Guy Doré

Throughout his career, Guy Doré has stood out for his research on the development of engineering knowledge and resources for cold-region infrastructure construction. He has been a leading figure in the advancement of knowledge for the benefit of northern populations while remaining close to his students.

Helping students learn

Guy Doré pioneered road infrastructure education and research in Université Laval’s Department of Civil and Water Resources Engineering. Over the years, he has been involved with students at all levels. He put together a program of courses in road geotechnics centred on the behaviour of roads in cold regions and developed three courses in road engineering. He also developed and taught a course in pavement management as part of the master’s program in municipal infrastructure management. He is an adjunct professor at five Canadian and international universities and has taught courses and delivered lectures at universities in New Zealand, China, Norway, and Denmark.

He has supervised or co-supervised 84 graduate students, including 20 doctoral candidates and 7 postdoctoral fellows. Five of them now are now professors at Québec universities, while most of the others are practising engineers with consulting engineering firms or Québec’s Ministère des Transports et de la Mobilité durable. In addition to supervising, he has refereed 15 doctoral theses as an external examiner at various universities.

At Université Laval, Professor Doré has served on many department-, faculty-, and university-level committees. He has also served as director of graduate studies and acting director of his department.

Advancing research

A prolific researcher, Guy Doré has published close to 100 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, 128 conference papers, and numerous articles in engineering journals, as well as research reports. Google Scholar lists close to 3,000 citations from his publications in the scientific literature. He put his expertise to work in the book he wrote on engineering in cold regions and the technical guidelines he co-wrote for development and management of transportation infrastructure in permafrost regions.

Tangible results of his work have taken the form of new instrumentation and testing technologies and of innovative new systems for protecting pavement and other infrastructure from the effects of freezing and thawing. Some of these systems have been the subject of patent applications and many are currently being used in Canada, the United States, France, Denmark, and Greece.

His research has brought funding from diverse sources that comes to $65 million. It has also brought him a number of national and international honours. Professor Doré has twice received the Roger J. E. Brown Award from the Canadian Geotechnical Society. He has received the Transportation Association of Canada’s Committee Chair’s and Academic Merit Awards, and the American Society of Civil Engineers’ Heb Rice Memorial Lecture and Can-Am Civil Engineering Amity Awards.

As a Centre for Northern Studies member, he held the NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Heavy Load, Climate and Pavement Interaction (i3C). He was also director of Arquluk Northern Engineering Research Program. He’s been involved in important international initiatives such as the European Union’s Nunataryuk and the Canada–Norway Frozen Canoes cooperation.

Guy Doré is regularly asked to share his expertise, and has been invited to international conferences in China, Russia, and Québec City. He has served on numerous Canadian and international committees, and chaired the committee to rewrite the standard for foundations on permafrost for the Canadian Highway Bridge Design Code. He is currently president of the Canadian Permafrost Association.