Klaus Benedikt SchönenbergerVision: Scientific research and technology development can be mobilized to help the poorest and most vulnerable in this world. Klaus Schönenberger obtained an MSc in Microengineering (1993), followed by a PhD (1996) from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL). After a post-doc at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, he spent over 10 years in the medical devices industry in leading positions such as Vice-President of Worldwide R&D in a 100mcompanyandGlobalVice−ResidentofResearchandTechnologyina1bn company. In 2009, as he was working for a medical devices company, he received a shock: he realized that there is a huge imbalance in access to medical technology in industrialized versus low and middle-income countries. After a closer look, he discovered that he imbalance’s main cause is a mismatch between existing technologies and business models, with those needed in low and middle-income countries. He decided to leave industry and, in 2009, he co-founded the EssentialMed Foundation, an innovative non-profit venture. In 2011, realizing that both technology and business models needed a profound rethinking, he joined EPFL where he launched EssentialTech, an initiative inspired by the philosophy of EssentialMed but expanded to a much wider portfolio of "essential" technologies. The university-wide program aims to develop innovative technologies and business models, for the benefit of sustainable development in low and middle-income countries. In this role, he has already launched and overseen a dozen large projects. Major Humanitarian actors such as the ICRC, MSF and Terre des Hommes took notice of the innovative approach proposed, and decided to collaborate in 2015-2016. This has resulted notably in the joint creation between EPFL and ICRC, of the Humanitarian Tech Hub at EPFL. In May 2017, Klaus directed and launched a MOOC(Massive Open Online Course) entitled “Technology Innovation for Sustainable Development” which aims to spread the unique methodology and approach worldwide. As of today, more than 6000 people have enrolled. In 2018 a first spin-off company was created. Award winning Pristem SA will deploy an innovative new digital xray imaging system, specifically designed for low-income contexts. In December 2018, the creation of the EssentialTech centre was announced by EPFL's presidency, and Klaus is now the Centre's director. Another spin-off of the EssentialTech Centre is the company HMCare, launched in 2020, which is deploying a transparent surgical mask. Solomzi MakohlisoTeaching & PhD Courses Development engineering ENV-470 This course teaches the fundamentals of technologies for development (Development Engineering) to design, pilot, and deploy appropriate, affordable and robust technologies to address sustainable development challenges and especially those related to extreme poverty in Low-income settings. Science, Technology & Vulnerability HUM-287 This course explores how science and technology can address extreme vulnerability caused by
Demetri PsaltisResearch group
Teaching & PhD PhD Students Victoria Fay, Colin Nikhil Christian Past EPFL PhD Students Wuzhou Song, Alexandre Goy, Julien Cuennet, Ioannis Papadopoulos, Xin Yang, Grégoire Pierre Jean Laporte, Thomas Jean Victor Marie Lanvin, Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini Hashemi, Nicolino Stasio, Morteza Hasani Shoreh, Marilisa Romito, Pooria Hadikhani, Eirini Kakkava, Joowon Lim, Giulia Panusa, Ahmed Bassam Sayed Ayoub Mohamed Ayoub, Amirhossein Saba, Niyazi Ulas Dinç Past EPFL PhD
Harm-Anton KlokExpertise
Polymer design at nanoscaleBiologically-inspired polymers
Mission
Research at the Laboratory of Polymer (LP) focuses on the development of novel advanced polymeric materials with potential applications in optics, electronics or medicine. The philosophy is that precise control over nanoscale structure is an important prerequisite to tailor polymer properties. To this end, a “bottom-up” approach is followed, which starts with designing a new material at the molecular level, in order to be able to pr
Paul Joseph DysonPaul Dyson joined the Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering at the EPFL in 2002 where he heads the Laboratory of Organometallic and Medicinal Chemistry and between 2008 and 2016 chaired the Institute. He has won several prizes including the Werner Prize of the Swiss Chemical Society in 2004, the Award for Outstanding Achievements in Bioorganometallic Chemistry in 2010, the Centennial Luigi Sacconi Medal of the Italian Chemical Society in 2011, the Bioinorganic Chemistry Award of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2015, the European Sustainable Chemistry Award of the European Chemical Society in 2018 and the Green Chemistry Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2020. He is also a Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher and has an H-index >110 (web of science and google scholar). He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2010, a Fellow of the European Academy of Science in 2019 and a life-long fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2020. Over the years he has held visiting professorships at the University of Bourgogne, University of Pierre et Marie Curie, University of Vienna, University of Rome Tor Vergara, Chimie Paristech and Shangai Jiao Tong University.Since 2016 he has been Member of the Council of the Division of Mathematics, Natural and Engineering Sciences at the Swiss National Science Foundation.Between 2016-2021 he has been Member of the Council of the Division of Mathematics, Natural and Engineering Sciences at the Swiss National Science Foundation. In 2021 he was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Basic Sciences.
