2014, 2020 and 2023), Co-chair of the Awards Committee for the Best Thesis Awards (2023), Associate-Editor of Fire Safety Journal (2010-2015), member of the Editorial Board of Fire Safety Journal (since 2016), and Contributing Editor of Fire Safety Science News (since 2011).
Brian J. Meacham, PhD, PE (CT&MA), EUR ING, CEng (UK), FIFireE, FSFPE, is the Managing Principal of Meacham Associates. He develops risk-informed performance-based solutions to complex building and infrastructure challenges, provides peer-review services, and undertakes building and fire regulatory system studies. He also conducts research in these areas as well as in sustainable and fire resilient built environments and fire safety technologies. Brian has authored more than 300 publications, given more than 300 presentations and has been awarded more than $4M in research funding. His prior positions include Associate Professor of Fire Protection Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Principal at Arup, Technical Director and Research Director at SFPE, and fire safety engineer in Europe and the USA. Brian is Chair of the ICC Performance Code Committee, Chair of the NFPA Technical Committee on Fire Risk Assessment Methods, Immediate Past Chair of the International Association for Fire Safety Science (IAFSS), a Past President of the SFPE, and a past Chair of the Inter-jurisdictional Regulatory Collaboration Committee (IRCC). He is a licensed Professional Engineer in CT and MA, a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Fire Engineers (UK), a registered European Engineer (EUR ING), a Fellow of the SFPE, and a Fulbright Global Scholar.
Kazunori Harada is a professor of architecture & architectural engineering at Kyoto University, Japan. He has a career in fire research for over 35 years. He has authored 14 IAFSS symposium papers. His expertise covers the fire resistance of construction materials, smoke movement and control, burning of combustibles in open and compartment, performance-based code & design of buildings and so on. He serves as a vice president of AOAFST, Asia-Oceania Association of Fire Science and Technology. He also serves as the Convenor of ISO/TC92/SC4 WG9, calculation methods for fire safety engineering (FSE), which develops calculation standards concerning FSE.
Enrico Ronchi is an Associate Professor at Lund University, Sweden. His research and education activities are focused on evacuation and human behaviour in case of building fires and wildfires. His work has been published in over 150 publications (including >90 peer-reviewed journal papers). He is currently Associate Editor for the journals Fire Technology and Safety Science and member of the editorial board of the Fire Safety Journal.
Jennifer Wen is currently Professor of Energy Resilience in the School of Mechanical Engineering Sciences, University of Surrey as Professor. Previously, Jennifer held positions at Computational Dynamics Limited (founding vendor of STAR-CCM), British Gas plc, South Bank University, Kingston University London, and University of Warwick. She is a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and Vice-Chair for Research for the International Association for Fire Safety Science. Jennifer is also a member and sub-task leader of the European Safety Panel on Hydrogen Safety (EHSP) established by the Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (now Clean Hydrogen Partnership) of the European Commission. She is an Associate Editor for the Proceedings of the Combustion Institute.
Dr Wojciech Węgrzyński is with ITB, that is the Polish Building Research Institute in Warsaw. He currently holds the position of the Deputy Head of Fire Research Department and the Professor of the Institute, and a Director at SFPE Europe. He is the Author of 40 peer-reviewed papers published in all of the primary FSE journals. His main area of interest is the fundamentals of compartment fire dynamics and standardized fire testing, and also: use of computational fluid dynamics in fire, wind and fire interaction and evaluation of the effects of the spread of smoke in buildings. His research is focused on the impact of the architectural context of the building on the smoke control performance, as well as finding solutions to make the smoke exhaust systems cheaper and more efficient. Member of the Sub-committee for Research of the IAFSS. 2018 NFPA Harry C. Bigglestone Award Recipient; 2019 Jack Watts Award Recipient; 2020 SFPE 5 Under 35 Award Recipient. Member of Editorial Board of ‘Fire Technology. Hosts a fire podcast at 
Dr. Shuna Ni is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Fire Protection Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park. She received her Ph.D. degree at Texas A&M University in 2018 and her Master’s degree at Tongji University in 2013. Dr. Ni’s research focuses on fire forensics, structural fire engineering, WUI fire resilience, fire safety of tall mass-timber buildings and fire-related multiple hazards. Her research has been funded by National Science Foundation, National Institute of Justice, Fire Protection Research Foundation, University Transportation Centers under the Department of Transportation, Grand Challenges Grants Program at the University of Maryland and industrial partners.
