Research

Our effort is focussed on quantitative analysis of prime safety issues identified with the maritime activity, such as instability, fire and shift of cargo. We work also on the development of novel methodological approaches of safety assessment.

Scientific Areas

  • Intact Ship Stability
  • Damaged Ship Stability
  • Parametric Rolling
  • Broaching-to
  • Surf-riding
  • Pure Loss of Stability
  • Probabilistic Stability Assessment
  • Parametric Sloshing
  • Fire Safety
  • Granular Matter Dynamics
  • Nonlinear Dynamics of Floating Bodies
  • Risk Assessment of Floating Structures
  • Ship Manoeuvring in Wind and Waves
  • Modelling and Dynamics of Sailing Yachts
  • Phenomena of Extreme Behaviour

Distinctions

  • Spyrou was invited to join the College of Expert Reviewers of the European Science Foundation (ESF)(7/2020).
  • Spyrou is the recepipent of the 2020 Dr. Kenneth S.M. Davidson medal from the U.S. Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (SNAME). The Davidson Medal is presented every two years to individuals for “Outstanding Scientific Accomplishment in Ship Research” (6/2020).
  • Ioannis Tigkas, a PhD graduate of the group, started as an Assistant Professor of Ship Dynamic Stability in the Department of Naval Architecture (Faculty of Engineering) of the University of West Attica (6/2020).
  • Spyrou was invited in August 2019 to join the editorial board of the Journal of Marine Science and Engineering (Ocean Engineering section).
  • Spyrou gave a lecture during the 26th Summer School on Dynamical Systems & Complexity (14-20 July 2019, NTUA, Athens) with title "Homoclinic Connections and their Impact on the Safety of Ships". In the same Summer School, Kontolefas presented elements of his PhD work in a talk with title "Identification of Coherent Sets in Phase Flows of Nonlinear Dynamical Systems".
  • Angelou, on July 12th 2019, successfully defended his PhD Thesis with title "Manoeuvring behaviour of a yacht in waves incorporating the forces at the sails using a fluid-structure interaction model".
  • Spyrou co-edited a special issue of the journal Ocean Engineering (Elsevier) with title: “Stability of Ships and Ocean Vehicles 2018” (published in July 2019), containing selected papers from the 13th International Conference on the Stability of Ships and Ocean Vehicles (STAB 2018) held in Kobe (Japan) between the 16th and 21st of September 2018.
  • Spyrou gave invited lectures at China’s Harbin Engineering University on the latest developments in ship dynamic stability assessment, expanding in particular on the method of wave groups (June 24-29, 2019).
  • Spyrou gave opening and closing speeches as chairman of the STAB Standing Committee during the 17th International Ship Stability Workshop (ISSW) held in Helsinki (June 9-12, 2019).
  • Margari, a new PhD candidate in the group, gained a 3-year scholarship from NTUA’s Special Account for Research Grants (March 2019).
  • Spyrou was an examination board member of the PhD thesis of Evangelos Philippas with title: “Hydrodynamic analysis of ship and marine biomimetic systems in waves using GPGPU programming” (March 2019).
  • Margari received an award from the local SNAME Committee in support of her PhD work.
  • Spyrou contributed as member of the Greek delegation to the 6th session of the Ship Design and Construction Sub-Committee of the International Maritime Organization, held in London (February 4-8, 2019).
  • Spyrou co-edited a book for Springer with title: Contemporary ideas on ship stability, Risk of Capsizing (published January 2019), ISBN 978-3-030-00516-0, containing selected papers from recent STAB Conferences and ISSW workshops.
  • Themelis was elected as an Assistant Professor in the School of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering of NTUA (12/2018), in the scientific field of Design and performance assessment of ships and marine systems.
  • Spyrou was external examiner for a St Petersburg State University (Russia) Phd Thesis written by Ivan Gennadevich Gankevich with title: “Novel modeling of irregular waves for simulating marine object dynamics” (2018)
  • Kaklamanis won a diploma thesis award for his thesis with title "Evaluation of statistical extrapolation methods for ship dynamic stability assessment", by RINA (2018).
  • Spyrou gave in Trieste an invited public lecture ​ ​with title "Empiricism and Science in Ship Safety" for the Navigando 2018 initiative (21 June 2018).
  • Spyrou was honored as the «39th Georg P. Weinblum Memorial Lecturer» for the academic year 2016-2017, by the Weinblum Foundation.
  • Stamou won a diploma thesis award for her thesis with title "Study of nonlinear dynamics of the surf-riding phenomenon of ships in waves using the method of Finite-Time Lyapunov Exponents", by RINA (2015).
  • Koromila gained the Eugenides Foundation Scholarship for her PhD research on "integrated risk indices for safe ship design and operation" (2015-2018).
  • The paper with title "probabilistic fire safety assessment of passenger ships" by Themelis & Spyrou that appeared in the December 2012 issue of the Journal of Ship Research was named by SNAME "A Significant Paper of 2012". The paper was republished in SNAME Transactions 2012.
  • The book with title "Contemporary Ideas on Ship Stability and Capsizing in Waves" co-edited by Spyrou was in the top 25% of the most dowloaded ebooks in the relevant Springer Collection.
  • Spyrou was the chairman of the organizing committee of the 11th International Conference on the Stability of Ships and Ocean Vehicles, held in Athens between 23-28 September 2012. Spyrou and Themelis were 2 of the 3 coeditors of the Proceedings.
  • Spyrou was elected Chairman of the international standing committee running the well-known STAB Conferences and Workshops for the period 2015-2018 (extendable to 2021).
  • Anastopoulos, Kontolefas and Palla won individual prizes for their final-year theses, by the American Bureau of Shipping Office in Athens (Sept. 2012).
  • Our research proposal with acronym HOMSHIP was successful and it will receive funding, under the very competitive EXCELLENCE scheme of the Greek Ministry of Education (May 2012).
  • Spyrou gave an invited guest lecture at the Centre for Ship and Ocean Structures of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (21 June 2011).
  • Themelis' PhD Thesis with title "Probabilistic Assessment of Ship Dynamic Stability in Waves" was singled out by NTUA's "Thomaidio Foundation" as the best PhD thesis examined in NTUA in 2008.

