Modern Engineered Bamboo Structures

Fast-growing and local to some of the poorest communities in the tropics and subtropics, bamboo holds huge potential for climate change mitigation, innovative construction and job creation, but the material is rarely used for more than simple construction and household use.

Modern Engineered Bamboo Structures collects the papers presented at the third International Conference on Modern Bamboo Structures (ICBS2018, Beijing, China, 25-27 June 2018). The overarching theme of the book is ‘Enhancing Cooperation for Green Development through Bamboo’s Contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals’. The contributions focus on how to realize bamboo’s huge potential in a number of areas: sustainable commodity production, disaster-resilient construction, poverty alleviation, climate change mitigation and adaptation, land restoration and biodiversity protection.

Modern Engineered Bamboo Structures recognizes bamboo’s various benefits, and aims at ministers, policymakers and representatives from research institutes, development organizations, NGOs or UN bodies and the private sector.

Dr. Y. Xiao is Distinguished Professor, Program Director for Energy, Environment and Infrastructure Sciences, in the Zhejiang University – University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign Institute (ZJUI), Zhejiang University International Campus in Haining, China. His academic career spanned in Japan, US and China. He serves as the associate editor for the ASCE Journal of Structural Engineering, Journal of Bridge Engineering, and editorial board member of the Journal of Constructional Steel Research. He is elected fellows of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and the American Concrete Institute (ACI). Passionate about bamboo, Dr. Xiao focuses and publishes pioneered research on engineered bamboo and holds many patents and the trademark technology GluBam®. In 2008, he was awarded the Best of What’s New in 2008 by the Popular Science Magazine, and was named as the Popular Science Innovator of 2008. Prof. Xiao’s team has designed and built many demonstration bamboo houses and bridges in China and Africa.

Dr. Z. Li graduated in civil engineering in 2009 from the Southwest Jiaotong University, then was enrolled in master/doctoral courses at the Hunan University. As an exchange student, he pursued doctoral courses at the Sapienza University of Rome, through Erasmus project (Eurasian University Network for International Cooperation in Earthquakes), and obtained a Ph.D. degree there in 2015. From Feb. 2015 to June 2016, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Sapienza University of Rome. He is now on the faculty as an assistant professor in college of civil engineering, Nanjing Tech University. Since 2009, he has been working on modern bamboo structures and has published more than 12 international journal papers related to this topic.

Mrs. Liu Kewei is the Coordinator of Global Bamboo Construction Programme at the International Bamboo and Rattan Organisation (INBAR – www.inbar.int), based at its Headquarters in Beijing, China. Mrs. Liu has managed more than 10 international bamboo construction projects across Asia, Africa and Latin American in the last 10 years. She is also one of the founders of INBAR Construction Task Force (INBAR TFC) and currently manages a group of 28 bamboo construction experts from 18 countries. As the Convenor of ISO/TC165 (Timber Structures) Working Group (WG) 12 – Structural Uses of Bamboo, Mrs. Liu is leading the development and revision of several international and Chinese standards for bamboo construction. Mrs. Liu is one of experts of "Timber and Bamboo Structures Committee" and a member of "Sustainable Civil Engineering Committee" organized by Chinese Society for Urban Studies in China. As the first author, she published the book on Contemporary Bamboo Architecture in China. She also translated into Chinese the book Sustainable Building in Practice: What the Users Think written by George Baird, published by China Architecture & Building Press in 2019 and 2013 respectively.