AMT 2026 - Advanced Materials and Technologies

Invited Speakers

Prof. Natalia Sobczak

Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland

Prof. Natalia Sobczak is a Head of the Department of Metallurgical Processes at the Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Krakow, Poland. She has a world-renowned reputation in high-temperature liquid state materials science with special attention to investigation of high-temperature phenomena in liquid-assisted processes (metal casting, joining, additive manufacturing, synthesis of metal matrix and ceramic matrix composites). Her research contributions include over 400 publication (h-index 25), 80 national and international projects (financed by European Space Agency, European Commission, United Nations Organization, Japan Society for Promotion Science, U.S.-Poland Maria Sklodowska-Curie Joint Fund) and 18 patents. She is also a holder of several prestigious national and international awards, i.a. Knight’s Cross of Polonia Restituta Order for all the scientific achievements in 2023 and Gold Cross of Merit, Gold Medals BRUSSELS EUREKA at the Belgian and Int. Trade Fair for Technological Innovations; American Vacuum Society and ASM International Award for “The Unique, Unusual and New Techniques in Microscopy”, 1st Prize Award at Kaohsiung Int. Invention and Design EXPO, Taiwan, etc.

Prof. Mietek Jaroniec

Kent State University, Kent, USA

Prof. Mietek Jaroniec received his MS and PhD from Maria Curie-Skłodowska University (Poland), where he later became a faculty member and was awarded the title of Professor in 1985. Since 1991 he has been Professor of Chemistry at Kent State University, USA, and is now Professor Emeritus. Since 2019 he has served as Academic Deputy Editor of Science Advances and has been a board member of numerous journals, including Adsorption, Applied Surface Science Advances, Carbon Innovation, Chemistry Materials, Exploration, Journal of Colloid and Interfacial Science, Materials Today Sustainability, and Nano-Micro Letters. Among his many honors, he values the Honorary Professorship of Maria Curie-Skłodowska University and Doctor Honoris Causa titles from Nicolaus Copernicus University, the Military University of Technology, and Poznan University of Technology. He also received the Maria Curie-Skłodowska Medal from the Polish Chemical Society and several Kent State University awards. His research focuses on interfacial chemistry, adsorption at gas/solid and liquid/solid interfaces, and nanoporous materials, including mesoporous silicas, inorganic oxides, carbon nanostructures, composites, and catalysts. His H‑index is 154 (Web of Science) and 172 (Google Scholar), and since 2016 he has been listed among the world's highly cited researchers in chemistry and materials science.

Prof. Blaž Likozar

National Institute of Chemistry, Ljubljana, Slovenia

Prof. Blaž Likozar is the Head of the Department of Catalysis and Chemical Reaction Engineering at the National Institute of Chemistry (NIC) in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He leads the “Chemical Reaction Engineering” programme, as well as numerous research projects, including 15 H2020 projects and more than 50 Horizon Europe projects. His expertise includes, among others, heterogeneous catalysis materials, modelling, simulation and optimization of process fluid mechanics, transport phenomena, and chemical kinetics. He worked at the University of Delaware in 2014–2015 as a Fulbright Program researcher. He has authored more than 400 scientific articles and has been cited over 10,000 times, with an h-index of 61. He is also involved in many industrial projects, among others with Total Energies, Evonik Industries, UPM, Novartis, and Carbon Recycling International. He is a recipient of the Pregl and Zois Awards.

Prof. Joaquín Silvestre-Albero

University of Alicante, Spain

Joaquín Silvestre-Albero is full professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Alicante. He leads the Nanopore Group by LMA devoted to the design of nanomaterials (activated carbons, metal-organic frameworks – MOFs, zeolites) with tailored porous structure and surface chemistry to be applied in a wide range of processes such as gas adsorption, gas separation, drug delivery, catalysis, among others. He is co-author of 205 papers in internationally recognized journals (h index 56) and several book chapters. Furthermore, he leads many national, international and industrial projects. He is the coordinator of the Horizon Europe project CLEANWATER “Multifunctional sustainable adsorbents for water treatment assisted with plasma technologies and for health protection from xenobiotics”, and partner of Horizon projects WAVEE “Waste as Valuable Elements for Europe”, and MOST-H2 “Novel metal-organic framework adsorbents for efficient storage of hydrogen”. He is also COI of the spin-off company OMIX CIRCULAR TECHNOLOGIES.

