Dr. Brabha Nagaratnam is an Associate Professor or Reader at the Faculty of Engineering and Environment. She is also the Programme Leader for the Civil Engineering Degree Apprenticeship Programme at Northumbria University. She is a structural engineer with a sustainable and value engineering background. Her career commenced in the construction industry working in structural design firms mostly in Malaysia and Ireland, 5 years prior to joining academia. She started her academic career at Technological University Dublin in 2006. She then continued her academic career at Curtin University Malaysia from 2010 before joining Northumbria University as an Assistant Professor in 2017.

Her research interest is in innovative and sustainable construction materials i.e primarily concrete materials such as ultra-high performance, green concrete, self-compacting concrete, fibre reinforced concrete, analysis and design of structures, fire safety and structural investigations, and repair and strengthening. She believes that all future builds should have as little impact on the environment as possible and use as many natural materials, in order to keep wastage at a minimum. Since, she has expanded her experimental research portfolio including lightweight steel structures, modular building construction and other structural materials.

She is also an active researcher with numerous publications in Q1 Journals and is currently a reviewer for the International Journal of Concrete Structures and Materials, Journal of Construction and Building Materials and Journal of Cleaner Production. 

Selected GRANTS:

1) Principal Investigator - European Regional Development Fund NU/Lynx Precast on Self Compacting Concrete Floor Slabs Containing Fibres (2019 to 2022)

2) Principal Investigator - European Regional Development Fund NU/Bespoke Concrete on Ultra High-Performance Concrete Thin Slabs (2020 to 2023)

3) Principal Supervisor - Knowledge Transfer Partnership with ESS Modular Construction, Ireland on Innovative Modular Building Connections (2020 to 2022). 

4) Principal Investigator - Knowledge Transfer Partnership (Redbrooks/Northumbria University) Development of Composite Structures - Long Span Flooring Systems”. (2020)

5) Co-Investigator - ERDF Industrial Intensive Innovation Programme (IIIP) (NU/The Home Engineers) (2020 to 2023)

6)  Co-Investigator - ERDF Industrial Intensive Innovation Programme, James Christopher Consulting Ltd, Newcastle (2019 to 2022)

7) Co-Investigator - Collaborative PhD Project, Northumbria University – Extraspace Solutions Ltd (2019 to 2022) 

RESEARCH SUPERVISION: