Dr. Yong-Rak Kim is currently Associate Director of the Texas A&M University Center for Railway Research, a US DOT Funded University Transportation Center, and a Professor in the Zachry Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Texas A&M University since 2020. He is also a holder of the Zachry CVEN Eminent Scholar Professorship. Prior to his appointment at Texas A&M, he was a Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he was a member of the faculty for fifteen years. Dr. Kim received a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering from Hanyang University in South Korea, a Master’s and Ph.D. degrees in Civil Engineering from Texas A&M University in 1999 and 2003, respectively. His research is centered on materials engineering for resiliency, defense, energy, health, and environment. Dr. Kim’s technical expertise includes nonlinear mechanics of infrastructure materials, multiscale modeling-characterization of materials, viscoelasticity, fracture and damage, geotechnical engineering of soils-aggregates, and mechanistic analysis-design of transportation systems. Dr. Kim has published over 120 refereed journal papers, and over 150 conference articles, given more than 240 presentations (including over 60 invited lectures/talks), and has been actively cited (H-index of 43). His research sponsors include federal, state, industrial, and international agencies, such as the National Science Foundation (NSF), U.S. Department of Transportation, U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Energy, NASA EPSCoR, several State Departments of Transportation, industry, and several international agencies. He is the recipient of several Honors and Awards recognizing his scholarly research, teaching, and professional service including the Faculty Research and Creative Activity Awards, the Distinguished Teaching Award, the Faculty Service Award, and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award. Dr. Kim is a Fellow of the Engineering Mechanics Institute and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). He is also a member of numerous professional societies including the ASCE, the Society of Engineering Science, the American Concrete Institute, the Transportation Research Board, and the International Society of Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering. He has served as an Associate Editor of four journals: ASTM-Advances in Civil Engineering Materials, ASCE-Journal of Transportation Engineering, Part B, ASCE-Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering, and ASTM-Journal of Testing and Evaluation.