Ioannis Vayas reaches 60

Steel Construction 6 (2013), No. 4 coming from research work. His research activities span from plate buckling problems, plastic resistance of cross-sections including torsion actions, low-cycle fatigue resistance of steel frames subjected to seismic actions, rotation capacity of beam-column joints, innovative dissipative devices in seismic resistant steel frames, numerical modelling of steel concrete composite bridges, etc. As design engineer he has been involved in the design of residential, office and industrial buildings, composite bridges, towers, masts and other structures. He has employed all his experience from the research and engineering work in a number of books published in Greek, German and English. In Greek he published 8 books on steel and steel-concrete composite structures, including the application of Eurocode 3 and Eurocode 4. Three of these books were translated to German and published by Ernst & Sohn. They were well received, because they were equally appropriate for students and practising engineers mainly due to a large number of well selected numerical examples. His last book (in co-authorship with A. Iliopoulos) on Design of Steel-Concrete Composite Bridges to Eurocodes that was published this year by Taylor & Francis, represents a culmination of publishing activities of Prof. Vayas. The book brings very complete information on the design issues of steel-concrete composite bridges with a lot of detailed information on all relevant topics have so far not been available in one publication. In 1997 the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania, awarded him an honorary doctorate for establishing a model cooperation between the two universities. Those who have had the privilege to meet Prof. Vayas and work with him in European research projects, in CEN/TC 250/SC3 (Eurocode 3 Committee) or at the conferences know that he has a strong personality but at the same time a kind character. He has made a lot of friends all around Europe and when he was involved in an unfortunate dispute about the authorship of one of the text books (published in Greek by one of his academic colleagues), very prominent European academics without any hesitation took his side and helped to solve the case. This is the opportunity that on behalf of all his friends and all those who appreciate Prof. Ioannis Vayas we wish him good health, and although the academic life in Greece has seen much better times, we wish him new excitements and challenges in his academic and professional life.