Jordi Fraxedas (Tarragona,1962), PhD in Physics (1990) from the University of Stuttgart (Germany), is a CSIC Scientific Researcher at the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICN2) in Barcelona (Catalonia). His thesis work was performed at the Max Planck Institut für Festkörperforschung (Stuttgart) and at BESSY (Berlin, Germany), under the supervision of Prof. M. Cardona, and worked at ESRF (Grenoble, France), CERN (Geneva, Switzerland), Materials Science Institute of Barcelona (ICMAB) and at CNRS (Angers, France). His research activity is focused on interfacial phenomena and surface science using synchrotron radiation-based spectroscopies and scanning probe microscopies. He has co-authored 160 peer-reviewed scientific articles (>4000 citations, H=32) and published the books Molecular Organic Materials: From Molecules to Crystalline Solids (Cambridge University Press, 2006), Water at Interfaces: A Molecular Approach (Taylor&Francis/CRC, 2014) and Molecular Materials: Preparation, Characterization and Applications (Taylor&Francis/CRC 2017). ORCID: 0000-0002-2821-4831
Keynote talk title: Lowering the activation temperature of Ti-Zr-V non-evaporable getter films by removing surface carbon contamination
Robert Vaßen made a diploma in physics and received a PhD at RWTH Aachen University (1990). In 2004 he finished his habilitation on the “development of new oxide thermal barrier coatings for applications in stationary gas turbines“. In 2009 he received an appointment as professor at the Ruhr University Bochum, from 2010 on he is also a guest professorship at University West in Trollhättan, Sweden. He is the head of the section “materials for high temperature technologies” and deputy head of IEK-1, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH. His major research topics are thermal spray and powder technology, protective high-temperature coatings especially thermal and environmental barrier coatings, membranes, repair technologies, and ceramics in general. His work is mainly focused on materials development for energy conversion systems including gas turbines, solid oxide fuel cells, hydrogen systems, and concentrated solar power. He published more than 300 papers, about 200 in peer-reviewed journals having an H-index of 77 and more than 20000 citations (google scholar). In 2017, he was introduced into the ASM/TSS Hall of Fame of Thermal Spray and since 2019 he is fellow of both ASM International and the American Ceramic Society. He was elected in 2019 into the evaluation board of the German science foundation (DFG) and re6elected 2023. In 2022, he received the SOFT innovation award for the development of graded tungsten/steal coatings for fusion reactor applications and in 2024 the ASM International Albert Sauveur award.
Keynote Talk title: The use of thermal spray technologies in energy conversion systems
Prof. Ping Xiao at University of Manchester currently hold Rolls-Royce/Royal Academy of Engineering Research in Advanced Coating Technology. He has carried out studies of coating materials for over 2 decades with focus on coating development for high temperature application in particular thermal barrier coatings and environmental barrier coatings for aero-engine applications. His research has generated 340+ research papers in peer-reviewed journals and is among the top 2% list of the most cited researchers since 2020. Ping Xiao’s research was submitted as an Engineering impact case to Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 and was among the 20 impact cases selected by University of Manchester. In recognition of his excellence and outstanding contribution in Surface Engineering he was awarded the IOM3 Tom Bell Surface Engineering Medal in 2024. He has been chair of IOM3 Surface Technology Group UK since May 2020 and has been chair of first and second international conferences on surface science, engineering and technology (SSET) at University of Manchester in 2024 and 2026 (https://www.iom3.org/events-awards/sset-2026.html).
Richard J. Spontak is a Distinguished Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, Professor of Materials Science & Engineering, and Alumni Distinguished Graduate and Undergraduate Professor at North Carolina State University.
He received his B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering (with honors/high distinction) from the Pennsylvania State University in 1983 and was later awarded the Ph.D. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 1988. He then pursued post-doctoral research in Materials Science & Metallurgy at the University of Cambridge (U.K.) and Condensed Matter Physics at the Institute for Energy Technology (Norway) before joining the Corporate Research Division of The Procter & Gamble Company in 1990.
In 1992, he accepted a faculty position at North Carolina State University, where he supervises the Macromolecular Materials & Morphology Group. Since that time, Spontak has published over 300 peer-reviewed journal papers and over 35 scholarly works as book chapters and invited monographs, and his work has been featured on 31 journal covers and cited over 14,000 times according to Google Scholar (as of November 2021). Although active in a diverse range of disciplines, his primary research interests relate to the phase behavior and morphology/property development of nanostructured polymers, polymer nanocomposites and coatings, electron microscopy, and stimuli-responsive soft materials.
