Dr. Golnaz Alipour joined Macquarie University as a lecturer in January 2021. Prior to this appointment, she was a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Sydney. She was part of a multidisciplinary team working on a project about the mechanics of healing and self-healing in clay soils which was funded by an ARC Discovery grant. Her research was focused on mechanical and hydrological factors that trigger damage and self-healing of geomaterials. She received her PhD in civil (Geotechnical) engineering from the University of New South Wales, Australia in 2019. During her PhD, funded by an Australian Postgraduate Award (APA) and the prestigious Engineering Research Award (ERA) top-up scholarship, she developed a constitutive model to investigate the behaviour of unsaturated soils under static and dynamic conditions. 

Golnaz is also passionate about teaching and learning. She has several years of experience in developing, coordinating and teaching various civil engineering units. She has also led several course enhancement and curriculum design projects. At Macquarie University, she is currently teaching Soil Mechanics unit with the aim of giving the students a good understanding of the basics of Geotechnical engineering and design. Her vision for teaching is based on a constructivist approach, which uses motivation, meta-learning, self-regulation/self-efficacy, and critical thinking.