Outline

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christian Cierpka studied Aerospace engineering at Technische Universität Dresden, did a 9 month research master course at the von Kármán Institute for Fluid Mechanics in Belgium in the field of optical multi-phase flow characterization and got his Ph.D. for a study on flow control on hydrofoils in 2009. During his Postdoc phase at Bundeswehr University Munich he was involved in the development of several optical diagnostic tools for microfluidics and head of a research group for electrochemical multi-phase flows. Since 2016 he is head of the group for engineering thermodynamics at Technische Universität Ilmenau. His main research interest include optical flow analysis, magneto hydrodynamics, microfluidic energy conversion and flow control in microfluidic systems.

Lars Dittrich studied Mechanical Engineering at Technische Universität Ilmenau and wrote his diploma thesis at the University of British Columbia, Canada. Already during his studies, he focused on microtechnologies and microsystems engineering. Since 2007 he worked as research associate in the micromechanical systems group at Technische Universität Ilmenau where he has been teaching numerous courses such as microtechnologies, microsensors, microactuators, or MEMS. Lars Dittrich is one of the founders and CEO of 5microns, a technology and service provider in the field of microsystems technology. His research interests include microfluidic systems, micro-macro interfaces and coupling, microactuators and microsensors.

Massimiliano Rossi has received his PhD degree in Mechanical Engineering at the Marche Polytechnic University in Italy and he is currently Associate Professor in the Department of Physics at the Technical University of Denmark. He is an internationally recognized expert in particle-image based velocimetry methods and one of the pioneers of single-camera 3D PTV methods for microfluidic flows. His research interests cover several fields within experimental microfluidics, including acoustofluidics, droplets, and micro-swimmers.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Steffen Strehle received his doctorate in engineering from the TU Dresden (Germany). He was a researcher at IFW Dresden e.V., TU Dresden and Harvard University (USA) and held a professorship in semiconductor systems at Ulm University (Germany) from 2011 to 2019. Since 2019, he is a full professor at TU Ilmenau (Germany) and holds the Chair of Microsystems Technology Engineering. His research interests include micro- and nanostructuring techniques as well as the design of high-precision micro- and nanoscale sensors.

Prof. Dr. med. Hartmut Witte is Mechanical Engineer and Physician. From 1990 to 1997 he was a member of Functional Morphology Group (Prof. Dr. phil. nat. H. Preuschoft) at Ruhr-Universität Bochum and received his Ph.D. in 1992, followed by the qualification as a „Specialists in Anatomy“ in 1995 and a Habilitation in the Medical Faculty in 1998. Starting in 1997, he worked as a group leader at Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena in the Institute of Systematic Zoology and Evolutionary Biology (Prof. Dr. rer. nat. M. S. Fischer). After his election as a Professor of Biomechatronics by Technische Universität Ilmenau, he established new activities in the fields of biomimetics and BioMOEMS, and extended the existing scientific base in biomedical and usability engineering.

Dr. rer. nat. Alexander Groß is an organic chemist by training and received a chemical-engineering degree from the University Darmstadt in 1997. In 2002 he got his Ph.D. from the University of Vienna for the investigation and development of synthesis and screening strategies in miniaturized formats. During his postdoc in the medicinal chemistry department of Merck (Darmstadt) he developed combinatorial chemistry methods for the single-bead synthesis of pharmaceutical screening libraries. End of 2003 he became a member of the micro reaction technology group at the TU-Ilmenau. His research interests focus on flow-chemistry and droplet-based microfluidics. He is a lecturer for instrumental analytics and PI for micro reaction technologies.

Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Steffen Hardt studied physics at Universität Gießen and the University of Washington/Seattle and obtained his PhD in theoretical high-energy physics in 1996. After that, his focus shifted to microtechnology and microfluidics. In 1997, he joined Fraunhofer IMM in Mainz, spent some time as a postdoctoral researcher at TU Darmstadt, and accepted a professorship in nano- and micro process technology at Universität Hannover in 2006. He has been a professor for nano- and microfluidics at TU Darmstadt since 2009. His research is centered around the fundamentals of transport phenomena in fluids on small scales, which he studies using experimental, theoretical and numerical methods. His main research interests include interfacial flows, wetting phenomena, electrokinetics, and the separation and manipulation of macromolecules and nanoparticles.