Martin VetterliMartin Vetterli was appointed president of EPFL by the Federal Council following a selection process conducted by the ETH Board, which unanimously nominated him.
Professor Vetterli was born on 4 October 1957 in Solothurn and received his elementary and secondary education in Neuchâtel Canton. He earned a Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from ETH Zurich (ETHZ) in 1981, a Master’s of Science degree from Stanford University in 1982, and a PhD from EPFL in 1986. Professor Vetterli taught at Columbia University as an assistant and then associate professor. He was subsequently named full professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California at Berkeley before returning to EPFL as a full professor at the age of 38. He has also taught at ETHZ and Stanford University.
Professor Vetterli has earned numerous national and international awards for his research in electrical engineering, computer science and applied mathematics, including the National Latsis Prize in 1996. He is a fellow of both the Association for Computing Machinery and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and a member the US National Academy of Engineering. He has published over 170 articles and three reference works.
Professor Vetterli’s work on the theory of wavelets, which are used in signal processing, is considered to be of major importance by his peers, and his areas of expertise, including image and video compression and self-organized communication systems, are central to the development of new information technologies. As the founding director of the National Centre of Competence in Research on Mobile Information and Communication Systems, Professor Vetterli is a staunch advocate of transdisciplinary research.
Professor Vetterli knows EPFL inside and out. An EPFL graduate himself, he began been teaching at the school in 1995, was vice president for International Affairs and then Institutional Affairs from 2004 to 2011, and served as dean of the School of Computer and Communication Sciences in 2011 and 2012. In addition to his role as president of the National Research Council of the Swiss National Science Foundation, a position he held from 2013 to 2016, he heads the EPFL’s Audiovisual Communications Laboratory (LCAV) since 1995.
Professor Vetterli has supported more than 60 students in Switzerland and the United States in their doctoral work and makes a point of following their highly successful careers, whether it is in the academic or business world.
He is the author of some 50 patents, some of which were the basis for start-ups coming out of his lab, such as Dartfish and Illusonic, while others were sold (e.g. Qualcomm) as successful examples of technology transfer. He actively encourages young researchers to market the results of their work.
Jan Van HerleBorn in Antwerp, Belgium. In Switzerland since 1983. Became Swiss citizen in 2004 out of conviction of principles of democracy and bottom-up participation. No double nationality. Village Council Member for 2 five-year mandates in 2006-2016.
1987 : Chemist from Basel University (CH).
1988 : Post-graduate IT diploma from Basel Engineering School.
1989 : Industry internship ABB Baden (CH).
1990-1993 : PhD Thesis EPFL, on Solid Oxide Fuel Cell cathode reaction mechanisms.
1994-1995 : Japanese Postdoctoral Fellowship in Tsukuba, Japan, on ceramic powders.
1995-2000 : Researcher at EPFL, Dpt. Chemistry : project responsible in PPM2 (materials), FP4-BriteEuram, NEDO (Japan), Swiss Gas Union (CH, oxygen membranes).
1998-2000 : Masters in Energy Technology, EPFL.
2000 : Cofounder of HTceramix SA (EPFL spin-off), now based in Yverdon (14 employees). Taken over by SOLIDpower in 2007, now 250 employees with 70 MCHF raised.
2000 : 1st Assistant and lecturer at LENI (STI-IGM) : fuel cell group responsible, projects on biogas (Federal Energy Office), woodgas (CCEM), fuel cell stacking (CTI, FP6, FNS), ceramic separation membranes (COST, FNS), microtubes (STI Seed), stability/lifetime/reliability in fuel cells (Electricité de France, swisselectric research). Currently 4 Ph D theses ongoing, 14 theses concluded, of which 5 colateral with SB and IMX. M.E.R. since Nov 2008.
Total funding raised so far >18 MCHF (50% as main applicant; 30% outside CH; 20% industry).
Scientific output : >135 peer-reviewed publications, >120 conference papers, 40 invited presentations (8 keynotes), >70 granted proposals.
Fluent in 5 languages (Dutch, French, German ( Swiss-german), English, Spanish).
Aleksandra RadenovicFrom April 2021 Full Professor 2015 -2021 Associate Professor2008-2015 Tenure-Track Assistant Professor2004-2007 Postdoc at the University of California, Berkeley in the group of Prof.Liphardt2003 PhD student of Prof. Dietler in Laboratory of Physics of Living Matter, University of Lausanne 1999 Diploma thesis on the subject of the Raman spectroscopy of beta carotene1994-1999 Physics department at the University of Zagreb1994 baccalaureate, Classical gymnasium
César PulgarinProf. C. Pulgarin is Chemist from Lausanne University, Master in environmental chemistry from Geneva University, Ph D in synthesis bio-inspired of natural substances from Neuchâtel University. During his education he carried out several industrial trainings.
