Appointment of Claude-Alain Roulet as professor with tenure

An international leader on the subject of the indoor environment quality and energy in buildings, Claude-Alain Roulet became a physics engineer at the EPFL in 1964 and Doctor of Sciences in 1973, completing a thesis on surfacephysics. After spending a brief period of time in industry, where he developed a laser for piercing tiny holes in watch rubies, he began a career as a building physicist in the Laboratory of building materials at the EPFL. He studied the effects of frost on construction materials, then developed mathematical models and measurement methods in relation to the energy performances of buildings.

With Niklaus Kohler, architect and now professor at the University of Karlsruhe, he introduced the teaching of building physics of construction at the EPFL. In 1982, he joined LESO and progressively took over the administration of a research group on the indoor environment in buildings, which presented him with the opportunity to participate in numerous national and international research projects.

Author of many publications and a lecturer much appreciated by his students in civil engineering and architecture, Claude-Alain Roulet participated in 1973 in the creation of the society Energie Solaire SA, a leading company in Switzerland in the production of solar thermal collectors.