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.
Michael GraetzelProfessor of Physical Chemistry at the Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) Michael Graetzel, PhD, directs there the Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces. He pioneered research on energy and electron transfer reactions in mesoscopic systems and their use to generate electricity and fuels from sunlight. He invented mesoscopic injection solar cells, one key embodiment of which is the dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC). DSCs are meanwhile commercially produced at the multi-MW-scale and created a number of new applications in particular as lightweight power supplies for portable electronic devices and in building integrated photovoltaics. They engendered perovskite solar cells (PSCs) which turned into the most exciting break-through in the history of photovoltaics. He received a number of prestigious awards, of which the most recent ones include the RusNANO Prize, the Zewail Prize in Molecular Science, the Global Energy Prize, the Millennium Technology Grand Prize, the Marcel Benoist Prize, the King Faisal International Science Prize, the Einstein World Award of Science and the Balzan Prize. He is a Fellow of several learned societies and holds eleven honorary doctor’s degrees from European and Asian Universities. His over 1500 publications have received some 220’000 citations with an h-factor of 218 (SI-Web of Science) demonstrating the strong impact of his scientific work.
Yves PerriardYves Perriard was born in Lausanne in 1965. He received the M. Sc. in Microengineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology - Lausanne (EPFL) in 1989 and the Ph D. degree in 1992. Co-founder of Micro-Beam SA, he was CEO of this company involved in high precision electric drive. Senior lecturer from 1998 and professor since 2003, he is currently director of Laboratory of Integrated Actuators. His research interests are in the field of new actuator design and associated electronic devices. In 2009, he is appointed Vice-Director of the Microengineering Institute in Neuchâtel until 2011. In 2013 the Federal Council has named him the the CTI commission in Bern. In 2014 he is appointed guest professor at Zhejiang University in China. In 2017, the lab is granted by the Werner Siemens Foundation of an amount of 12 millions CHF in order to set up a new Center for Artificial Muscules. Since 2018, he is Expert with Innosuisse, the new Swiss Innovation Agency. http://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=fr&user=V2onuO8AAAAJ https://actu.epfl.ch/news/a-12-million-franc-donation-to-create-a-center-for/ Alexis BoegliDr Alexis Boegli holds a PhD from the University of Neuchâtel. Starting with a mechanical background, Alexis has a ten year experience in the design and implementation of analogue and digital electronic systems. Since 2001, he has focused on the design and implementation of RF systems. Alexis has designed several RF boards for IP01 including the actually commercialized one. Working as a post-doc project leader at IMT, he is challenged by the optimization of size, range, power and production of wireless systems. His position at the IMT Neuchâtel (University of Neuchâtel until 2008, EPFL Neuchâtel since 2009) provides access to a highly professional design environment and direct contacts to other research institutes such as the EPFL and the CSEM.
Christophe BallifChristophe Ballif is director of the Phototovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratoryb) (PV-Lab at the institute of microengineering (IMT) in Neuchâtel (part of the EPFL since 2009). The lab focus is on the science and technology of high efficiency heterojunction crystalline cells,so-called passivating contacts for solar cells, multi-junction solar cells include novel generation Perovskite on innovative optical high speed detector and on various macroelectronics application. It also deals with energy management with a focus on integration of solar electricity into the energy system. The PV-Lab has strongly contributed to technology transfer and industrialization of novel devices and full technology with numerous companies. Christophe Ballif graduated as a physicist from the EPFL in 1994, where he also obtained in 1998 his Phd degree working on novel PV materials. He accomplished his postdoctoral research at NREL (Golden, US) on compound semiconductor solar cells (CIGS and CdTe). He worked then at the Fraunhofer ISE (Ge) on crystalline silicon photovoltaics (monocrystalline and multi-crystalline) until 2003 and then at the EMPA in Thun (CH) before becoming full professor at the University of Neuchâtel IMT in 2004, taking over the chair of Prof. A. Shah. Since 2013, C.Ballif is also the director of the new CSEM PV-Center, also located in Neuchâtel. The CSEM PV-Center is focussing more on industrialisation and technology transfer in the field of solar energy, including solar electricity management and storage. At the core of the CSEM PV-center activities lies several "pilot lines" for various kinds of solar cells manufacturing, with a focus coating technologies, wet chemistry processes for crystalline silicon, metalisation techniques for solar cells, and a platform for developing "ideal packaging solutions and polymers" for PV modules. In addition, joined facitilites between CSEM and EPFL of over 800 m2 are available for modules manufacturing, measuring and accelerated aging. CSEM PV-center has also full team dedicated to storage and energy systems and operates a joined center with BFH in Biel for research on electrochemical storage. He (co-) authored over 500 journal and technical papers, as well as several patents. He is an elected member of the SATW, member of the scientific council of the Swiss AEE, and member of the board of the EPFL Energy center. In 2016, he recieved the Becquerel prize for his contributions to the field of high efficiency photovoltaics.