Since March 1989, he has been working at the EPFL where he is leader of the Advanced Oxidation Processes Group (GPAO) active in the development chemical, photochemical, electrochemical, ultrasonic processes, their coupling between them and with biological systems to degrade chemical and microbiological pollutants in water and air. He has an H index of 40 and he is the world most cited author in 1) TiO2 photo-assisted bacterial inactivation in water and 2) Coupling of photochemical and biological processes for pollutant degradation. He has been involved in ten African, South American and European international research projects. He has been Swiss representative in COST program 540.
Auke IjspeertAuke Ijspeert is a full professor at the EPFL, and head of the Biorobotics Laboratory (BioRob). He has a B.Sc./M.Sc. in physics from the EPFL (1995), and a PhD in artificial intelligence from the University of Edinburgh (1999). He carried out postdocs at IDSIA and EPFL, and at the University of Southern California (USC). He then became a research assistant professor at USC, and an external collaborator at ATR (Advanced Telecommunications Research institute) in Japan. In 2002, he came back to the EPFL as an SNF assistant professor. He was promoted to associate professor in October 2009 and to full professor in April 2016. His primary affiliation is with the Institute of Bioengineering, and secondary affiliation with the Institute of Mechanical Engineering. His research interests are at the intersection between robotics, computational neuroscience, nonlinear dynamical systems, and machine learning. He is interested in using numerical simulations and robots to get a better understanding of sensorimotor coordination in animals, and in using inspiration from biology to design novel types of robots and adaptive controllers. (see for instance Ijspeert et al Science 2007, Ijspeert Science 2014, and Nyakatura et al Nature 2019). He is also investigating how to assist people with limited mobility using exoskeletons and assistive furniture. He is regularly invited to give talks on these topics (e.g. TED talk given at TED Global Geneva, Dec 8 2015). With his colleagues, he has received paper awards at ICRA2002, CLAWAR2005, IEEE Humanoids 2007, IEEE ROMAN 2014, CLAWAR 2015, SAB2018, and CLAWAR 2019. He is an IEEE Fellow, member of the Board of Reviewing Editors of Science magazine, and associate editor for the IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics and for the International Journal of Humanoid Robotics. He has acted as an associate editor for the IEEE Transactions on Robotics (2009-2013) and for Soft Robotics (2018-2021). He was a guest editor for the Proceedings of IEEE, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, Autonomous Robots, IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine, and Biological Cybernetics. He has been the organizer of 7 international conferences (BioADIT2004, SAB2004, AMAM2005, BioADIT2006, LATSIS2006, SSRR2016, AMAM2019), and a program committee member of over 50 conferences.
Jean-Marie Drezet1992-1996: PhD work at Laboratoire de Métallurgie Physique under the supervision of Prof. Michel Rappaz (cf : http://library.epfl.ch/theses/?display=detail&nr=1509) 1997-2000: EMPACT project (European Modelling Programme for Aluminium Casting Technologies) 2001-2004: VIRCAST project (European Virtual Casting) 2005-2006: Study of the sawing process of rolling sheet al. ingots (Alcan Fonds) 2005-2006: WelAIR project (Welding of Airframes, EADS) 2005-2008: study of the electron beam welding of Cu-Cr-Zr alloys (CEA, France) 2006-2008: study of the laser beam welding of Al-Li alloys (EADS, France) 2008-2011: co-supervision with Prof. A. Nussbaumer of the PhD work of C. Acevedo on the influence of residual stresses on the fatigue design of tubular welded joints, http://library.epfl.ch/theses/?nr=5056 2007-2010: co-supervision with Prof. J.-F. Molinari of the PhD work of K. Shahim on the Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus (S. Momjian, HU-Genève et R. Sinkus, ESPCI-Paris), http://library.epfl.ch/theses/?nr=5191 2008-2012: co-supervision with Prof. M. Rappaz of the PhD work of M. Sistaninia on the simulation of solidification cracking using granular models (CCMX-MERU project) 2010-2014: supervision with Prof. M. Rappaz of the PhD work of N. Chobaut on the modelling of stresses during quenching of thick heat treatable aluminium parts (CCMX-MERU project) 2011-2015: supervision with Prof. H. Van Swygenhoven-Moens of the PhD work of P. Schloth on precipitation during quenching of thick heat treatable aluminium parts (CCMX-MERU project) 