Invited Speakers
Prof. Iovka Dragieva
Prof. Iovka Dragieva (DSc., Dr, Chemist) is one of the leading scientists in the field of nanoscale particles production by means of chemical processes in aqua solutions and metal particles applications with more than 150 scientific articles and 29 patents.
The object of her interest is original technological processes and reactors for production of metal clusters, metal nanoparticles, ferromagnetic nanoparticles, hybrid nanoparticles as nanowires, core/shell products incl. metal clusters on carbon nanotubes. Their chemical composition could contain one, two or more elements selected from the list of 42 chemical elements.
She is co-ordinator of two NSF-USA /BAS - Bulgaria joint projects, leader-invest. for proposal (PROMETHEAS), national contact person of Bulgaria for Priority 3 and member of the program committee for Priority 3 "Nanotechnology and nanoscience, knowledge-based multifunctional materials, new production processes and devices" of the 6th Framework Program of European Communities. Furthermore she is president of the National Expert Council on Nanotechnologies of Bulgaria, member of American Chemical Society and IEEE Society, participant in "Network for Nanostructured Materials of ACC" (NENAMAT) and in coordination action "Co-ordination by Best Practice exchange and on Knowledge building by NMP-NCP’s in an Enlarged European Research Society" (COOREERS).
Prof. Dragieva is leader of a department "Nanoscale Materials" of Institute of Electro-chemistry and Energy Systems at Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (former Central Laboratory of Electrochemical Power Sources) and consists of 7 departments devoted to R&TD of batteries and fuel cells.
Prof. Kornel F. Ehmann
Prof. Kornel F. Ehmann is James N. and Nancy J. Farley Professor in Manufacturing and Entrepreneurship at Northwestern University,Evanston, Illinois, USA.
He obtained his M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Belgrade in 1974 and his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1979. In 1985 he became Associate Professor at the Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, Professor at the Northwestern University in 1990, Distinguished Honorary Professor at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, India and Adjunct Professor at University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign in 2004 and Adjunct Chair Professor at Chung Yuan Christian University, Chung-Li, Taiwan in 2006.
Prof. Ehmann is a fellow of ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) and SME (Society of Manufacturing Engineers) and has been Past President of NAMRI/SME (North American Manufacturing Research Institution of SME) and Past Chair of the Manufacturing Engineering Division of ASME.
His primary research activities lies in Micro/meso-scale manufacturing, Precision engineering, Machine tool dynamics and control, Material removal processes and Automation and robotics. The pervasive theme throughout Professor Ehmann’s research activities is the accuracy, precision and dynamic stability of shape generation and replication processes.
Prof. Hans Nørgaard Hansen
Hans Nørgaard Hansen is the Professor of Micro/Nano Manufacturing and Focus Area Manager in Micro/Nano and Precision Manufacturing at Technical University of Denmark. He received his M.Sc. in 1993, his Ph.D. in 1997 and the HD in 1999. Prof. Hansen has been awarded the Professor Wilkens Award, the Nordic Metrology Award, the CIRP F.W. Taylor Medal, as well as the HRH Prince Henrik’s award.
Hans Nørgaard Hansen has written more than 50 published papers in international journals and contributions to international conferences with referees. He serves on or has been a member of the European Society for Precision Engineering and nanotechnology (euspen), the International Academy for Producting Engineering (CIRP), the Dansk Maskinteknisk Selskab, the Scientific Technical Committee regarding Surfaces within CIRP and EUREKA Factoring Working Group.
The core activities of the research group comprise micro product design and development, tooling technologies for micro injection moulding and micro metal forming, mass production technologies, chemical and electrochemical processes and laser technologies. Finally the integration of processes into coherent process chains is a key activity.
Prof. Jan G. Korvink
Prof. Jan G. Korvink obtained his M.Sc. in computational mechanics from the University of Cape Town in 1987, and his Ph.D. in applied computer science from the ETH Zurich in 1993. After his graduate studies, he joined the Physical Electronics Laboratory of the ETH Zurich, where he established and lead the MEMS Modelling Group. This was followed by a move in 1997 to the Albert Ludwig University in Freiburg, Germany, where he holds a Chair position in microsystem technology and runs the Laboratory for Microsystem Simulation.
Currently, Prof. Korvink is dean of the Faculty of Applied Science. He has written more than 180 journal and conference papers in the area of microsystem technology, and co-edits the review journal Applied Micro and Nanosystems, see http://www.wiley-vch.de/ books/info/amn. His research interests cover the modelling and simulation and low cost fabrication of microsystems.
Prof. Brad Nelson
Brad Nelson is the Professor of Robotics and Intelligent Systems at ETH-Zürich and is the director of IRIS. His primary research direction lies in extending robotics research into emerging areas of science and engineering. He received a B.S. (Mechanical Engineering)from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1984, an M.S. (Mechanical Engineering) from the University of Minnesota in 1987, and the Ph.D. degree in Robotics (School of Computer Science) from Carnegie Mellon University in 1995. During these years he also worked as an engineer at Honeywell and Motorola, and served as a United States Peace Corps Volunteer in Botswana, Africa. In 1995 he became Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota in 1998, and Professor at ETH in 2002.
He has been awarded a McKnight Land-Grant Professorship and is a recipient of the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, the National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award, the McKnight Presidential Fellows Award, and the Bronze Tablet. He was elected as a Robotics and Automation Society Distinguished Lecturer in 2003 has been nominated for and/or won best paper awards at major robotics conferences and journals for 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007. He was named to the 2005 "Scientific American 50," Scientific American magazine's annual list recognizing outstanding acts of leadership in science and technology from the past year.
Prof. Nelson serves on or has been a member of the editorial boards of the IEEE Transaction on Robotics, the IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology, the Journal of Micromechatronics, the Journal of Optomechatronics, and the IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine. He has chaired several international workshops and conferences.
He is currently the head of the Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering (D-MAVT).
Prof. Svetan Ratchev
Svetan Ratchev is a Professor in Manufacturing Engineering and Director of the Nottingham Centre of Excellence in Customised Assembly (CECA).
He researchs and consults in key areas of precision manufacture including assembly automation, precision machining and distributed design and manufacture. He has authored over 120 publications of which over 90 are in refereed journals, books and conferences. Svetan is a member of the IFAC technical committees TC5.1 and TC5.2 and the founding chair of the International Precision Assembly Seminar IPAS.
