Rodney Eatock Taylor
Oxford, United Kingdom
28th Georg Weinblum Memorial Lecture (2005/06)
On Modelling the Diffraction of Water Waves | PDF
Ship Technology Research/ Schiffstechnik, vol. 54(2007), pp. 54–80
Short Biography
Rodney Eatock Taylor was born 10th January 1944 in London. He obtained his first degree at King’s College, Cambridge in 1965 (Mechanical Sciences Part I followed by Architecture and Fine Arts Part II), and MSc and PhD degrees in Civil Engineering from Stanford University in 1966 and 1968 respectively.
On returning to the UK in 1968 he gained two years experience in structural engineering with Ove Arup and Partners, returning to academic work in 1970 as a postdoctoral researcher investigating ship structures and hydroelasticity at University College London. He became a Lecturer there in 1972, Reader in 1980 and Professor of Ocean Engineering in 1984, during which time his research focus shifted to hydrodynamics and fluid–structure interactions in relation to offshore structures. In 1989 he was appointed Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Hugh’s College. His research has been published in some 280 journal articles and conference papers, covering vibrations of offshore platforms, numerical and analytical hydrodynamics, and hydroelasticity of ships and very large floating structures. He has lectured on his research in France, Italy, Norway, Australia, India, Singapore, China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Brazil, Argentina and the USA, and at numerous conferences. He was the UK Representative on the Standing Committee of the International Ship and Offshore Structures Congress from 1992 to 2000.
Professor Eatock Taylor was Dean of Engineering at University College London from 1988–1989, and Head of Engineering at Oxford from 1999–2004. He became a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects (1986) and of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (1989). In 1990 he was elected a Fellow of The Royal Academy of Engineering, and from 2004–2007 he was Chairman of the Academy’s Research Committee and a Vice-President. In 2008 he was made an Honorary Fellow of University College London and an Honorary Professor of Harbin Engineering University. He has been Visiting Professor at École Centrale de Nantes (1983, 1997) and at the Research Institute for Applied Mechanics (RIAM) of Kyushu University (1997). On retirement in 2009 he became Emeritus Professor at Oxford University, and a Visiting Professor at the National University of Singapore (2009–2015); and Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia from 2015.
Last update: February 2018