Maher KayalMaher Kayal received M.S. and Ph.D degrees in electrical engineering from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland) in 1983 and 1989 respectively. He has been with the Electronics laboratories of the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland) since 1990, where he is currently a professor and director of the Energy Management and Sustainability" section. He has published many scientific papers, coauthor of three text books dedicated to mixed-mode CMOS design and he holds eleven patents. His technical contributions have been in the area of analog and Mixed-signal circuits design including highly linear and tunable sensors microsystems, signal processing and green energy management. Prizes and Honors : Electronics Letters journal Premium Award 2013, Outstanding Paper Award? IEEE Mixdes 2013 Basil Papadias paper Award, IEEE Powertech 2013 Best Paper Awards, Mixdes 2013 Best Paper Awards, ICCAS 2012 Outstanding Paper Award- IEEE Mixdes 2012. Poland Section IEEE ED Chapter special award in 2011. Credit Suisse Award for Best Teaching- 2009. The William M. Portnoy Award at the Energy Conversion Congress and Exposition , California Sept 2009. Best Paper Award - IEEE-Mixdes 2009. High Quality Paper - IEEE Power Tech Conference June 2009. Best Paper Award - IEEE-Mixdes 2007. Best Paper Award - IEEE-TTTC International Conference on Automation, Quality and Testing, Robotics - 2006. Best Application Specific Integrated Circuit at the International European Design and Test Conference ED&TC - 1997. Ascom Award for the Best Work in Telecommunication Fields 1990. Publications Books. Books: Methodology for the Digital Calibration of Analog Circuits and Systems, Marc Pastre & Maher Kayal. Springer Publisher- (ISBN 1-4020-4252-3)-2006. Structured Analog CMOS Design, Danica Stefanovic & Maher Kayal. Springer Publisher-(ISBN 978-1-4020-8572-7)-2008. Linear CMOS RF Amplifiers for Wireless Applications, Maher Kayal, Springer Publisher. (ISBN 978-90-481-9360-8)-2010. Coeditor of Microelectronics Education Kluwer Academic Publishers. (ISBN 1-4020-2072-4). -2004.
Paolo RicciPaolo Ricci earned his masters degree in nuclear engineering at the Politecnico di Torino, Turin (Italy) in 2000. His doctoral studies were conducted at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, with focus on kinetic simulation of magnetic reconnection in the Earth's magnetotail. He spent two-and-a-half years as a postdoctoral researcher at Dartmouth College's Department of Physics and Astronomy, where he worked on gyrokinetic simulations of the Z pinch. He joined the EPFL's Swiss Plasma Center (SPC), as a EURATOM fellow in 2006, was named Tenure Track Assistant Professor in June 2010, and Associate Professor in August 2016. He is at the head of the SPC theory group. Paolo Ricci is the recipient of the 2016 Section de Physique Teaching Prize and of the 2021 Craie d'Or award from the EPFL physics bachelor students.
