Plenary and Keynote Speakers

Dr. Afshin J. Ghajar
Oklahoma State University, USA
Plenary Speaker

Afshin J. Ghajar is Emeritus Regents Professor and John Brammer Endowed Professor in the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, Oklahoma, USA and an Honorary Professor of Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China. He received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees all in mechanical engineering from Oklahoma State University. His expertise is in experimental heat transfer/fluid mechanics and development of practical engineering correlations. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the American Society of Thermal and Fluids Engineers (ASTFE). He is a Registered Professional Engineer in the State of Oklahoma. Professor Ghajar has received countless teaching/service awards, such as the 75th Anniversary Medal of the ASME Heat Transfer Division, the ASME ICNMM Outstanding Leadership Award, and the Donald Q. Kern Award, among others. His research work has resulted in over 250 publications including professional journals, reports, books, peer-reviewed conference papers or symposium proceedings. His research achievements have also been documented by a large number of presentations as well as keynote and invited lectures all over the world. A 2020 study conducted by Ionnidis et al. of Stanford University [Updated science-wide author databases of standardized citation indicators (plos.org)], ranked nearly 160,000 scientists of all disciplines based on citations to their work over their career and for the year 2019, Professor Ghajar ranked in the top 1.3% of researchers in Mechanical Engineering and Transports category. He currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Heat Transfer Engineering Journal and is the Heat Transfer Series Editor for CRC Press (he has edited 13 books to date). He is the co-author of two popular textbooks, Heat and Mass Transfer – Fundamentals and Applications, 6th Edition (2020), and Fundamentals of Thermal-Fluid Sciences, 6th Edition (2022), both published by McGraw-Hill; and the author of Two-Phase Gas-Liquid Flow in Pipes with Different Orientations, Springer Briefs in Applied Sciences and Technology, published by Springer 2020, and Single- and Two-Phase Flow Pressure Drop and Heat Transfer in Tubes, Mechanical Engineering Series, published by Springer, 2022.

Topic of Plenary: Two-Phase Flow Void Fraction, Pressure Drop, and Heat Transfer in Pipes with Different Orientations
Keynote Abstract

Dr. Gretar Tryggvason
Johns Hopkins University, USA
Plenary Speaker

Gretar Tryggvason is the Charles A. Miller, Jr. Distinguished Professor at the Johns Hopkins University and the head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. He received his PhD from Brown University in 1985 and was on the faculty of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor until 2000, when he moved to Worcester Polytechnic Institute as the head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Between 2010 and 2017 he was the Viola D. Hank professor at the University of Notre Dame and the chair of the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering. Professor Tryggvason is well known for his contributions to computational fluid dynamics; particularly the development of methods for computations of multiphase flows and for pioneering direct numerical simulations of such flows. He served as the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Computational Physics 2002-2015, is a fellow of APS, ASME and AAAS, and the recipient of several awards, including the 2012 ASME Fluids Engineering Award and the 2019 ASTFE Award.

Topic of Plenary: Simulations and Modeling of Multiphase Flows
Keynote Abstract

Dr. Bofeng Bai
Xi'an Jiaotong University, China
Keynote Speaker

Bofeng Bai received the B.Eng. degree in fluid machinery from Xi’an Jiaotong University (XJTU), China, in 1993, the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Power Engineering & Engineering Thermophysics from XJTU in 1995 and 1999, respectively. He started his academic career as a Lecturer at XJTU in 1999, as Professor since 2007, and as Leading Professor since 2015. He serves as the Deputy Director of the State Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow in Power Engineering and leads research group of Advanced Energy Power Multiphase Flow (AEPMF). He has won China National Funds for Distinguished Young Scientists. He is currently the secretary general of the multiphase flow branch of the Chinese Society of Engineering Thermophysics, the deputy chairman of the heat exchanger safety and energy efficiency committee, and the deputy secretary general of the hydrogen energy equipment committee of the China Special Technology Promotion Association. Prof. Bai has been serving as the Associate Editor of Journal of Mechanical Engineering Science (Proc. IMech E Part C) since 2019, Journal of Measurement since 2020, Advisory Board member of Physics of Fluids from 2023-2025.

His primary research interests focus on multiphase flow fundamentals and applications in energy engineering, power engineering, thermal engineering and petroleum engineering. He has authored and co-authored more than 270 papers published in international journals and more than 200 papers in conference proceedings. He chaired and co-chaired 8 international academic conferences or symposiums and delivered 30 keynote speeches. His research results have won 1 second prize of national technological invention awards and 4 first prizes of provincial and ministerial science and technology awards.

Topic of Keynote: Multiphase Reaction Flow and Heat Transfer Of Coal Gasification in Supercritical Water For Hydrogen Production: From Pore To Agglomeration Perspective
Keynote Abstract

Dr. Francesco Coletti
Hexxcell Ltd., Uk
Keynote Speaker

Francesco is the CEO of Hexxcell Ltd., a London-based software and consulting company focussed on the development of Hybrid-AI Digital Twins for heat transfer systems. Francesco has a track-record of developing industrial digital solutions from ideation, R&D all the way to deployment in the field, with particular focus on combining physics-based models with Artificial Intelligence for monitoring, optimization and predictive maintenance of process and energy systems. Prior to Hexxcell, Francesco worked as a Development Specialist at the Linde Technology Center in Buffalo, NY. He is also a part-time Associate Professor at Brunel University London where he contributed to the launch of a new Chemical Engineering Department and was a visiting academic at Imperial College London (2016-2017).
Francesco has been elected Fellow of the Energy Institute in 2023. He is one of two elected representatives for the UK serving on the Scientific Committee of the International Heat Transfer Conference. He was elected to the UK National Heat Transfer Committee in 2014 and subsequently appointed as its Secretary in 2015. Since 2019 he is a Director of AIChE Fuels&Petrochemical Division and is currently serving as the Chair of the Division. He is involved with The organization of several international conferences, including the Topical Series on Heat Exchangers held every two years at the AIChE Spring Meeting which he initiated and chairs. He is the Executive Editor of Heat Exchanger Design Handbook and the co-editor of the first monograph dedicated to Crude Oil Fouling. He has published over 80 scientific contributions including journal articles and peer-reviewed conference proceeding and holds two patents.
Francesco holds a Laurea degree in Chemical Engineering from Padova University, Italy; an MSc in Process Systems Engineering and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from Imperial College London, UK

Topic of Keynote: Exploring Applications of Machine Learning For Data Regression in Heat Transfer
Keynote Abstract