Kristina SchoonjansExpertise
Bile acid signalingNutrient sensingIntermediary metabolismMetabolic disorders
Teaching & PhD PhD Students Adrien Faure Past EPFL PhD Students Pan Xu, Ece Yildiz, Nadia Bresciani, Yu Sun, Francesca Pontanari, Alejandro Alonso Calleja Past EPFL PhD Students as codirector Mitsunori Nomura, Pan Xu, Katyayanee Neopane, Lucie Camille Chanvillard, Jakob Josef Langer, Bilge Sen Elçi Courses General Biology BIOENG-110 The purpose of the course is to provide a general overview of the biolo
Kamiar AminianKamiar Aminian received the M.S. degree in electrical engineering in 1982, the Ph.D degree in biomedical engineering in 1989 and the Postgraduate degree on technical computing in 1993 from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). He was assistant professor (1994-1996) with Sharif University of Technology (Tehran). He joint EPFL in 1996 where he is currently Professor of medical instrumentation and the director of the Laboratory of Movement Analysis and Measurement in the Institute of Bioengineering of EPFL. His research interests include methodologies for human movement monitoring and analysis in real world conditions mainly based on wearable technologies and inertial sensors with emphasis on gait, physical activity and sport. His research aims to perform outcome evaluation in orthopaedics, to improve motor function and intervention programs in aging and patients with movement disorders and pain, and to identify metrics of performance in sport science.
Kamiar Aminian is a member of the International Society of Posture and Gait Research, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the European Society of Movement Analysis in Adults and Children, the Prevention of fall Network Europe, the Intentional Society of Biomechanics and the President of the 3D analysis of the human movement group. He is author or co-author of more than 450 scientific papers published in reviewed journals and presented at international conferences and holds 10 patents related to medical devices.
Full CV
ORCID
Marcel SalathéTeaching & PhD PhD Students Laura Espinosa Montalbán, Marouane Toumi, Rohan Singh Past EPFL PhD Students Gianrocco Lazzari, Martin Mathias Müller, Sharada Prasanna Mohanty Courses Digital epidemiology BIO-512 Epidemiology is foundational to medicine and public health. This course starts with the key principles of classical epidemiology, progressing through computational modeling techniques, and concluding with the digital approaches of today. Students will also develop a digital epidemiolo
Dario FloreanoProf. Dario Floreano is director of the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL). Since 2010, he is the founding director of the Swiss National Center of Competence in Robotics, a research program that brings together more than 20 labs across Switzerland. Prof. Floreano holds an M.A. in Vision, an M.S. in Neural Computation, and a PhD in Robotics. He has held research positions at Sony Computer Science Laboratory, at Caltech/JPL, and at Harvard University. His main research interests are Robotics and A.I. at the convergence of biology and engineering. Prof. Floreano made pioneering contributions to the fields of evolutionary robotics, aerial robotics, and soft robotics. He served in numerous advisory boards and committees, including the Future and Emerging Technologies division of the European Commission, the World Economic Forum Agenda Council, the International Society of Artificial Life, the International Neural Network Society, and in the editorial committee of several scientific journals. In addition, he helped spinning off two drone companies (senseFly.com and Flyability.com) and a non-for-profit portal on robotics and A.I. (RoboHub.org). Books
Manuale sulle Reti Neurali, il Mulino (in Italian), 1996 (first edition), 2006 (second edition)Evolutionary Robotics, MIT Press, 2000
Bio-Inspired Artificial Intelligence, MIT Press, 2008
Flying Insects and Robots, Springer Verlag, 2010
Christian HeinisTeaching & PhD PhD Students Thomas Julien Denis Emel, Alessandro Scapozza, Nathan Moïse De Sadeleer, Florian Handel, Hugo André Clerc, Frédéric Brantschen, Grégoire Menoud, Ines Michrafy, Jonathan Schmitt, Laura Elena Massaad Past EPFL PhD Students Jeremy Touati, Shiyu Chen, Sophie Venet-Bonnot, Lisa Pollaro, Inmaculada Rentero Rebollo, Philippe Diderich, Charlotte Urech-Varenne, Silvia Bellotto, Davide Bertoldo, Alessandro Zorzi, Camille Villequey, Jonas Alfred Karl Wilbs, Grigory Karateev, Vanessa Carle
Florence PojerExpertise
MER and Head of Unit - Protein Production and Structure Reseach Core Facility within the Life Sciences School - PTPSP: Expertise in Integrative protein Structural Biology (mainly X-ray Crystallography and Cryo-EM) and production of macromolecules in mammalian and bacterial cells. Innovate4Life team member at SV: i4L supports the next generation of entrepreneurs through education, mentorship, and funding, to translate life sciences discoveries into technologies that benefit society. Education and
Dominique PiolettiDominique Pioletti received his Master in Physics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) in 1992. He pursued his education in the same Institution and obtained his PhD in biomechanics in 1997. He developed original constitutive laws taking into account viscoelasticity in large deformations. Then he spent two years at UCSD as post-doc fellow acquiring know-how in cell and molecular biology. He was interested in particular to gene expression of bone cells in contact to orthopedic implant. In April 2006, Dominique Pioletti was appointed Assistant Professor tenure-track at the EPFL and is director of the Laboratory of Biomechanical Orthopedics. His research topics include biomechanics and tissue engineering of musculo-skeletal tissues; mechano-transduction in bone; development of orthopedic implant as drug delivery system. Since 2013, he has been promoted to the rank of Associate Professor.
