Professor Martin Mayfield-Tulip (he/him)

Department of Civil and Structural Engineering

Head of Department

Professor of Engineering Design

Infrastructure Leader

CIV Martin Mayfield
Profile picture of CIV Martin Mayfield
martin.mayfield@sheffield.ac.uk
+44 114 222 5054

Full contact details

Professor Martin Mayfield-Tulip
Department of Civil and Structural Engineering
Room D110
Sir Frederick Mappin Building (Broad Lane Building)
Mappin Street
Sheffield
S1 3JD
Profile

To ensure that we thrive within the capacity of the planet we need resilient, high-performing infrastructure systems.

Professor Martin Mayfield-Tulip


Martin Mayfield-Tulip took over the role of Head of Department in 2021 and has 24 years’ practice as a designer of engineering systems at Mott MacDonald and as a Director of Arup (Education Leader for the UK, Middle East and Africa, Mechanical and Electrical Engineering Leader for North West and Yorkshire and lastly Sheffield office Leader).

These roles entailed leading teams of over 60 professional Engineers from a range of disciplines, working on a diverse array of projects in the UK and overseas. During this time, he built an industrial research portfolio (>£3m) including Multi- Systems Modelling Structures for Future Cities and Integrated Infrastructure Frameworks for Cities.

These roles entailed leading teams of professional engineers from a range of disciplines, working on a diverse array of projects in the UK and overseas. During his time at Arup he worked on infrastructure projects, stadia, airports, niche sustainable buildings.

Martin returned to academia, when he took up a Chair in the Department in 2013. He was made the Infrastructure Research Leader for Engineering at Sheffield and is leading the Sheffield component of the UKCRIC initiative.

Together with Dr Densley Tingley he leads the RISE (Resources, Infrastructure and built Environments) research group which now includes 14 researchers working across the nexus of technology and infrastructure to enable the creation of a built environment that allows humanity to thrive within the carrying capacity of the planet, and, in so doing, restore the balance between humanity and natural systems.

Martin’s work in the Department aims to understand how to engineer sustainable solutions, by adopting a systemic approach to problems and identifying the leverage points in dynamic systems that allow us to create paradigm shifts in our use of energy and resources.

To do this, engineers must appreciate the environmental and physical complexities that need to be addressed, the social and economic context of the challenge, and crucially, how these interrelate.

By focusing on the role of engineering in society, Martin aims to understand the interaction between human and natural systems and, therefore, create solutions and develop our infrastructure in a manner that allows humanity to flourish.

He recognises the opportunities presented by Complexity Science to improve the resilience and performance of complex adaptive systems such as future energy systems, cities and our national infrastructure.

His expertise spans a diverse array of systems engineering, sustainable design, climate change mitigation and adaptation, mission critical systems, city systems and mapping infrastructure interdependencies.

This includes system of systems resilience studies for a range of organisations including cities and banks. He has designed a wide range of resilient energy and infrastructure systems such as stadia, data centres and city quarters.


Publications

Journal articles

Conference proceedings papers

Reports

  • Jobbins S, Clarke G, Holt N, Beasley R, Punzo G & Mayfield M (2019) Strategic Research Agenda: Addressing Challenges of Complexity and Resilience RIS download Bibtex download
  • Mayfield M, Punzo G, Beasley R, Clarke Ginny , Holt N & Jobbins S (2018) Challenges of Complexity and Resilience in Complex Engineering Systems RIS download Bibtex download

Preprints

Research group

Resources, Infrastructure Systems and built Environments Discipline

Grants

View all research projects

Past Grants

Grand Challenge for Water

The EPSRC-funded Grand Challenge Centre for Water, comprising 6 UK universities and 100+ industrial partners working in collaboration to develop the sustainable water solutions of the future and to accelerate innovation uptake across the water sector.


CORONA

The City Observatory Research platfOrm for iNnovation and Analytics (CORONA) brings together a team of internationally recognised researchers and stakeholders to deliver early research outputs from the £8m UKCRIC Urban Observatories (UOs) equipment grant.


Urban Flows Observatories

Through the gathering of data relating to the physical processes within cities, Urban Observatories enable characterisation of how cities ‘work’ and how their constituent engineering, natural and social systems interact.

This characterisation is achieved through the analysis of data to create information, support modelling and build simulations of these physical processes.

Professional activities and memberships
  • Principal Investigator for the EPSRC ENCORE Network+ Engineering Grand Challenge for Risk and Resilience (EP/N010019/1) to identify, develop and disseminate new methods to improve the resilience and sustainable performance of complex engineered systems.
  • Co-Investigator for the EPSRC TWENTY65 Engineering Grand Challenge for Water (EP/N010124/1) developing Future Water Scenarios and exploring goal alignment across the water-energy nexus.
  • Director of the ESPRC funded £2.4m Sheffield Urban Flows Observatory (EP/P016782/1) and a Co-I for CORONA, the first research project for the UKCRIC National Observatory (EP/R013411/1). This city laboratory is being built to understand the flow of energy and resources in cities.
  • He led i-CAIR, the £8m Integrated Infrastructure project which includes the National Water Infrastructure Facility for Distributed Water Infrastructure (EP/R010420/1).
  • Management Board member of the Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures, a member of the Editorial Panel of several journals, Sheffield City Region Infrastructure Board, the All Party Parliamentary Group on Smart Cities, CIBSE Resilient Cities Group and the European Innovation Partnership for Smart Cities and Communities.
PhD opportunities

I am not currently taking on any new PhD students, however you can see current PhD opportunities in the department with other supervisors here.