News – Dr. Wenbo Zheng, P.Eng., University of Northern British Columbia

2026/01: We are happy to onboard three new PhD students for a Mitacs research project with a nearby mine. Welcome!
2025/12: Huan successfully defended her doctoral dissertation at UNBC – congrats! Huan is the first UNBC PhD graduate from our research group. Huan now works as an Engineering EIT in Prince George. Congrats Huan!
2025/10: Wenbo delivered an invited presentation on ‘Understanding and predicting slope deformation with machine learning and monitoring data’ to the BC Society of Engineering and Geoscience.
2025/09: Wenbo delivered a presentation on ‘Temperature effect on rock mechanical properties of Canadian gas shale using instrumented indentation testing’ at the GeoManitoba Conference.
2025/08: Wenbo delivered two technical presentations on ‘Open pit slope deformation prediction using machine learning and multi-sources field data’ and ‘Experimental characterization of time-dependent behavior of tight laminated rock formations from Canadian shale gas plays’ at the RockEng 2025 Conference.
2025/07: Kamran’s two journal papers were accepted for publication: ‘Experimental study on mineral precipitation prediction and mitigation for geothermal fluids in Clarke Lake Field in British Columbia, Canada’ on Geothermics, and ‘A review of recent advances in mineral scaling in geothermal energy systems: mechanisms, mitigation, and case studies’ on Environmental Earth Sciences. Great job Kamran!
2025/07: Wenbo received tenure and was promoted to the rank of Associate Professor. Big thanks to the dedication and hard work of our current/past members of the research group!
2025/05: Wenbo received a prestigious University Excellence in Research Award. Big thanks to the dedication and hard work of our current/past members of the research group!
2025/05: Huan published our Montney rock mechanics research title ‘Time-dependent behavior of tight laminated rock formations from Canadian shale gas plays: laboratory testing and constitutive modelling’ on Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering.
2025/04: Wenbo visited several universities in China (Sun Yat-sen University, Tongji University, and China University of Geosciences) and delivered guest research presentations/seminars.
2025/04: Wenbo was awarded an NSERC Alliance Grant to work with the BC Ministry of Forests on flow slides for the next 4 years!
2025/04: Wenbo and his colleague, Prof. Dziedzic, were awarded a Mitacs Accelerate Cluster to work with a local mine on tailing dam geotechnical/hydrological research, which will train 3 PhD interns in the next three years.
2025/02: Wenbo has been awarded a CFI/BCKDF grant (over $300,000) to develop an enhanced rock mechanics laboratory at UNBC!
2024/12: Wenbo has been awarded an NSERC Alliance International grant to collaborate with Prof. Xiaoying Zhuang at Leibniz University Hanover in Germany on hydraulic fracturing simulations.
2024/11: Gaoyang wrote and published several articles within the past year’s visit to our research group, includes ‘A hybrid resolved CFD-DEM study on internal erosion in gap-graded soils considering coarse particle shape’ on Computers and Geotechnics, ‘A machine learning-based drag model for sand particles, and ‘A resolved CFD-DEM investigation on granular sand sedimentation considering realistic particle shapes’ on Geotechnique. Excellent work!
in transition flow aided by spherical harmonic analysis and resolved CFD-DEM’ on Acta Geotechnica
2024/09: Gaoyang and Huan attended and presented at the annual Canadian Geotechnical Conference in Montreal. Their presentation titles are: ‘Numerical investigation of the interaction between irregularly-shaped granular soil and fluid using resolved CFD-DEM method’ and ‘Application of instrumented indentation testing for measuring mechanical properties of rock’. Gaoyang was partially supported with a university travel grant for this conference attendance.
2024/06: Kamran successfully defended his master’s thesis at UNBC. Kamran will be starting his PhD studies at Simon Fraser University in 2024/09 with a full scholarship. Congrats and well done!
2024/06: Huan published our Montney rock indentation research on Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering, which presented the influence of mineralogical characteristics on the mechanical properties of Montney tight formations using instrumented Indentation tests and SEM-EDS analysis. Check the paper here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00603-024-04004-3
2024/05: Leila started her Mitacs Globalink summer internship in our group. She will be working on indentation testing on Montney rock under elevated temperatures. To know more about Mitacs Globalink internships for undergraduate/graduate students, check here: https://www.mitacs.ca/our-programs/globalink-research-internship-students/
2024/05: Hassan published our LBM-DEM research on Computers and Geotechnics, which simulated the interaction between the fluid phase and irregularly shaped solid particles and is useful for studying the underlying effect of particle shape on many geotechnical issues such as internal erosions. For more details, check our open-access article using https://lnkd.in/gWuwm_73
2024/05: Emmanuel presented our research titled ‘Prediction of open pit wall deformation using machine learning and multi-sources field data‘ at the CIM Connect Conference in Vancouver. Thanks to our industry partner Gibraltar Mine for sponsoring the research and to the UNBC Research Office for awarding Emmanuel a travel grant.
