Bridging the Gap between Life and Physics (PDF)

Ron Cottam grew up in Cheshire, in the north-west of England. At school he studied mathematics, physics and chemistry, and went on to gain a bachelor's degree in applied physics and electronics and a PhD in the acoustic physics of II-VI and III-V compounds at the University of Durham, UK. He was invited to the University of Leuven in 1972 to start a new research activity in shape-memory alloy ultrasonics, and in 1976 became responsible for the music-recording facility in HiFi Home, Brugge. He established Sound Stuff - a study bureau in acoustics and music recording facility - in 1979, and worked as an independent in recording-studio design and recorded-music production until he joined the Department of Electronics and Informatics (ETRO) of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) in 1983. From 1984 until the 2011 he has been 'campus medewerker' for the microelectronics R&D company IMEC vzw in ETRO, working on chemical sensors, integrated optical components, and most recently as leader of the Living Systems Project in the LAMI laboratory of ETRO. He currently continues research work in the Living Systems Project at the VUB as 'vrijwillige medewerker'. Ron has an impressive publication record (see attached).



Willy Ranson received the Telecommunication Engineer degree in 1975 from the University of Leuven, Belgium. He was Assistant Professor in the Department of Microwaves and Lasers at the University of Leuven until 1983, when he joined the Department of Electronics and Information Processing (ETRO) of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). Since 1989 he has been a member of the Inter-university Micro-Electronics Center (IMEC) in the VUB. Willy has participated in projects and contracted research on such diverse topics as planar antenna structures, high frequency wave-guides, chemical sensors, biological applications for breast cancer detection, optical information processing for parallel computation, CO2 laser applications, microelectronic process