Plenary speakers

Prof. Dr. Ewa Gorecka

University of Warsaw, Poland

Prof. Ewa Gorecka (University of Warsaw) is the head of Laboratory of  Dielectrics and Magnetics at Warsaw University, Department of Chemistry, her group specialises in characterization of soft matter structure.  Ewa Gorecka is a leading expert in the field of liquid crystals.  Her main  interests are: chiral liquid crystalline structures build of achiral molecules,  hybrid inorganic–organic structures, polar phases, gels and complex structure of polymers. She is an expert in applying X-ray techniques to study soft matter. She has published over 300 articles that have been cited over 7,000 times.

Prof. Dr. Timo Repo

University of Helsinki, Finland

Timo Repo received his PhD in 1997 from University of Helsinki (Finland), where he was nominated as a full professor of inorganic chemistry in 2007. His research is focused on green chemistry and homogeneous catalysis, including catalyst development for activation of small molecules (e.g. CO2, H2), oxidation, reduction, C-H activation and biomass valorization.

Prof. Dr. Ester Heath

Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia

Ester Heath has been employed at Jožef Stefan Institute since 1991. She earned her M.Sc. (1994) and Ph.D. (1998) in Chemistry – Environmental Organic Analysis from the University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia. She spent 15 months at the University of Plymouth, Plymouth in the UK and two years at McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada. Currently, Prof Heath is Head of the Laboratory for Organic Analytical Chemistry within the Department of Environmental Sciences, Jožef Stefan Institute and a full professor at the International Postgraduate School Jožef Stefan in Ljubljana, Slovenia.

Prof Heath has been working in the field of organic analytical chemistry for over 30 years and has a broad experience in experimental work (sample preparation, quantitative and qualitative determination) and analyzing trace organic compounds and their metabolites/transformation products using different analytical techniques (gas/liquid chromatography, mass spectrometry). Lately, she has been involved in studying the cycling of residues of contaminants of emerging concern in matrices related to the environment, food and health. Prof Heath is a Slovene representative of the European Chemical Societies’ Division of Chemistry and the Environment and a Springer journal Environmental Science and Pollution Research Editor. In 2022, Prof. Dr. Ester Heath received the Zois Award for her Outstanding Achievements in the Use of Organic Analysis in the Fields of Environment, Food, and Health.

Dr. Matej Praprotnik, Professor

National Institute of Chemistry and Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia

Matej Praprotnik is Head of the Laboratory for Molecular Modeling at the National Institute of Chemistry and professor of Physics at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, University of Ljubljana. He studied physics and received his B.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Ljubljana. He carried out postdoctoral research in the Theory group at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research, Mainz, Germany. He has held visiting scientist positions at the Computational Science & Engineering Laboratory (ETH Zurich), the Institute for Mathematics and Its Applications (University of Minnesota), the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (University of California, Santa Barbara), and the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics China (Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing). Matej is former Chair of the PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe) Scientific Steering Committee. He served as President of the Slovenian Biophysical Society from 2015 to 2019. He also serves as a council member of CECAM (Centre Européen de Calcul Atomique et Moléculaire) and as a scientific council member of the National Institute of Chemistry. He is recipient of the ERC Advanced Grant 2019 by the European Research Council and the Zois Recognition in 2022. His research is focused on computer simulation of soft and biological matter. The focus is on developing and combining innovative computational and theoretical methods augmented by machine learning techniques to study complex molecular systems.

Dr. Blaž Likozar, Associate Professor

National Institute of Chemistry, Slovenia

Prof. Blaž Likozar is a head of the Department of Catalysis and Chemical Reaction Engineering at the National Institute of Chemistry (NIC), leading the programme “Chemical Reaction Engineering”, as well as numerous research projects (15 H2020 / 26 in Horizon Europe alone). His expertise lies (among others) in 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 >290 articles, was cited >6000 times, having a h-index of 39. He is also involved in many industrial projects, amongst others, with TotalEnergies, Evonik Industries, UPM, Novartis, Carbon Recycling International… He is a recipient of Pregl and Zois awards.

Prof. Dr. Nora Kulak

University of Potsdam, Germany

Nora Kulak is a Professor in Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Potsdam in Germany since July 2023. Until recently, she was the head of the Institute of Chemistry at Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg in Germany, and held a chair in Inorganic Chemistry at this university. Until 2020 she was an Assistant Professor at Freie Universität Berlin. Her expertise lies in the field of Bioinorganic Chemistry and the applications of coordination chemistry in medicine for therapy and diagnosis as well as metal-based redox catalysis. Nora studied chemistry and received her diploma and Ph.D. degree from Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, Germany. She carried out postdoctoral research at the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) in Berlin and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge/MA. Nora was granted fellowships from the state of Baden-Württemberg and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), respectively. She is a recipient of the Dr. Sophie Bernthsen as well as the Dr. Otto Röhm Gedächtnisstiftung award.