2024/04: Hassan successfully defended his master’s thesis at UNBC – congrats! Hassan is my first UNBC graduate from our research group. Hassan now works as an Engineering EIT in Prince George
2024/02: Wenbo gave a talk on Montney rock mechanics and conductivity research in the NRESi Colloquium. Check here for his presentation. https://video.unbc.ca/media/NRESi+Colloquium+-+Dr.+Wenbo+Zheng+-+February+2nd%2C+2024/0_y3kapyet/23996
2023/11: Dr. Yan Wang and Mr. Gaoyang Hu started their one-year research visits to our research group.
2023/10: Wenbo attended the annual Canadian Geotechnical Conference ‘GeoSaskatoon’ and delivered two technical presentations.
2023/06: Wenbo has been awarded an NSERC Alliance International grant to collaborate with Dr. Adnan Sufia at the University of New South Wales in Australia on DEM-LBM for soil erosion.
2023/05: Dorsaf arrived at UNBC from Tunisia to start her 12-week summer internship on indentation testing on Montney rock.
2023/05: Emmanuel joined the research group as a master’s student in the MASc Engineering program and will be working on a Mitacs Accelerate research project with Gibraltar Mines on open pit wall deformation using field monitoring data and machine learning.
2022/11: A paper titled ‘Coupled thermal-hydraulic simulations of fracturing in granite under high temperature and high-pressure treatment via peridynamic’, co-authored by one of our visiting students, Yang Zhang, has been published in the International Journal of Rock Mechanics and Mining Sciences. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1365160922002131
2022/10: Huan and Wenbo attended the annual Canadian Geotechnical Conference ‘Geocalgary’. Huan delivered an oral presentation titled ‘Quantify the effect of mineralogical composition on mechanical properties of Montney siltstone using micro-indentation test and SEM-EDS analysis’. Wenbo chaired two technical sessions and attended two Canadian Geotechnical Society division meetings.
2022/09: Siva, a Ph.D. candidate from the University of Queensland, started a 12-week MITACS research visit to our group.
2022/08: A joint manuscript ‘Suffusion of gap-graded soil with realistically shaped coarse grains: A DEM-DFM numerical study’ led by Dr. Fengshou Zhang and his student Tuo Wang at Tongji University has been accepted for publication in the ASCE International Journal of Geomechanics.
2022/06: Wenbo and co-PIs Drs. Matt Reid and Jueyi Sui have been awarded an NSERC RTI grant (one out of nine grants in Civil, Industrial and Systems Engineering nationwide) for purchasing a versatile mechanical tester for characterizing the engineering behaviours of various materials (e.g. rock/timber…)
2022/03: Hassan and Huan won first place and second place, respectively, in the Faculty of Science and Engineering’s Ph.D. student presentation session during the UNBC Research Week. Congrats Hassan and Huan!
2022/02: Wenbo has been awarded an NSERC Alliance International grant to collaborate with Prof. Ranjith Pathegama Gamage at Monash University on repurposing hydrocarbon formations for geothermal utilization.
2022/02: Our research on time-dependent sand proppant deformation conducted by UNBC undergraduates Diego/Drew has been accepted for publication in Geomechanics and Geophysics for Geo-Energy and Geo-Resources. Click here for the full paper. Great job!
2021/12: Wenbo received an outstanding reviewer award from Elsevier – International Journal of Mining Science and Technology.
2021/10: Huan has been awarded a UNBC research project award for her research on Montney siltstone indentation.
2021/10: Wenbo is pleased to serve as the Secretary/Treasurer for the Northern BC Section of the Canadian Society for Civil Engineering.
2021/06: Wenbo has been awarded his first NSERC discovery grant ‘Improving characterization and modelling of the rock-proppant interaction in hydraulic fractures for deep-earth geo-resource extraction’. Many thanks for the support from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. https://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/local-news/unbc-prof-to-study-ways-to-mitigate-resource-extraction-geohazards-3940521
2021/05 Wenbo is pleased to serve on the Rock Mechanics Division Committee of the Canadian Geotechnical Society.
2021/03: Our manuscript ‘Quantifying the influence of grain morphology on sand hydraulic conductivity: a detailed pore-scale study’ has been published in Computers and Geotechnics.
2021/02 Wenbo is pleased to serve on the Soil Mechanics and Foundation Division Committee of the Canadian Geotechnical Society.