Professor Rotta Loria is the head of the Mechanics and Energy Lab at Northwestern University. His group works at the intersection of geomechanics, energy, and environmental sustainability. In this context, he develops with his group theoretical and experimental investigations to understand, characterize, and predict the impact of energy transfers on the structure, properties, and behavior of geological materials: soils, rocks, concrete, and systems thereof. Rotta Loria’s overarching goal is to understand geological materials at their most fundamental – structural – level and to investigate the essential features of their properties and behavior (e.g., thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical). Dr Rota Loria completed his Ph.D. at the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics at EPFL and is the co-founder of both Enerdrape, an EPFL spinoff which developed developed the world’s first prefabricated geothermal panel technology, and GEOEG, an engineering design and innovation office, providing local solutions to make buildings, districts, and cities more sustainable.