George Kiriakidis, Professor of the Department of Physics of the University of Crete and Head of the TCM research group at the Institute of Electronic Structure and Laser (IESL) of the Foundation for Research and Technology – Hellas (FORTH), has been unanimously elected as the President of the European Materials Research Society (E-MRS) for the period 2017-2019. Prof. Kiriakidis has served as vice-President of the E-MRS for the last four years. It is the first time that a Greek materials scientist is voted in the E-MRS leadership.

The European Materials Research Society was founded in 1983 and is the second largest materials society in the world after the American MRS. It has more than 5000 members from industry, government, academia and research laboratories, who meet regularly to debate recent technological developments on functional materials. It encourages scientists, engineers and research managers to exchange information on an interdisciplinary platform, and recognizes professional and technical excellence by promoting awards for achievement from student to senior scientist level. Among these are:the “E-MRS Anniversary Award”, the annual “Czochraski award”, the IUMRS “Global Leadership and Service Award” and the “EU-40 Materials Prize”.

As an adhering body of the International Union of Materials Research Societies (IUMRS), the E-MRS enjoys and benefits from very close relationships with other Materials Research organizations elsewhere in Europe and around the world and promotes bilateral cooperation with corresponding societies from Japan (MRS-J), China (C-MRS), Korea (MRS-K) and Brazil (MRS-B).

The E-MRS is a member of the European Materials Forum (EMF), an independent and informal organization representing both public and private societies, companies and agencies committed to the scientific and technological development of Materials Science in Europe.

The E-MRS is also an advisory member for the optimum implementation of the proposed by the President of the European Commission establishment of the European Institute of Technology (EIT) and organizes, on a bilateral basis, the influential World Materials Summit (WMS).

Short CV

Prof. Dr. KIRIAKIDIS GEORGE was born in Thessaloniki, Greece on April 4, 1950.

On Feb.1973 he was awarded the degree of BSc Physics/ Aristotelion University of Thessaloniki, Greece. From 1973 to 1978 he followed graduate studies in UK and received a MSc in Automatic Control Systems for UMIST in 1975 and a PhD from the Elect. Eng. Dept. Salford University, UK in 1979. In 1996 he was awarded the degree of MBA from the Univ. of Surrey, UK. Since 1981, he is with the Physics Dept. of the University of Crete, Greece, currently serving as Full Professor. He was the founding member and first director of the Science and Technology Park of Crete (1993-97). In June 2014 he was appointed as Adjunct Professor at the MEA Dpt, CEMR West Virginia University, USA.From 1985-1991 he was the deputy director of the III-V Microelectronics Group, IESL Foundation for Research and Technology - Hellas, (FORTH), Crete, Greece.

On 1992 he established and is still heads the TCM Group at IESL / FORTH. The current research interests of his group focus on the growth and study of the optical, electrical, structural and chemical properties of metal oxide thin films as potential materials for novel opto-electronic applications (gratings, TTFTs, waveguides, etc), solar cells, and chemical sensors as well as photocatalytic materials for clean air and depolluting applications.

G. Kiriakidis has published more than 120 scientific papers in Refereed Journals and participated in over 100 National and International Conferences (including 58 as invited speaker). He has three patents and established the International Transparent Conductive Materials (TCM) conference series in 2016 organized on a bi-annual base in Crete. He is also the Editor and co-author in 7 Scientific Reports and three proceedings books.

Contact Details:

Prof. George Kiriakidis

Head of the TCM research group

Institute of Electronic Structure and Laser (IESL)

Foundation for Research and Technology – Hellas (FORTH)

Tel. +20 2810 391271

e-mail: kiriakid@iesl.forth.gr