Brian Lattimer, Ph.D. is a Professor in Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech where he performs experimental and computational research on fire safety and disaster resilience. He has nearly 30 years of experience in fire related research. His research areas include material behavior in fires, fire dynamics, suppression agents, heat transfer from fires to surfaces, structural response during fire, and firefighting technology.
Yu Wang is a professor at the State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China (USTC). He got joint Ph.D. from USTC and the City University of Hong Kong in 2016 and had working experience at the University of Edinburgh, Worcester Polytechnic Institute and National University of Singapore before returning to China in 2020. His primary research areas are high-rise building fire and large outdoor fire. Yu has published over 50 SCI journal papers, and is currently an Associate Editor in Fire Technology and Editorial Board Member in Fire Safety Journal. He initiated the first English fire course at USTC, Introduction of Fire Dynamics, reported by China News and People’s Daily Online (over 260,000 audiences). In recent years, he has received SFPE Global 5 Under 35 Award, Youth May Fourth Medal (Anhui Province), Young Faculty Career Award (USTCAF), and some Best Paper/Presentation/Poster/Image Awards in IAFSS or AOSFST.
ROGAUME Thomas is an Professor at the University of Poitiers – Pprime Institute (UPR3346 CNRS), FRANCE.
Prof. Yuji Nakamura is Full Professor in Department of Mechanical Engineering, Toyohashi University of Technology (TUT), appointed as Affiliate Full Professor in Center for Fire Science and Technology, Tokyo University of Science (since 2014). He currently serves the Head of Energy Conversion Laboratory and appointed as Department Chair since 2024. Prof. Nakamura has made professional service in Fire Science Community served as Management Committee of IAFSS during 2021-2023, worked as Co-chair of LOC in the most recent IAFSS symposium at Tsukuba, acting Associate Editor of Fire Technology since 2014 and board member of Fire Safety Journal since 2017.
Dr Felix Wiesner is an Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia and study the role of engineered timber in fire safety. I work in the Faculty of Forestry as part of the Wood Science department. My research focus has mostly been experimental, considering fire dynamics in timber compartments and the structural fire capacity of engineered timber products. In addition, I am interested in the performance of timber in exterior building or infrastructure setting. This closely interfaces with wildfire considerations for the wildland urban interface (WUI), especially when it comes to smouldering.
Arnaud Trouvé is Professor and Chair in the Department of Fire Protection Engineering at the University of Maryland in College Park, USA. He joined the Faculty in 2001 with a Ph.D. (1989) and Engineering Degree (1985) from École Centrale of Paris, France, and with previous experience as a combustion research engineer. Professor Trouvé’s research interests include fire modeling and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD); application of data assimilation to fire and combustion; and physical modeling of combustion- and fire-related phenomena, including compartment fires, wildland fires and explosions. Professor Trouvé is a Fellow of the Combustion Institute and the recipient of the 2017 FORUM Sjölin Award. He has served on the editorial boards of the Proceedings of the Combustion Institute, Progress in Energy and Combustion Science, Combustion and Flame, and Fire Technology, and is currently on the editorial boards of Combustion Theory and Modelling and the Fire Safety Journal. Professor Trouvé is also a past Chair of the US Eastern States Section of the Combustion Institute (ESSCI) and a past Member of the Executive Board of the International Association for Fire Safety Science (IAFSS). He is a co-Chair of a recent initiative endorsed by IAFSS and called the “IAFSS Working Group on Measurement and Computation of Fire Phenomena” (the MaCFP Working Group) and the past Chair of a new network of leading higher-education institutions and research laboratories in fire safety engineering called the International Fire Safety Consortium (IFSC).
Dr Xinyan Huang is an Associate Professor at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and the Deputy Director of the Research Centre for Fire Safety Engineering. He received his PhD from Imperial College London, MSc from UC San Diego, and BEng from Southeast University, and was a Postdoc at UC Berkeley. Dr Huang is a Combustion Scientist and a Fire Safety Engineer who has co-authored over 200 journal papers. He is an Associate Editor of Fire Technology and International Journal of Wildland Fire, an editorial member of J. Building Engineering, Fire Safety J. and Fire and Materials, a Chartered Building Services and Fire Engineer, a committee member for HK Fire Safety Code, and a Fire Expert for HK High Court. He receives the NSFC Excellent Young Scientists Fund, Bernard Lewis Fellowship and Sugden Best Paper Award from Combustion Institute, “5 under 35” and Bono Award from the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE).