Berend SmitBerend Smit received an MSc in Chemical Engineering in 1987 and an MSc in Physics both from the Technical University in Delft (the Netherlands). He received in 1990 cum laude PhD in Chemistry from Utrecht University (the Netherlands). He was a (senior) Research Physicists at Shell Research from 1988-1997, Professor of Computational Chemistry at the University of Amsterdam (the Netherlands) 1997-2007.
In 2004 Berend Smit was elected Director of the European Center of Atomic and Molecular Computations (CECAM) Lyon France. Since 2007 he is Professor of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry at U.C. Berkeley and Faculty Chemist at Materials Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Since 2014 he has been director of the Energy Center at EPFL.
Alfio QuarteroniOf italian nationality, Alfio Quarteroni was born on May 30th 1952. He pursued his studies in mathematics at University of Pavia and at University of Paris VI. In 1986 he was nominated full professor at Catholic University of Brescia, later professor in mathematics at University of Minnesota at Minneapolis and professor in numerical analysis at Politecnico di Milano. He is designated full professor in 1997 and enters into service with EPFL in 1998. At EPFL, he teaches numerical analysis to engineers and mathematicians and holds specialized courses about mathematical modelling and scientific computing for master and PhD students. He had been scientific director of CRS4, plenary speaker of more than two hundred international conferences; he is member of the European Academy of Sciences, the Italian Academy of Sciences, the Lombard Academy of Science and Letters. He is Editor in Chief of two book series (MS&A and Unitext) by Springer, associate editor of 25 international journals. He has been plenary speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians ICM2006. He had been responsible of several European research networks. His team has carried out the aerodynamic and hydrodynamic simulations for the optimization of Alinghi, the Swiss sailing yacht that has won two editions of the America's Cup in 2003 and 2007.
Jean-François MolinariProfessor J.F. Molinari is the director of the Computational Solid Mechanics Laboratory (http://lsms.epfl.ch) at EPFL, Switzerland. He holds an appointment in the Civil Engineering institute, which he directed from 2013 to 2017, and a joint appointment in the Materials Science institute. He started his tenure at EPFL in 2007, and was promoted to Full Professor in 2012. He is currently an elected member of the Research Council of the Swiss National Science Foundation in Division 2 (Mathematics, Natural and Engineering Sciences), and co editor in chief of the journal Mechanics of Materials. J.F. Molinari graduated from Caltech, USA, in 2001, with a M.S. and Ph.D. in Aeronautics. He held professorships in several countries besides Switzerland, including the United States with a position in Mechanical Engineering at the Johns Hopkins University (2000-2006), and France at Ecole Normale Supérieure Cachan in Mechanics (2005-2007), as well as a Teaching Associate position at the Ecole Polytechnique de Paris (2006-2009). The work conducted by Prof. Molinari and his collaborators takes place at the frontier between traditional disciplines and covers several length scales from atomistic to macroscopic scales. Over the years, Professor Molinari and his group have been developing novel multiscale approaches for a seamless coupling across scales. The activities of the laboratory span the domains of damage mechanics of materials and structures, nano- and microstructural mechanical properties, and tribology. François MaréchalPh D. in engineering Chemical process engineer
Researcher and lecturer in the field of computer aided process and energy systems engineering.
Lecturer in the mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and environmental sciences engineering in EPFL.
I'm responsible for the Minor in Energy of EPFL and I'm involved in 3 projects of the Competence Center in Energy and Mobility (2nd generation biofuel, Wood SOFC, and gas turbine development with CO2 mitigation) in which i'm contributing to the energy conversion system design and optimisation.
Short summary of my scientific carrer
After a graduation in chemical engineering from the University of Liège, I have obtained a Ph. D. from the University of Liège in the LASSC laboratory of Prof. Kalitventzeff (former president of the European working party on computer aided process engineering). This laboratory was one of the pioneering laboratory in the field of Computer Aided Process Engineering.
