Rui Miguel Madeira Lança is an Adjunct Professor of Civil Engineering at the Instituto Superior de Engenharia, Universidade do Algarve (since 1998). He leads the Department’s Hydraulics Laboratory (since 2023); previously, he served as Head of the Department of Civil Engineering (2016-2019) and was the director of the higher technical programme (TeSP) in Civil Protection (2022-2025). His academic and professional activity centres on hydraulic engineering, hydrology, flood risk and local scour, alongside sustainability indicators for regional development. He holds a PhD in Civil Engineering from Universidade da Beira Interior (2013; thesis on clear-water scour at single piers and pile groups), an MSc in Soil and Water Engineering from Universidade de Évora (2000), and both a pre-Bologna Licenciatura (1997) and a Bacharelato (1995) in Civil Engineering from Universidade do Algarve. Beyond academia, he contributes to regional governance as a member of the Algarve Hydrographic Region Council and the District Civil Protection Commission (both since 2022), and has participated in research projects such as POOLWISE, OBSERVE, SPOOLS, S-GREEN and COMPLEX.