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Mickaël Le Vern is a general engineer graduated from Arts et Métiers ParisTech and holds a Master degree in Civil Engineering from Laval University in Canada.
After working from 2016 to 2017 as an Operations Engineer at Carrières de Chailloué in Normandy, he started a PhD thesis at Gustave Eiffel University in October 2018 entitled “Study of dust flight mechanisms and conditions: application to earthmoving sites”. His work, carried out under the direction of Frédérique Larrarte and Andry Razakamanantsoa of the Gustave Eiffel University and Frédéric Murzyn of ESTACA, takes place in Bouguenais within the Geomaterials and Environmental Interactions laboratory. The research activities are at the crossroads between soil mechanics, fluid mechanics and aerosol science. The study focuses on dust emissions from civil engineering sites which are the second most emitting sector in France after farming. Truck traffic on earhmoving runways is the principal cause of emissions. This generates dust clouds that can have health, environmental and visibility impacts. To limit these nuisances, earthworkers water the traffic lanes extensively, which increases the cost of the work sites and leads to a significant waste of water. Mickaël’s work is motivated by the need to quantify and limit the flight of these dusts while preserving water resources. The aim is to highlight the processes that lead soil particles, initially bound together in a granular matrix, to become atmospheric aerosols. This study is interesting for the professional community of the construction sector (Poster Award received at the Journée Techniques Routes in 2020), for the community of French researchers in Civil Engineering (Young Researcher Award received at the Rencontres Universitaires de Génie Civil in 2021) and also for the international community of researchers in geoenvironmental engineering (work rewarded at the Geo-Environmental Engineering conference in 2021). Mickaël is also involved in the teaching activities offered at the École Centrale de Nantes on the theme of “Environment, Mobility, Health». He teaches the course “Acquisition of Scientific Data on Air Quality”.
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