Rodrigo Martins is a Full Professor at FCT NOVA and an internationally recognized expert in advanced functional materials for electronics and energy applications. He has authored more than 1,375 scientific publications, which have received over 44,500 citations, resulting in an h-index of 105.
He currently serves as President of the European Academy of Sciences, Director of the Associated Laboratory i3N (Institute of Nanostructures, Nanomodelling and Nanofabrication), President of the Board of the Portuguese Advanced Materials Cluster (NANOMAT), and member of the Board of the Portuguese Batteries Cluster (BatPower). He is also Chair of European Affairs for the European Materials Research Society (E-MRS) and Editor-in-Chief of the journal Discover Materials.
Professor Martins coordinates EMERGE (Emerging Printed Electronics Research Infrastructure), the first European research infrastructure dedicated to technologies beyond silicon.
He is a member of several prestigious academies and professional organizations, including the Academia Europaea, the Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona, the Portuguese Academy of Engineering, and the Portuguese Order of Engineers. He serves on the Advisory Board of the European University for Customized Education (EUNICE) (2025–2027) and on the Editorial Board of Innovation Materials (2025–2027).
His international distinctions include serving as Co-Chair of the FNRS Quinquennial Scientific Prize – A. De Leeuw-Damry-Bourlart Prize in Applied Exact Sciences (Belgium). He holds appointments as Qiushi Chair Visiting Professor at Zhejiang University, Honorary Professor at the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Technical University of Wuhan, Wuhan University, and Fuzhou University, and as Invited Professor at Southwest University, Chongqing.
In 2023, he was selected as a PIFI Distinguished Scientist by China, and in 2025 he received the prestigious Chinese Government Friendship Award.
Previously, Professor Martins served as President of the International Union of Materials Research Societies (IUMRS) and was a member of both the Scientific Council of the European Research Council (ERC) and the Advisory Council of the European Commission’s Directorate-General responsible for the Horizon Europe Programme.
Santiago Gómez-Ruiz (1978, Toledo, Spain) received his B.Sc. in Chemistry from the Universidad de Castilla La Mancha (Spain) (1996-2001). Then, he joined the Rey Juan Carlos University as Assistant Professor (Profesor Ayudante de Escuela Universitaria) at ESCET.
In 2003, he did a predoctoral stay at laboratory of Prof. Hey-Hawkins at Leipzig University (Germany) as "Marie Curie Training Site Fellow" and in December 2004, he finished his Ph.D. thesis focused on the synthesis and catalytic properties of novel metallocene complexes "Design and Applications of Novel Group 4 and 5 Metallocene Complexes" with the highest qualification ("Summa Cum Laude") and the European Diploma. He was awarded a new position in the URJC (Profesor Ayudante Doctor) in 2005. He has also worked in a project for knowledge transfer with the company Repsol.
He obtained one of the most prestigious postdoctoral research fellowship from the renowned Alexander Von Humboldt Foundation (2006-2007). During that time he worked in the field of P-Chemistry publishing several articles of high impact.
In December 2007 got back to URJC and started a new research topic based on the design and preparation of novel metallodrugs and nanostructured materials with biological applications against cancer. In August 2009 he was awarded as Professor of Inorganic Chemistry (Profesor Titular de Universidad) and since February 2020 he is Full Professor of Inorganic Chemistry (Catedrático de Universidad).
He is currently leading other different research topics focused on the synthesis of nanostructured materials with angiogenic, antibacterial or antineurodegenerative applications and the preparation of novel advanced materials with catalytic and photocatalytic applications in environment or energy. He has published important contributions in journals of high impact and has contributed as plenary or invited speaker in prestigious international conferences.
Starting from 2001, he has published over 175 research papers, 2 patents, has participated in more than 20 research projects and has been principal investigator of a competitive Exchange Research Project with University of Leipzig funded by DAAD and IP of 3 projects of the Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICIN-AEI, Spain).
He has also supervised 6 PhD students, 6 MSc. students and several exchange predoctoral or postdoct researchers. He collaborates with several groups worldwide. In addition, he has been principal investigator of several research projects for knowledge transfer with Chevron Phillips Chemical.
Professor Oliver G. Schmidt is the Scientific Director of the Research Center for Materials, Architectures and Integration of Nanomembranes (MAIN) and holds the Chair of Material Systems for Nanoelectronics at the Chemnitz University of Technology, Germany. He is Adjunct Professor of Nanophysics at Dresden University of Technology, Germany and Honorable Professor at both Fudan University and Changzhou University. He is an elected member of the German Academy of Science and Engineering and has received several international prizes and awards: Among them the Otto-Hahn Medal from the Max-Planck-Society in 2000, the Philip-Morris Research Award in 2002, the Carus-Medal from the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina in 2005, the International Dresden Barkhausen Award in 2013, the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz-Prize of the German Research Foundation in 2018, and an Advanced Grant of the European Research Council (ERC) in 2019. He is a pioneer in micromachined microrobots, their biomedical applications and their potential for creating artificial life. He achieved several Guinness World Records (e.g. smallest man-made jet engine and smallest microelectronic robot) and has made major scientific contributions to small scale energy storage devices, flexible electronics and integrated microsystems for biomedical applications. He has been an ISI highly cited researcher in 2018, 2019, 2022, 2024, 2025 and has authored and co-authored > 900 papers with a citation index > 67.000 and an H-index of 133. https://www.tu-chemnitz.de/etit/nano/OliverGSchmidt.php
Ibrahim Abdulhalim is a professor in the Department of Electrooptic Engineering at Ben Gurion University. He has worked in research and development in a variety of academic institutions and industrial companies. From August 1988 till May 1991, he was a research associate within the Optoelectronic Computing Systems Center in the University of Colorado at Boulder, USA where he worked on ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulators. During July 1991 till July 1993 he was a research fellow in the Optoelectronics Research Center of Southampton University, England, working on fiber acousto-optic modulators for Q-switching and Mode-locking of fiber lasers. During 2000-2001 he was with the Thin Films Center of the University of Western Scotland as a researcher and lecturer. Among the companies he worked for are KLA-Tencor and Nova measuring instruments working in optical metrology systems for the inspection of the fabrication processes in the microelectronics industry and in GWS-Photonics working on guided wave liquid crystal devices for the optical telecommunications. Since October 2005 he joined the Department of Electrooptic Engineering at Ben Gurion University. His current research activities involve liquid crystal devices, nanophotonic and plasmonic structures for biosensing, improved biomedical optical imaging techniques such as spectropolarimetric imaging and full field optical coherence tomography using liquid crystal devices. Prof. Abdulhalim has published over 120 journal articles, 60 conference proceedings papers, 10 book chapters, coauthored 1 book titled Integrated Nanophotonic Devices (Micro and Nano Technologies), and has 10 patents. He became a fellow of the Institute of Physics, UK in 2004 and SPIE fellow in 2010. He is an associate editor of the SPIE Journal of NanoPhotonics and for the Journal of Physics Express. Prof. Abdulhalim is acting as the head of Department of Electrooptic Engineering since 2007.