In the group of Professor Kalitventzeff, I have worked on the development and the applications of data reconciliation, process modelling and optimisation techniques in the chemical process industry, my experience ranges from nuclear power stations to chemical plants. In the LASSC, I have been responsible from the developments in the field of rational use of energy in the industry. My first research topic has been the methodological development of process integration techniques, combining the use of pinch based methods and of mathematical programming: e.g. for the design of multiperiod heat exchanger networks or Mixed integer non linear programming techniques for the optimal management of utility systems. Fronted with applications in the industry, my work then mainly concentrated on the optimal integration of utility systems considering not only the energy requirements but the cost of the energy requirements and the energy conversion systems. I developed methods for analysing and integrating the utility system, the steam networks, combustion (including waste fuel), gas turbines or other advanced energy conversion systems (cogeneration, refrigeration and heat). The techniques applied uses operation research tools like mixed integer linear programming and exergy analysis. In order to evaluate the results of the utility integration, a new graphical method for representing the integration of the utility systems has been developed. By the use of MILP techniques, the method developed for the utility integration has been extended to handled site scale problems, to incorporate environmental constraints and reduce the water usage. This method (the Effect Modelling and Optimisation method) has been successfully applied to the chemical plants industry, the pulp and paper industry and the power plant. Instead of focusing on academic problems, I mainly developed my research based on industrial applications that lead to valuable and applicable patented results. Recently the methods developed have been extended to realise the thermoeconomic optimisation of integrated systems like fuel cells. My present R&D work concerns the application of multi-objective optimisation strategies in the design of processes and integrated energy conversion systems.
Since 2001, Im working in the Industrial Energy Systems Laboratory (LENI) of Ecole Polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) where Im leading the R&D activities in the field of Computer Aided Analysis and Design of Industrial Energy Systems with a major focus on sustainable energy conversion system development using thermo-economic optimisation methodologies. A part from the application and the development of process integration techniques, that remains my major field of expertise, the applications concern :
Rational use of water and energy in Industrial processes and industrial production sites : projects with NESTLE, EDF, VEOLIA and Borregaard (pulp and paper).Energy conversion and process design : biofuels from waste biomass (with GASNAT, EGO and PSI), water dessalination and waste water treatment plant (VEOLIA), power plant design (ALSTOM), Energy conversion from geothermal sources (BFE). Integrated energy systems in urban areas : together with SCANE and SIG (GE) and IEA annexe 42 for micro-cogeneration systems.
I as well contributed to the definition of the 2000 Watt society and to studies concerning the emergence of green technologies on the market in the frame of the Alliance for Global Sustainability.
Klaus KernKlaus Kern is Professor of Physics at EPFL and Director and Scientific Member at the Max-Planck-Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, Germany. He also is Honorary Professor at the University of Konstanz, Germany. His present research interests are in nanoscale science, quantum technology and in microscopy at the atomic limits of space and time. He holds a chemistry degree and PhD from the University of Bonn and a honorary doctors degree from the University of Aalborg. After his doctoral studies he was staff scientist at the Research Center Jülich and visiting scientist at Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill before joining the Faculty of EPFL in 1991 and the Max-Planck-Society in 1998. Professor Kern has authored and coauthored close to 700 scientific publications, which have received nearly 60‘000 citations. He has served frequently on advisory committees to universities, professional societies and institutions and has received numerous scientific awards and honors, including the 2008 Gottfried-Wilhelm-Leibniz Prize and the 2016 Van‘t Hoff Prize. Prof. Kern has also educated a large number of leading scientists in nanoscale physics and chemistry. During the past twenty-five years he has supervised one hundred PhD students and sixty postdoctoral fellows. Today, more than fifty of his former students and postdocs hold prominent faculty positions at Universities around the world.
Christian Gabriel TheilerChristian Theiler obtained his Master’s degree in physics from ETH Zurich in 2007 and his PhD from EPFL in 2011. He then joined MIT as a postdoctoral associate to work on the Alcator C-Mod tokamak. In 2014, he returned to EPFL as a EUROfusion fellow, to join the TCV tokamak team. Two years later, he was named Tenure Track Assistant Professor in Plasma Physics at EPFL. Christian’s research focuses on tokamak boundary physics and related diagnostic techniques. He has contributed to the understanding of the formation, propagation, and control of turbulent plasma structures, called blobs, and gained new insights on the structure of transport barriers in the plasma periphery in different high-confinement regimes. His current research focuses on detachment physics and turbulence characteristics in conventional and alternative divertor magnetic geometries.
Alfredo PasquarelloAlfredo Pasquarello studied physics at the
Scuola Normale Superiore
of Pisa and at the University of Pisa, obtaining their respective degrees in 1986. He obtained a doctoral degree at the EPFL in 1991 with a thesis on
Multiphoton Transitions in Solids
. Then, he moved to Bell Laboratories at Murray Hill (New Jersey), where he carried out postdoctoral research on the magnetic properties of carbon fullerenes. In 1993, he joined the Institute for Numerical Research in the Physics of Materials (IRRMA), where his activity involved first-principles simulation methods. In 1998, he was awarded the EPFL Latsis Prize for his research work on disordered silica materials. Succeeding in grant programs of the Swiss National Science Foundation, he then set up his own research group at IRRMA. In July 2003, he is appointed Professor in Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics at EPFL. Currently, he leads the Chair of Atomic Scale Simulation.
