Professor Joseph J. Assaad, Chairperson of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Balamand, has ranked amongst the top 2% of scientists worldwide in a recent Stanford study. This study has classified researchers based on their career-long citation impact until the end of 2019.

The study is based on Scopus data. The list of top scientists was created on the basis of standardized citation indicators like information on citations, h-index, co-authorship, and a composite indicator. The authors developed a formula to calculate the career-long impact of researchers based on six indicators.

Prof. Assaad has more than 84 technical papers published in renowned peer-reviewed journals such as ACI, ASCE, CBM, and others with the majority indexed in Scopus. His current h-index is 25 (according to Scopus) with more than 2500 citations (according to Google Scholar), placing him among the top Civil Engineering researchers in Lebanon. In the Stanford Study, Prof. Assaad is the only researcher listed in the field of Construction and Buildings in Lebanon.

Vice President for Internationalization and Engagement and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering Prof. Rami Abboud congratulated Prof. Assaad for this outstanding accolade highlighting the excellent research that Prof. Assaad has been engaged in throughout his career and since his arrival at the Faculty of Engineering. “I am not surprised that Prof. Assaad is considered amongst the top scholars in his field globally. It is for sure something extraordinary as all other scholars listed in the study are either retired or close to retirement age. Prof. Assaad is still at the peak of his career with many years to come, and I am confident that the best is yet to be achieved by Prof. Assaad. He has been a true visionary in taking research at the Department to a new helm”, concluded Prof. Abboud. ​