Biographical notes
Dr Kazem Abhary, A. Professor at the School of Advanced Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, the University of South Australia, obtained his B.Eng and M.Eng in Mechanical Engineering from Tehran University, and Master by Research and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Manchester (then UMIST: University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology), England. Since then he has been continuously involved in tertiary education and research, and has acted as a consulting engineer to variety of industries. His publications, exceeding 120, include numerous international journal and conference papers, two handbook chapters, seven book chapters, three books, and a bi-lingual Mechanical Engineering Lexicon. He has also published a number of non-technical articles on social and literary issues. He has undertaken about 100 engineering projects in Australia, Singapore and Malaysia, has educated a few thousand engineers and supervised many post-graduate students (Masters and PhD). He has been on the international advisory board of a number of international engineering conferences and engineering journals; associate editor of an engineering journal; reviewer to a number of international engineering journals and conferences, and keynote speaker to international engineering conferences and engineering graduation ceremonies. His publications include seven new methods in Design of Machinery (Mechanical Design, Mechanisms and Vibrations) the methods that have downgraded project-type design-problems to the level of classroom tutorials. He is also a co-inventor of a machine. He was an elected member of the Council of the University of South Australia for two terms (2001-2004) and has been a member of Standards-Australia/Standards-New Zealand since 1994. His biography is listed in a few international Who’s Who dictionaries including Marquis Who’s Who in Science and Engineering. He strongly believes that a fundamental key to avoid the detrimental impact of Technology on society and the environment is a radical shift in engineers’ attitude toward social, humanitarian and spiritual awareness. Therefore, it is now over fifteen years that he has committed himself to “the enhancement of engineers’ awareness on social and environmental impact of the Engineering Profession” as a major mission in his teaching, and also national and international seminars. He is a social figure in Australia due to his extensive services to the community, including over 50 talks on SBS Radio and Radio Adelaide on Science, Technology, Language, Culture, Literature, and Social Affairs since 1993. He is a winner of the six awards, namely UniSA Lecturer-of-the-Year 2007, 2008, 2009 Award, UniSA Quality Teaching Award 2008, UniSA Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning Award 2008, and ALTC (Australian Learning and Teaching Council) Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning Award 2009.
Dr Dejan Djukic in 2011 retired from his position of Senior Lecturer at the School of Engineering and Advanced Technology (Massey University, New Zealand). Dejan received his BSc in Electrical Engineering from Belgrade University, Yugoslavia, and the Ph.D. degree from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne. His research expertise is in Systems Engineering, Electronics and Microcontrollers, and Signal Processing and Real Time Software.
Dr Hung-Yao Hsu is Senior Lecturer at the School of Advanced Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering at the University of South Australia. He received his PhD in Manufacturing Engineering from University of South Australia, his Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, and his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from National Taiwan Institute of Technology, Taiwan. He has been involved in various projects both in Australia and Taiwan. Projects in the past included rapid transit system construction, laser printer development, and cellular manufacturing system design. His teaching and research interests include knowledge management along with several other engineering disciplines, such as Kinematics and Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems. Hung-Yao is member of The Institution of Engineers, Australia and reviewer for international scientific journals. He is a co-author in a book and he published a number of journal and conference transcripts.
Professor Pei-feng Hsu (Ph.D. University of Texas, Austin, Texas, 1991) joined Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at the Florida Institute of Technology in 1993 as an assistant professor and became Department Head in 2007. Dr. Hsu's research interests include micro-scale radiation transport with applications to semiconductor manufacturing; ultra-fast light pulse scattering processes with applications to optical imaging and remote sensing, radiation heat transfer in combustion and energy conversion systems, and numerical models for radiative transport equation and Maxwell's equations for steady and transient processes. He has contributed in over 45 journal papers, 60 conference papers, one book chapter, one patent, one licensed technology, and over 80 invited and contributed presentations. Dr. Hsu has consulted for US and international companies on thermal energy systems and designs. He chaired numerous heat transfer related conference sessions. He has served on the Int. Symposium of Radiation Transfer scientific committee since 2001 and IEEE Rapid Thermal Processing Conference program committee since 2004. He received Florida Tech's College of Engineering Faculty Excellence in Research Award in 2004 and The Boeing Company Welliever Faculty Fellowship in 2002. He has been elected an Associate Fellow of AIAA in 2003 and a Fellow of ASME in 2006. In 2007, he was nominated by Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China, for Changjiang Scholar. He helps organize the 2009 and 2010 Taiwan-Florida Higher Education Conferences.
