Faculty members Aris Georgakakos and Sotira Yiacoumi have been newly appointed to endowed positions within the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Endowed professorships are prestigious appointments that provide faculty members with discretionary funding for research, equipment, travel and other professional development to advance their work. CEE has more than doubled its number of endowed professorships and faculty chairs since 2018, thanks to generous gifts from alumni and friends of the School.
Aris Georgakakos
Aris Georgakakos has been appointed the Turnipseed Family Professor.
Georgakakos joined the CEE faculty in 1984 as an Assistant Professor. He was promoted to Associate Professor and granted tenure in 1990 and promoted to Professor in 1996. Further, he has served since 1998 as the Director of the Georgia Water Resources Institute. Dr. Georgakakos earned his B.Sc. degree in Civil Engineering from National Technical University of Athens, Greece in 1980 and his M.Sc. (1983) and Ph.D. (1984) in Hydrology & Water Resources from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Georgakakos has been a prolific researcher and has made significant scholarly contributions. Dr. Georgakakos’ expertise is in the area of water resources management and hydrology.
As the Director of the Georgia Water Resources Institute, which is one of 54 water resources institutes established by federal law in each U.S. state and territory, Dr. Georgakakos and his research group have provided extensive technical, policy, and capacity building support to the State of Georgia, including the transfer of several information and decision support tools for environmental resources management, development of the first comprehensive State water resources management plan, data and knowledge for the resolution of litigious river basin disputes with neighboring states, and sponsorship of more than 100 annual graduate research assistantships for students at various Georgia universities.
Sotira Yiacoumi
Sotira Yiacoumi has been appointed to the Susan G. and Christopher D. Pappas Professorship.
Yiacoumi joined the faculty of Georgia Tech in 1992 as an Assistant Professor in CEE and was tenured and promoted to Associate Professor in 1997. She was promoted to Professor in 2003. Dr. Yiacoumi earned her Dipl. Engr. in Civil Engineering from Aristotle University (Greece) in 1985. She earned her M.S. (1987) and Ph.D. (1992) degrees in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Syracuse University.
At Georgia Tech, Dr. Yiacoumi has demonstrated excellence in her research and scholarship endeavors. Her research interests include colloidal and interfacial phenomena in environmental and energy systems. Her research contributions span the following areas: sorption phenomena, colloidal phenomena, influence of sorption on colloidal behavior, molecular techniques, and novel environmental processes. She has published over 115 journal papers and book chapters. She publishes her research results in a diverse set of highly-regarded journals (e.g., Nature Sustainability, Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, Separation and Purification Technology, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, Chemical Engineering Journal, and Renewable Energy). Further, she co-authored the book “Kinetics of Metal Ion Adsorption from Aqueous Solutions: Models, Algorithms, and Applications.” Dr. Yiacoumi has been the recipient of recognitions for excellence, including receiving an NSF CAREER Award.