Dr. Diego Martinez Martinez

Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology

Dr. Diego Martinez Martinez is Lead R&T Scientist at the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST). He holds 2 PhD’s, in Inorganic Chemistry (Seville, 2007) and Applied Physics (Groningen, 2017). His research is focused on the deposition, characterization and properties of coatings for different applications, particularly oriented towards substrate protection against aggressive environments or harsh conditions. His contributions cover different aspects of tribology, mechanical properties, protection of flexible and complex substrates (e.g. cork and rubber) and coating engineering. He has worked in different academic institutions across Europe (Spain, Portugal, Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg), and he has published more than 65 SCI-indexed articles (h index 24) and holds four patents.

Dr. Juan Carlos Sanchez-Lopez

Institute of Materials Science of Seville, Spain

Dr. Juan Carlos Sanchez-Lopez is a Research Scientist at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) at the Institute of Materials Science of Seville (ICMS). He obtained his PhD in Chemical Sciences in 1998. His research is focused on the tailored design of nanostructured materials and functional thin films, with particular emphasis on magnetron sputtering and plasma-based vacuum technologies. His work addresses surface engineering, tribology, and energy-related applications, including selective solar absorber coatings with enhanced oxidation resistance and thermal stability. He has published over 130 SCI-indexed articles, holds three patents, and has extensive experience in national and European research projects.

Prof. Ludovic Noels

University of Liège, Belgium

Prof. Ludovic Noels obtained his degree in Aerospace Engineering in 2000 and his Ph.D. in 2004 from the University of Liège, Belgium. He subsequently held a postdoctoral position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, USA, from 2005 to 2006, working with Prof. Radovitzky in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Since 2008, he has been with the University of Liège, where he has progressed to Full Professor and leads the Computational and Multiscale Mechanics of Materials (CM3) Unit within the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering. The CM3 Unit develops advanced multiscale numerical methods to predict the behavior, including failure, of complex engineered materials and has participated in numerous national and international projects, including the coordination of the FET-Open project MOAMMM, participation in the Horizon Europe project DIDEAROT, and several ERA-NET initiatives. The unit has established expertise in multiscale modeling of nonlinear material systems, AI-based surrogate modeling, Bayesian parameter identification, and multiphysics constitutive modeling for metals and polymers, with recent work extending to continuum mechanics simulations on quantum computing platforms.

Prof. Pavel Souček

Masaryk University, Czech Republic

Pavel Souček is an Associate Professor at the Department of Plasma Physics and Technology, Masaryk University (Czech Republic). He obtained his Ph.D. in plasma physics in 2013 and habilitated in 2019. His research focuses on plasma-assisted deposition of advanced thin films, with an emphasis on high-entropy ceramics, non-equilibrium materials design, and process–structure–property relationships. In collaboration with industry, he develops nanocomposite superhard coatings, nanolaminates combining hardness and ductility, and metallic glass thin films for demanding applications. His recent work increasingly targets materials for a sustainable future, including high-entropy oxides for next-generation lithium- and sodium-ion batteries, solid-state catalysts for green hydrogen, and radiation-resistant materials for fusion technologies. He has authored 79 publications with over 850 citations (WoS, h-index 18). His research aims to bridge plasma physics and materials science to enable the controlled design of novel materials beyond equilibrium. He is actively involved in peer review for journals and funding agencies and contributes to international collaboration through the Taiwanese–Czech UAAT-ICU partnership.