Dr Yung-Chou Kao is Associate Professor at the National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences, Taiwan. In addition to his expertise in applied mechanical engineering, Dr Kao is experienced in Web applications and programming (Network and Windows Programming, Agent communication, HTML, JAVA and Common Gateway Interface). Dr Kao worked for 5 years as practicing engineer in advanced metalworking industries before joining the Academe in 1997. He has published numerous international journal (16) and conference (over hundred) papers, including two book articles.
Dr Zlatko Kovacic is Associate Professor at the Open Polytechnic. Before arriving in New Zealand in 1995, Dr Kovacic was a lecturer in the Belgrade University, Yugoslavia for over fifteen years. He has a PhD in statistics and has taught a variety of undergraduate and postgraduate statistical courses, as well as computer programming and econometrics. His research interests range from IT education, to eCommerce, time series and multivariate analysis, and other aspects of using computers and communications technologies. He is Editor-in-Chief of academically peer refereed Interdisciplinary Journal of Information, Knowledge, and Management, Senior Associate Editor of Informing Science: The International Journal of an Emerging Transdiscipline and Associate Editor of Journal of Information Technology Education.
Dr Dennis Mulcahy is Adjunct Professor at the University of South Australia. His practical experience includes work at the Central Electricity Research Laboratories, Surrey UK. His portfolio includes the rank of an Associate Professor (1991), Head of School (1993 -2000), team member in the Targeted Links Project with Korea and Indonesia (1993-1997) and Program Leader for Education and Training - CRC for Water Quality and Treatment (1995-2008). Dennis has published a number of papers addressing topics in Physical, Analytical and Environmental Chemistry and in the relevant Education issues.
Dr Biao Qin received his Ph.D degree from Huazhong University of Science & Technology in 2003 and then spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow in Tsinghua University. He joined Renmin University of China as an Assistant Professor in 2005 and became an Associate Professor in 2007.
Dr Sead Spuzic has over 15 years of practicing experience in industry both in Europe and Australia. In addition, he has been appointed at several universities (Australia, Europe, Middle East, New Zealand) to teach a number of courses related to technology, science and management. He is member of the Australasian Association for Engineering Education (AAEE), member of organising committees at several international scientific conferences and reviewer for several international journals. His multi-disciplinary background evolved into an interest in cross-disciplinary knowledge sharing. His publications (listed at http://people.unisa.edu.au/Sead.Spuzic) cover a wide spectrum of topics such as the basics aspects of knowledge, collaboration, motivation and disambiguation in education, along with specialists themes in material sciences, mechanical, manufacturing and management engineering.
Professor Richard Thorn retired from the position of Head at the School of Engineering and Science, Victoria University, Melbourne. He has held research and academic positions in Australia, Norway and the UK, with particular research interests in multi-phase flow measurement, instrument validation and measurement education. Until the end of 2006 he was Assistant Dean of the Faculty of Business, Computing and Law, Head of the School of Computing and Professor of Measurement Systems at the University of Derby, UK, and in January 2007 he joined Victoria University. Professor Thorn was the Editor of Australian Journal of Instrumentation and Control. In addition, he has edited or co-authored 4 books including: Handbook of Measurement Science (1982, John Wiley & Sons), The three-volume Handbook of Measuring System Design (2005, John Wiley & Sons).
Professor Faik Uzunovic joined Faculty of Metallurgy and Materials Science Zenica in 1989 to serve in positions of educator, Vice-Dean, Dean and during 2004-2005 as acting Rector of newly constituted University of Zenica. Prior to his academic career he significantly contributed to RMK Zenica (now subsidiary of ArcelorMittal, the largest steel company in the world) both as a manager and technologist. He is registered UNIDO expert (United Nations Industrial Development Organization) and has made numerous research contributions in engineering sciences.