In recognition of his fundamental and applied research endeavors, he is the recipient of numerous honors and awards such as the Alcoa Foundation Engineering Achievement and Distinguished Engineering Research Awards, Alexander von Humboldt and Tewkesbury fellowships, the North Carolina State University Alumni Outstanding Research and Global Engagement Awards, the 2006 American Chemical Society (PMSE Division) Cooperative Research Award in Polymer Science & Engineering, the 2007 German Society for Electron Microscopy Ernst Ruska Prize, the 2008 American Chemical Society (Rubber Division) Chemistry of Thermoplastic Elastomers Award, the 2011 Institute of Materials, Minerals, and Mining (IOM3) Colwyn Medal, the 2012 Norwegian University of Science & Technology Lars Onsager Medal, the 2015 Society of Plastics Engineers International Award, the 2021 Tau Beta Pi Distinguished Alumni Award, and the 2021 International Association of Advanced Materials Researcher of the Year Award.
An elected fellow of the American Physical Society, IOM3, and the Royal Society of Chemistry, he is or has been on the editorial advisory board of more than 20 international journals and holds editorial positions on three of them. He has been recognized as a 2007 Outstanding Scholar Alumnus and a 2012 Alumni Fellow by the Pennsylvania State University, and he is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences and the North Carolina State University Research Leadership, Global Engagement and Outstanding Teaching Academies.
Spontak is also a highly acclaimed educator and academic mentor. For his instructional effectiveness employing cooperative and active learning pedagogies in the classroom and his widespread efforts to promote interdisciplinary engineering design and undergraduate research, he has received college- and alumni-level Outstanding Teaching Awards, as well as the university-level Board of Governor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, the highest institutional honor bestowed by the University of North Carolina system. He has also received the 2006 International Network for Engineering Education & Research Recognition Award and the 2009 American Society for Engineering Education Southeast Region Outstanding Mid-Career Teaching Award, and he has served as a Fulbright Senior Specialist and an Erasmus Fellow.
Professor Marcela Bilek holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge, UK, a BSc from the University of Sydney and an MBA from the Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. Prior to her present appointment as Professor of Applied Physics at the University of Sydney (since 2000), she worked as a visiting Scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, USA, held a visiting Professorship at the Technische Universitat Hamburg-Harburg in Germany and a Research Fellowship at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge, UK.
Professor Bilek heads the Applied and Plasma Physics Research Group. Research projects in these areas are a stimulating mix of fundamental physics and practical applications, in areas which include materials physics, plasma deposition and processing, thin film materials, vacuum glazing, renewable and sustainable energy and cross-disciplinary research in the areas of biointerfaces and medicine.
Marcela has received a number of honours for her work including the Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year in 2002, an ARC Federation Fellowship and an MIT TR100 Young Innovator award in 2003, the Australian Academy of Science Pawsey Medal in 2004 an Australian Innovation Challenge Award in 2011 and an ARC Future Fellowship in 2012. In 2013 she was elected to the Fellowship of the American Physical Society (APS) "for outstanding contributions to the physics of plasma processing, resulting in plasma sources, processes and materials with applications to industries ranging from information technology to biomedicine". In 2015 she was elected to the Fellowship of the Institute of Electronic and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) "for contributions to the science and application of plasma processes for materials modification and synthesis".
Holger Kersten is a Professor at the Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics at University of Kiel, Germany since 2006. Prior Professor Kersten was the head of the plasma processes group at the Leibniz Institute for Plasma Science and Technology (INP Greifswald) in Greifswald, Germany. The focus of his research includes basic studies on the interaction of plasmas with surfaces, complex plasmas and their applications in plasma technology. In 1999, he received the Greifswald Plasma Physics Prize in recognition of his research. Professor Kersten was furthermore the president of the German Society for Plasma Technology from 2009 to 2013. He is currently an Editor-in-Chief of the European Physical Journal Techniques and Instrumentation (EPJTI) and Vice Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at Kiel University.
