Student Highlight: Meet Satuk Sari

Satuk is a fourth-year PhD student, advised by Professor Adda Athanasopoulos-Zekkos. He received his M.Sc. and B.Sc. from Middle East Technical University, Department of Civil Engineering, Ankara, Turkey.

Q: What got you interested in geosystems?
It sits right at the intersection of fundamental mechanics and real-world risk. I was drawn to problems where soil behavior, uncertainty, and extreme events, especially earthquakes, directly affect the safety and resilience of infrastructure.

Q: What areas of geo-engineering are you interested in, and why?
Advanced soil mechanics, geotechnical earthquake engineering, soil-structure interaction, laboratory testing, large-scale simple shear testing, energy-based frameworks, reliability-based probabilistic models for liquefaction, dynamic response of gravelly soils. My interest in these topics stems from my motivation to better understand and mitigate the impacts of earthquakes on geotechnical systems. Having grown up in Turkiye and pursued my doctoral studies in California (both regions with significant seismic activity), I have developed a strong awareness of the societal importance of earthquake resilience. This experience has motivated me to study the mechanisms governing soil behavior under seismic loading and to contribute to improving the reliability of geotechnical design in earthquake-prone regions.

Q: What research work are you participating in, and why is it important to you?
I am mostly participating in laboratory testing and field case history evaluation of gravelly soils. Gravels received limited research attention compared to sands due to their large particle size, which makes them unexplored when it comes to liquefaction analysis. Using the large scale cyclic simple shear device, I am able to test gravelly soils in the laboratory and investigate their behavior under both cyclic and monotonic loading, which is rare in literature. Then using my own lab data, I can then try to find a connection between the field cases and laboratory testing for these unique materials.

Q: Who else would your research be important to, and why?
My research would be particularly relevant to engineering consulting firms, infrastructure owners, and public agencies involved in projects located on gravelly soils in seismically active regions. Many existing liquefaction assessment procedures were originally developed for clean sands and are often difficult to apply reliably to gravelly soils due to limitations in field testing and empirical databases. As a result, engineers frequently face significant uncertainty when evaluating liquefaction susceptibility in these materials. By improving our understanding of the cyclic and dynamic behavior of gravelly soils through large-scale laboratory testing and developing energy-based and reliability-based probabilistic frameworks, my research aims to provide more reliable tools for assessing liquefaction triggering. These improvements can help engineers make better-informed design decisions for foundations, earth structures, ports, dams, and transportation infrastructure built on gravelly deposits. Ultimately, this can lead to safer and more cost-effective designs while reducing uncertainty in geotechnical earthquake engineering practice.

Q: Is there an unexpected surprise experience at UC Berkeley or in the Geosystems Program you can share?
Professors are really available to students. You can reach out to them most of the time with any questions and they love to help and teach.

Q: What is your process in handling a challenging situation (i.e. getting over a threshold of doubt or resistance) and moving forward?
Staying calm and focusing on the possible solutions instead of the problem itself.

Satuk engages in sports such as running and going to the gym. After achieving his PhD, he “would like to find an academic position and continue to do research, as well as teach.”