Dr Stanley Y. Van Horn is Director at the English Language Center at The Rochester Institute of Technology, New York, US. In addition, Dr van Horn is a member of UCIEP Board of Directors. His previous positions include Associate Director at the Intensive English Institute (EIL) University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign). He was also Associate Editor for World Englishes journal, and Secretary/Treasurer the International Association for World Englishes (IAWE). Stanley has a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Illinois and his research interest include cross-cultural communication and world Englishes. Stan has taught IEI courses in business English and grammar for as well as courses for EIL and Linguistics departments. Before coming to Illinois, Stan lived and worked as a teacher in Micronesia where he came to appreciate eating sushi, kayaking and hiking in the mountains. He has also studied in Switzerland and Washington, D.C. His personal interests include rollerblading, bicycling, reading, learning about languages, and listening to music from different places in the world.
Dr Denise Wood is a Senior Lecturer and Teaching and Learning Portfolio Leader in the School of Communication, International Studies and Languages at the University of South Australia. She has extensive experience in the multimedia and is a founding member of the Government’s Information Policy Advisory Council (established by the Telecommunications Minister in 1996). She was the Director of OptCom SA Inc., a Federal and State Government funded organisation, which provided multimedia production and training in the late 1990s. Her URL is http://people.unisa.edu.au/Denise.Wood. Denise is the Principal Investigator in two nationally funded research grants as well as several University funded projects. She leads a research project funded by the Australian Teaching and Learning Council, addressing the design and development of an open source 3D virtual learning platform. The findings from her research have been widely published in books, journals and at conferences which largely focus on the use of Web 2.0 and 3D virtual worlds to promote social inclusivity, and to engage learners in virtual experiential learning. Denise is Associate Editor of the Higher Education and Research Development Society Journal and she is a reviewer of several books, peer reviewed journals and conferences. She is a member of various industry and Government Advisory Committees focusing on the use of Web 2.0 and virtual worlds in education and business. Denise maintains a strong social networking profile via Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo, Ning Groups, a Wordpress Blog, Twitter, Del.icio.us, and Second Life. Denise has received a number of awards including a University of South Australia Award for Teaching Excellence, UniSA Citations for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning, Quality Teaching Awards in 2007 and 2008, the University Equity Award, the Premier’s Public Sector Engagement Award for building communities (2009) as the Project Leader for the SA Government funded Sustainable Online Community Engagement project and SA Information Technology Achiever of the Year presented by the Premier of South Australia.
Dr Guang Xu is an Associate Professor at the Harbin Normal University, China. He received his PhD from Harbin Institute of Technology and his research interests include Organization Theory and Innovation, Organization change etc. He has contributed in over 35 journal papers, 16 conference papers, 2 books, and over 40 invited and contributed presentations. He supervised projects funded by the National Social Science Foundation of China, Natural Science Foundation of Heilongjiang Province, and the Humanities and Social Sciences Foundation of Educational Commission of Heilongjiang Province. Dr Xu now serves as Vice Dean of School of Management. In addition, Dr Guang Xu is the Executive Director of Heilongjiang Business Management Association, as well as a Senior Consultant of AID Management Consulting Co Ltd and Shenzhen Handsel Intellectual Development Company Ltd.
Dr Robert (Bob) Young is a Senior Lecturer at at the Wolfson School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, Loughborough University. Dr Young has extensive industrial and academic experience. His main expertise is in computer based information and knowledge systems for product design and manufacture. His research is now linked to Product Lifecycle Management systems with a focus on the modelling of manufacturing knowledge such that it can be shared effectively across multiple designs and manufacturing systems. In recent years this has involved product and manufacturing capability modelling, multi-context feature and product family models, knowledge reuse, and also the application of foundation ontologies for knowledge sharing and interoperability. Dr Young has held a number of government funded grants plus industrially funded projects totalling over £5M and published over 70 journal and conference papers. He supervises PhD graduates and collaborates with many experts including Bath, NIST, Ecole Centrale de Lille, Toronto University and UNAM in Mexico. He also contributes to ISO TC184 SC4 and recently become involved with the EU INTEROP-Vlab.
