Personale docente

Education:

2004, Ph.D., Geotechnical Engineering, Polytechnic of Turin, Italy

1999, M.Sc., Civil Engineering, University of Parma, Italy

Academic and Research Appointments:

2023-now, Rector’s Delegate for Relations with Africa

2019-now, Deputy Director of the University Centre for International Cooperation (CUCI)

2016-now, Associate Professor and Teacher for the courses of “Rock mechanics and slope stability”, “Geotechnics”, and “Foundation engineering”, University of Parma, Italy;

2018-now, Visiting Professor and Teacher for the course of “Soil Mechanics” at Institute d’Enseignement Supérieur (INES) de Ruhengeri – Rwanda;

2018-now, member of the Teachers' Board of the PhD in Earth Sciences at the University of Parma;

2013-2016, Assistant Professor in Geotechnical Engineering, University of Parma, Italy;

2006-2013, Research Assistant in Geotechnical Engineering, University of Parma, Italy;

2004-2013, Professor on annual contract in Geotechnical Engineering, University of Pavia, Italy;

2005: Grant for a Technology Transfer Project between University of Parma, CAE s.r.l. and Acrotec s.r.l., financed  by E.C. Funding and Emilia Romagna Region (Italy).

Scientific activity:           

With the Research Group in Geotechnical Engineering of the University of Parma cooperated to some National Research Projects funded by Italian Ministry in the field of landslides and tunneling.

The main research interests deal with: (i) systems for real-time territory control and evaluation of shallow landslides susceptibility on regional scale; (ii) soil-atmosphere interaction; (iii) use of expanding polyurethane resins in foundation remediation; (iv) micropiles.

Chiefly responsible of different research projects on behalf of private companies, namely:

• Research project aimed at determining a methodology for calculating the load-bearing capacity of micropiles made with blowing resin, on behalf of commissioned by Parco Scientifico Tecnologico Parma Tecninnova s.r.l. and Novatek s.r.l. (contract no. 10/2009).
• Holder of an assignment for research activities at the University of Salento – Centre of Service for Major Projects, within the Regional Programme for Environmental Protection – Axis 7 line of intervention h) "Study for the implementation of quarry activities", aimed at defining analysis methodologies for the geomechanical characterisation of rock masses in quarry areas of Cursi, Mottola and Apricena (2010-2011).
• Responsible for a research agreement between the University of Parma and the Novatek s.r.l. company, on the following topic: "Optimisation of dimensioning methods for micropiles with press-fill and columnar injections of expanding resin for the consolidation of foundations and embankments in the earth' (2014-2017).
• Scientific responsible for a research contract between NTK Group s.r.l. and the University of Parma for a study entitled "Analysis of experimental data from tests on an innovative type of geothermal probes' (2018).
• Scientific responsible for a research contract between Edilsystem s.r.l. and the University of Parma, in collaboration with the 'G. d'Annunzio' University of Chieti-Pescara, for a study entitled 'Development of a method for sizing Geosystem minipiles' (2021-2022)

Responsible for the Project "Stat4Change: Statistical treatment of Big Data from environmental time series related to soil-atmosphere interaction for climate change adaptation strategies", funded by the Emilia Romagna Region under the Call for Proposals "High skills for research and technology transfer" submitted under the Call approved by DGR 2088/2019. POR FSE 2014/2020 (March 2020, 30,000 euro).

Co-supervisor of the following PhD candidates:

1. Gian Luca Losi (2011) "Spatio-temporal modelling of soil slip phenomena: from slope scale to territorial scale", University of Parma;
2. Massimiliano Bordoni (2015) "Rainfall-induced shallow landslides prediction at different scales", University of Pavia.

Supervisor of the following PhD candidates in Earth Sciences:

1. Usman Ali Khan (2021-2024) - Thesis title: 'Analysing the effects of hydrogeomorphological processes related to sediment transport at basin scale'. Co-authors: Professors A. Chelli, F. Celico, R. Vacondio.
2. Giada Sannino (2021-now) - Thesis title: "Modelling soil-vegetation-atmosphere interaction phenomena related to water resource management and slope stability for climate change adaptation strategies”.

Member of:           ISSMGE – International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering;                              AGI – Associazione Geotecnica Italiana (Italian Geotechnical Society).

Member of the Editorial Board of the following international journals:

• Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering (Springer)(2018-present)
• ICE Proceedings – Geotechnical Engineering (2015-2019);

Reviewer for the following International Journals: Landslides (Springer); Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering (Springer); Engineering Geology (Elsevier); Environmental Geotechnics (ICE); Geotechnical and Geological Engineering (Springer); Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (EGU); Innovative Infrastructure Solutions (Springer); Physics and Chemistry of the Earth (Elsevier); Journal of Mountain Science (Springer); Natural Hazards (Springer).