Talk Title: Plasma cleaning and treatment of art objects
Dr. Amit Goyal is a SUNY Distinguished Professor and SUNY Empire Innovation Professor at the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo; a Member of the US National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Inventors; a Fellow of AAAS, MRS, IEEE, APS, ASM, ACERS, IOP, WIF, and WTN; and a Member of the US National Materials & Manufacturing Board (NMMB). He has co-authored over 360 publications and has 85 issued patents, and was ranked by Thomson-Reuters as the most cited author worldwide. He is the Director of the Lab for Heteroepitaxial Growth of Functional Materials & Devices, and the Director of the NYS Center of Plastics Recycling Research & Innovation at SUNY. He has received numerous accolades, including the presidential-level DOE’s E.O. Lawrence Award in the inaugural category of Energy Science & Innovation.
Giuseppe Carbone received the MSc Mechanical Engineering Degree on February 1998 and in February 2002 the Ph. D. degree in Advanced Production Systems at Politecnico di Bari (Italy). He is currently Full Professor of Applied Mechanics, Head of the Department of Mechanics Mathematics and Management at Politecnico di Bari (Italy), and President of the Italian Tribology Association. In 2010 he founded the Tribology Lab at Polytechnic University of Bari. He has been Visiting Scientist at the Juelich Research Center (Germany) and at the Eindhoven University of Technology (Netherlands), Academic Visitor at the Imperial College London, and Visiting Scholar at University of North Texas. He is Research Associate at the Institute of Photonics and Nanotechnologies of the National Council of Research - Italy. His scientific interests focus mainly on tribology, contact mechanics, viscoelastic materials, adhesion, biomimetics, mechanical transmissions, mechanical vibrations, system dynamics, soft robotics grips, swarm intelligence and complex systems. His research has been funded from National and European programmes and private companies with more than 8 million €. He is founding member of PoliMech s.r.l. a Spinoff company of Polytechnic University of Bari. He serves as Associate Editor of Chaos Solitons and Fractals, and of the Journal Frontiers in Mechanical Engineering (Tribology Section). He is member of the Editorial Board of (i) Tribology International, (ii) Biomimetics, (iii) ISRN Tribology. He also served as Guest Editor of Tribology International, Biomimetics, Coatings, Lubricants, and Applied Science. His H-index is 40 (source: Scopus). He authored about 300 publications, of which about 165 in archive journals indexed in Scopus.
Prof. Rony Snyders is a Full Professor at the University of Mons (UMONS), Belgium, where he leads the Plasma–Surface Interaction Chemistry (ChIPS) group. He obtained his PhD in Science from UMONS in 2004, followed by postdoctoral research at École Polytechnique de Montréal (Canada) and RWTH Aachen University (Germany). Since 2007, he has been head of ChIPS and also serves as Scientific Director at Materia Nova R&D, fostering collaboration between academia and industry. His research focuses on low-pressure plasmas and their applications in thin film growth, plasma polymerization, surface modification, and plasma-assisted catalysis. Prof. Snyders has published more than 250 peer-reviewed papers, accumulating over 8,000 citations with an h-index around 48, and has supervised over 20 doctoral theses. He has played key leadership roles, including serving as President of the Belgian Vacuum Society (2018–2021) and as a member of the Rectoral Board at UMONS for the European University initiative EUNICE. Recognized internationally, he has been a Guest Professor at Tianjin University (China) since 2017 and regularly contributes to European collaborative projects on plasma processing and advanced materials. His career bridges plasma science and surface engineering, advancing both fundamental understanding and technological innovation in plasma-based materials research.
Dirk Hegemann heads the Plasma & Coating group at Empa, the Swiss federal research institute for materials science and technology. He studied physics and received his PhD in materials science from TU Darmstadt, Germany, in 1999. After a research stay at the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology in Stuttgart, Germany, he moved to Empa in St.Gallen, Switzerland, in 2003. Dirk Hegemann specialized in physical and chemical plasma deposition and etching processes as well as plasma-chemical gas phase processes. He published more than 140 peer-reviewed papers (H-index: 50) and is ranked among the Top Scientists in the field of Materials Science in Switzerland. His team focuses on the plasma functionalization of flexible polymeric materials and their implementation in industry as well as environmental aspects of plasma technology. Dirk Hegemann is a member of the board of the Swissvacuum Society and the International Plasma Chemistry Society (IPCS), and he serves as Editor-in-Chief for the journal Plasma Processes and Polymers,
Keynote Talk title: Environmental Aspects of Plasma-chemical Processes