Faculty Profile

Prof Weihua            Zhang is Prof of & Director for the State Key Laboratory of            Traction Power (TPL), Southwest               Jiaotong University,China, which is a            research-intensive institution with talented staff and students            skilled in solving problems closely related to high speed train.

  His research interests            include rail vehicle design theory and structural reliability;            vehicle system dynamics and control; pantograph-catenary            relation; measurement and test technology.

  With his immense            experience and expertise of 30 years, he has been in charge of or            actively got involved with many major projects, funded by the            government agencies as well as China’s top train makers, including            the China Ministry of Railway, the National Natural Science            Foundation of China (NSFC), the China Northern and South Locomotive            and Rolling Stock Corporations and so on. He has published over 100            refereed papers in these areas in various journals as well as 2            books, and gave a number of keynote speeches on conferences.

  As one of the founders            of the full-scale roller rig in TPL, his original PhD work focused            on dynamic simulation of railway vehicles, and his paper entitled            "A study on dynamic behavior of pantograph by using hybrid            simulation method " was chosen as the Paper of 2005 by the            Institution of Mechanical Engineers of the UK，and was granted the Hawksley Thomas            Award by the institution.

  Now Prof Zhang has            been committed to modernizingChina’s railway            undertaking, studying how to increase the trains’ running speed and            ensure safety and passenger comfort. Under his leadership, TPL has            become one ofChina’s            premier learning and research institutions in high speed train field.