Background
Robert Kayen was born in New York, United States of America in 1959.
Robert Kayen was born in New York, United States of America in 1959.
He earned his Bachelor of Surgery in civil engineering and geology in 1981 from Tufts University, Master of Surgery degree in geology in 1988, and Doctor of Philosophy in engineering under the supervision of James K. Mitchell at the University of California, Berkeley in California in 1993.
He is a leading international expert in the fields of earthquake engineering, soil liquefaction, and ground failure. Kayen"s research focuses on geotechnical engineering, engineering characterization of natural hazards and extreme events, and earth science aspects of civil engineering. Since 1991, he has worked as a research scientist at the United States. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California.
Professor Kayen joined the faculty of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California Los Angeles in 2007.
He has also served on the faculties of Kobe University, Japan and University of California, Berkeley as a visiting professor Kayen has authored over 300 journal articles, conference papers, and studies in the fields of earthquake engineering, LIDAR/Geomatics, engineering geophysics, methane hydrate disassociation, and marine engineering geology.
Robert Kayen is an American rock climber best known for the first solo ascent of the West Buttress of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park in 1982, an alpine-style eleven-day climb of one of the four original big wall siege routes on the face. Kayen skied the first winter traverse of the Sierra Nevada Mountains along a four hundred mile route between Mount Whitney and Lake Tahoe in 1984 and 1985, ski-mountaineering via the John Muir Trail with John Webster, and alone for the Tahoe-Yosemite Trail.