Bengt Kasemo Professor, Chalmers University of Technology

Bengt Kasemo (born 1942) is Professor of Physics at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, since 1983. He has published ca. 350 scientific papers and has about 15 patents. The citation number is ca 8500.

General areas of expertise are materials S&T, surface science, and nanotechnology. Application areas include catalysis, biocompatibility, (bio)sensors, and materials for energy technology.

He heads a research group of ca. 40 people active in basic surface science (surface properties and surface reactions, photo physics and photochemistry at surfaces), bionterfaces, biomaterials, biocompatibility (medical implants, biosensing, cell surface interactions) , nanoscience and nanotechnology, optical properties of and processes with nanoparticles, heterogeneous catalysis for environment and sustainable energy (emission cleaning, photocatalysis, nanofabricated model catalysts, nanoscale chemical kinetics, Monte Carlo simulations of kinetics). The research is primarily focused on metallic and ceramic materials, and less on polymers.

He is on, and has served on, the editorial boards of several international scientific journals, e.g. Surface Science, Chemical Physics Letters, Catalysis Today, J Biomed. Mtrls, Catalysis Letters. He is a frequently invited international conference speaker (5-10 per year). He has been serving on several national science policy and research funding boards, including the Government's Advisory Board for Research, and is a frequent reviewer of international research proposals.

He is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA) (previous vice president of the latter). He currently chairs a joint project group between the two tow academies, to make an accessible and informative book about future energy systems.

He has received several prices e.g. the George Winter award from the European Society for Biomaterials (1999) and the Akzo-Nobel prize from the Royal Academy of Engineering sciences (2001). In 2005 he was awarded Honorary Doctorate at the Danish Technical University. In 2007 he received the gold medal (large size) from the Royal Academy of Engineering Sciences.

He has co-founded four start-up companies (one still active, - Q-Sense AB) and is and has been serving on the board of directors of such companies in the biotechnology area and one in the sustainable energy area. He is currently on the BoD of one listed company.

He is a member of the American Physical Society, American Chemical Society, American Vacuum Society, and the Biomaterials Society.

He has been on many science advisory boards and currently at the Fritz Haber Institute (MPI) in Berlin, the Materials Science Department ETH Zurich, and the Hefei National Laboratory for Physcial Sciences at the Microscale (HFNL) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

He has extensive experience of consultancy with industry.

Main research achievements: Pioneering surface chemiluminescence, which ignited a number of papers on charge transfer and non-adiabatic processes on surfaces (mainly in the 70-80ies).
Established a leading group in basic research on Ti implants (w. Brånemark, Lausmaa, Gold,…)
Nanocatalysis, especially the nanofabrication approach to make model (A Grant) catalysts and associated MC simulations (with VP Zhdanov).
Photoinduced surface processes especially on graphite with unique e-h pair excitations driving chemical reactions and phase transformation in ice (w. D Chakarov).
Supported lipd bilayer (biomembrane) formation (w C Keller) and extensions into sensing (Höök) and cell work (Gold).
Development and commercialization of the QCM-D technique. Patents and RSI paper and start-up company (Q-Sense AB).
A variety of flow reactor constructions for catalysis; several RSI papers.
UHV studies of hydrogen storage in Mg and phase diagrams of this system (w Krozer).
Initiator (w. three partners at Chalmers) of the Competence Center for Catalysis, KCK.
Director of the previous NUTEK-SSF Biomaterials Consortium and SSF program Biocompatible materials.
Co-ordinatior of the EU FP 6 STREP program Nanocues dealing with biofunctional surfaces.
Director of the SSF program Photo-active Nanoparticles,
Nanoparticle arrays and nanoarchitectures