In Memoriam: Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Emeritus and Innovative Geotechnical Engineer Mladen Vucetic

UCLA civil and environmental engineering professor emeritus Mladen Vucetic, who had a stellar international reputation as an expert in soil dynamics and a mentor to many students throughout his 31-year academic career, died on October 4, 2023 in Los Angeles following a battle with cancer. He was 72.

Vucetic received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in civil engineering from the University of Zagreb, Croatia in 1976 and 1981, respectively. He completed his doctoral degree — with a dissertation titled “Pore pressure buildup and liquefaction at level sandy sites during earthquakes” — at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York under the tutelage of professor Ricardo Dobry in 1986. Vucetic started his career as an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York.

In 1987, Vucetic joined UCLA’s Civil and Environmental Engineering Department as an assistant professor, advancing to associate professor in 1993 and full professor in 2000 before retiring from the active faculty in 2018.

Over the three decades he spent at UCLA, Vucetic taught many courses that inspired countless students. But he was perhaps best known for two undergraduate courses (CEE 120: Introduction to Geotechnical Engineering and CEE 128L: Soil Mechanics Laboratory) and two graduate courses (CEE 222: Soil Dynamics and CEE 224: Advanced Cyclic and Monotonic Soil Behavior).

“Professor Mladen Vucetic was an innovative engineer and a dedicated teacher,” said Ertugrul Taciroglu, chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering. “He had been an inspirational mentor to his students and a wonderful colleague to all of us at UCLA. While we are saddened by his passing, we know his legacy will live on in the hearts and minds of those he impacted.”

His research passions were to improve fundamental understanding of soil responses to dynamic loading, such as those caused by earthquake ground shaking. Working with his former advisor Dobry, as well as his own students and other collaborators, Vucetic significantly advanced the understanding of how stiffness and energy dissipation characteristics vary among different soil types. He also made important contributions to furthering the understanding of deformations required to induce nonlinear soil response. His work in these areas was presented in a series of highly impactful articles that continue to be routinely cited and applied in geotechnical engineering research and practice.

Vucetic advised eight doctoral students during his career, each of whom has gone on to successful careers in geotechnical engineering industry, academia or research laboratories.

“Professor Mladen Vucetic was an innovative engineer and a dedicated teacher,” said Ertugrul Taciroglu, chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering. “He had been an inspirational mentor to his students and a wonderful colleague to all of us at UCLA. While we are saddened by his passing, we know his legacy will live on in the hearts and minds of those he impacted.”

Vucetic is survived by his wife Lana, daughter Sonia and son Alan.

Professor Jonathan Stewart contributed to the story.