Recently, SIMULIA introduced the 2020 SIMULIA Champions, the inaugural team of brand ambassadors whose expertise and passion position them to advance the future of simulation technology. In this series of blogs, we will be introducing some of our individual SIMULIA Champions, finding out more about their history – and future – with the technology.
Xinpu Shen is a Professor at the China University of Petroleum, whose department of petroleum engineering ranks number one globally, according to Shen. He advises graduate students and Ph.D. candidates on their theses, while working on several research projects himself for the petroleum industry. Shen began his academic career in 1993 as a lecturer at Tsinghua University, from which he received his Ph.D. in Engineering Mechanics.
In 2001 Shen became a Professor at Shenyang University of Technology, where he began working with Abaqus. He used the software to find numerical solutions to mechanical problems in petroleum engineering.
“Abaqus is really a silver bullet to solve the problems I met in my work,” he says.
Shen left the academic world for a period of time to work at Halliburton in Houston, Texas as a Senior Technical Advisor. While at Halliburton, a major provider of products and services to the energy industry, Shen encountered one of the greatest challenges of his career. He was tasked with analyzing the phenomenon of creep, which is when a solid material moves or deforms under mechanical stress. Abaqus has several models for simulating creep, which Shen used to investigate the deformation of a casing. It took him a month of work, testing different values until he was able to come up with a solution to prevent the deformation. The company used his research to alter the part, adding plastic fibers to make it resistant to damage.
Continuous technical innovation is essential for solving engineering problems and surviving competition in the petroleum industry, says Shen.
“If we want to be successful in our careers we need to be innovative to create new technology,” he says. “Sometimes if we don’t have good tools it is difficult to achieve this goal.”
Abaqus is one of those tools, and Shen has been using it since 2004. He returned to academia in 2018 when he joined the China University of Petroleum. Over the course of his career, he has also published two books on the topic of using Abaqus to create numerical solutions for problems in drilling and reservoir geomechanics, casing deformation, and hydraulic fracturing optimization. In addition, he has published 98 academic papers.
Shen enjoys his work in teaching and research, particularly in solving engineering problems with Abaqus. To offset the stress of all of his hard work, Shen practices Tai Chi daily and has been doing so since he was in high school. He describes the practice as “recovery for the body and also the spirit.”
SIMULIA is pleased to welcome Xinpu Shen into the 2020 SIMULIA Champions program and excited to continue working with him in the future. Stay tuned to the blog to learn more about our other 2020 SIMULIA Champions.
SIMULIA offers an advanced simulation product portfolio, including Abaqus, Isight, fe-safe, Tosca, Simpoe-Mold, SIMPACK, CST Studio Suite, XFlow, PowerFLOW and more. The SIMULIA Learning Community is the place to find the latest resources for SIMULIA software and to collaborate with other users. The key that unlocks the door of innovative thinking and knowledge building, the SIMULIA Learning Community provides you with the tools you need to expand your knowledge, whenever and wherever.
Clare Scott is a SIMULIA Creative Content Advocacy Specialist at Dassault Systèmes. Prior to her work here, she wrote about the additive manufacturing industry for 3DPrint.com. She earned a Bachelor of Arts from Hiram College and a Master of Arts from University College Dublin. Clare works out of Dassault Systèmes’ Cleveland, Ohio office and enjoys reading, acting in local theatre and spending time outdoors.