Organisation of scientific conferences:

• Co-chairman of the session 'Field Testing and Slope Stability', within the 4th Asia Pacific Conference on Unsaturated Soils, 23-25 November 2009, Newcastle (Australia), at the invitation of the organising committee.
• Co-chairman of the session 'Prediction methods for rainfall triggered landslides", IAEG XII Congress - Engineering Geology for Society and Territory, 15-19 September 2014, Turin (Italy). Contribution to the review and selection of contributions admitted to the oral presentation in the same session.
• Member of the organising committee of the VIII International Conference on Debris Flow Hazard Mitigation - DFHM8, 26-29 June 2023, Turin (Italy). The conference is hosted by the Polytechnic University of Turin and the University of Turin, and is organised in collaboration with the Italian Geotechnical Association and the Debris Flow Association.
• Promoter and organiser of an international Summer School entitled "Landslides and slope stability analysis in Rwanda", 11-15 July 2022 at the Rwanda Polytechnic - College of Musanze (Rwanda). The event was organised under the auspices of the International Consortium on Landslides (ICL), the International Association of Hydrogeologists (IAH) - Italian Chapter, and the Software-House Rocscience.

International cooperation projects

Since 2018, Deputy Director of the University Centre for International Cooperation (CUCI) of the University of Parma.

Coordinator of CBHE Erasmus+ Project: “Enhancement of Rwandan higher education in strategic fields for sustainable growth – EnRHEd”, leaded by the Università of Parma with two EU partners, namely Université de Liege (Belgium) and RHEINISCHE FACHHOCHSCHULE KOLN GGMBH (Germany), and four Rwandan Higher Education Institutions: University of Rwanda; INES-Ruhengeri; IPRC Musanze; University of Technology and Arts of Byumba.

Programme:         EPPKA2 - Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Action:                  CBHE-JP - Capacity Building in higher education - Joint Projects

Proposal:              Call for Proposals 2019 - EAC-A03-2018

Application No:    609579-EPP-1-2019-1-IT-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP    - Grant: 905.000,00 euro

Selection of recent articles in international journals:

Khan U.A., Valentino R. (2022) Investigating the Granulometric Distribution of Fluvial Sediments through the Hybrid Technique: Case Study of the Baganza River (Italy). Water 2022, 14, 1511.

Fusco F., Bordoni M., Tufano R., Vivaldi V., Meisina C., Valentino R., Bittelli M., De Vita P. (2022) Hydrological regimes in different slope environments and implications on rainfall thresholds triggering shallow landslides, Natural Hazards, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-022-05417-5

Valentino R., Bisceglie F. Romeo E. (2023) Effects of Artificial Aging on Polyurethane Resins Used in Geotechnical Works, Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering, 35, 5, Article number 04023055, DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)MT.1943-5533.0004715

Petrella E., Raimondo M., Chelli A., Valentino R., Severini E., Diena M., Celico F. (2023) Processes and factors controlling the groundwater flow in a complex landslide: A case study in the northern Italy, Hydrological Processes, Vol. 37, Issue 5, e14891, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.14891

Valentino R. (2023) FEM Modelling of Thin Weak Layers in Slope Stability Analysis, Geosciences, 13, 233. https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences13080233 

Anello M., Bittelli M., Bordoni M., Laurini F., Meisina C., Riani M., Valentino R. (2024) Robust statistical processing of long-time data series to estimate soil water content, Mathematical Geosciences, 56(1), 3-26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11004-023-10100-x

Bordoni M., Vivaldi V., Giarola A., Valentino R., Bittelli M., Meisina C. (2024) Comparison between mechanical and hydrological reinforcement effects of cultivated plants on shallow slope stability, Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 912, Article number 168999, DOI 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.168999

Valentino R., Pizzati M., Mizero j. (2024) Combined Effect of the Microstructure and Mechanical Behavior of Lateritic Soils in the Instability of a Road Cut Slope in Rwanda, GeoHazards, 5(2), 559-581.

Sannino G., Tomei F., Bittelli M., Bordoni M., Meisina C., Valentino R. (2024) Implementation of a slope stability method in the CRITERIA-1D agro-hydrological modeling scheme, Landslides, DOI 10.1007/s10346-024-02313-w.

Sannino G., Tomei F., Bittelli M., Meisina C., Bordoni M., Valentino R. (2025) A three-dimensional agro-hydrological model for predictive analysis of shallow landslides: CRITERIA-3D, Engineering Geology, 352, 108073, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enggeo.2025.108073.