A graduate in Civil Engineering, Federico Zanelli received his PhD degree in Mechanical Engineering with honors from Politecnico di Milano in July 2022, discussing his thesis entitled "Full scale smart monitoring of High Voltage Transmission Lines." In June 2023, he took office as a Research Fellow (RTDA) in SSD ING-IND/13 at the Department of Mechanics, Politecnico di Milano.
His research activity mainly concerns fluid-structure interaction, with specific reference to cable aerodynamics and bridge aeroelasticity. These topics are addressed both with experimental activities in Wind Tunnel and Cable Dynamics Laboratory and with numerical simulations. Another line of research is the monitoring and analysis of vibrations on civil and mechanical structures, such as conductors for high-voltage lines and bridges. This theme also extends to research activities in the railway field for monitoring vehicle and infrastructure dynamics and rolling stock braking system.
Since 2020, he has been participating in several working groups focused on diagnostic and monitoring activities in the railway sphere born within the JRC Trasporti, a center for research and innovation in railway systems initiated by Fondazione Politecnico di Milano. Since 2021, he has participated in WG B2.84 of CIGRE (Council on Large Electrical Systems) with the aim of evaluating the limitations and possible improvements of the numerical methodologies currently used for the analysis of wind-induced motions on conductors of electrical transmission lines.
He is the author of several scientific papers published in journals or in proceedings of international conferences. As for teaching activities, he has been an assistant professor in the master's degree program "Wind Engineering," and has been co-advisor of several master's theses in Mechanical Engineering at the Politecnico di Milano.