Sten van den Broek is a doctoral candidate within the Polymer Technology group at the Eindhoven University of Technology. The aim of his project is to bring mechanistic understanding to what governs local failure of long fiber reinforced thermoplastic systems via phenomenological observations and micro-mechanical modelling using state of the art constitutive models. Ultimately, those findings will be translated into a relevant failure parameter that allows improved performance prediction under complex loading conditions on a macroscopic level. A major part of his project focuses on the influence of the long fiber microstructure, which varies due to the different processing routes, on the final properties of the material. 

Sten van den Broek obtained his Bachelor's degree at the Eindhoven University of Technology in 2016. During his master he functioned one year as one of the board members of the student team University Racing Eindhoven and did his internship at DSM Materials Science Center regarding fatigue in additive manufactured materials. In 2019 he received his Master's degree after completing his graduation project within the Polymer Technology group. During this project he worked on understanding pre-yield failure in short fiber reinforced thermoplastics using a micromechanical modelling approach under supervision of Tom Engels and Leon Govaert. A few months later, in 2020, he started as a doctoral candidate within the Polymer Technology group under supervision of Leon Govaert and Tom Engels.