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Reginald DesRoches is Rice University’s eighth president. He also serves as a professor of civil and environmental engineering, and professor of mechanical engineering. DesRoches' tenure at Rice began in 2017, when he accepted the post as the William and Stephanie Sick Dean of Engineering at the George R. Brown School of Engineering. Several key interdisciplinary initiatives were launched during DesRoches’ time as dean, some of which were neuroengineering, synthetic biology and data science. Before his appointment at Rice, DesRoches served as chair of the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Georgia Tech in Atlanta.

DesRoches’ primary research interests are in the design of resilient infrastructure systems under extreme loads and the application of smart materials. His research is highly interdisciplinary and spans micro- to macro-scales. He has published approximately 300 articles and delivered more than 100 presentations in over 30 different countries.

A fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and the society's Structural Engineering Institute (SEI), DesRoches served as the key technical leader in the United States’ response to the 2010 Haiti earthquake, taking a team of 28 engineers, architects, city planners and social scientists to study the impact of the earthquake. He also has participated in numerous congressional briefings to underscore the critical role that university research must play in addressing the country’s failing infrastructure and enhancing the nation’s resilience to natural hazards. He is on the advisory board for the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) Simulation Center, the California Department of Transportation Seismic Advisory Board, the Halliburton Labs Clean Tech Accelerator and the HTX Impact Fund, which is focused on minority led startups.