Recently Funded Projects

  • Prediction of broaching-to of ships in an irregular seaway: Classification of motions and calculation of probability based on phase-space information. Funded by ONR, 2017 - 2019 (PI).
  • Prediction of broaching-to of ships in an irregular seaway: coupled motions. Funded by ONR, 2015 - 2017 (PI).
  • Development of probabilistic models for evaluating the dynamic stability and capsizing tendency with respect to broaching-to. Funded by ONR, 2013 - 2015 (PI).
  • HOMSHIP: Homoclinic phenomena in ship dynamics: deterministic occurences and their stochastic counterparts. Funded by GSRT, 2012 - 2015 (PI).
  • FIREPROOF: Probabilistic Framework for Onboard Fire Safety. Funded by the EU, 2009 - 2012 (PI).
  • Development of probabilistic models for evaluating the dynamic stability and capsizing tendency with respect to broaching-to. Funded by ONR, 2010 - 2012 (PI).
  • Model experiments of dynamic stability (CEHIPAR – Madrid). Funded by the EU, 2008 (R).
  • VELOS - Development of a virtual environment for use in ship evacuation studies. Funded by GSRT, 2006 - 2007 (R).
  • SAFEDOR: Design, Operation and Regulation for Safety (R). We led the sub-project "probabilistic ship stability assessment". Funded by the EU, 2005 - 2007.
  • ESPEN: A complete operational system for observing and forecasting waves with application to Greek navigation. Funded by GSRT, 2005 - 2007 (PI).