Speakers

Professor Luis Dorfmann is Professor at Tufts University. He received his Ph.D. and M.Sc. from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Laurea from the University of Padova, Italy. His research focuses on the nonlinear behaviour of materials capable of large deformations, encompassing experimental, analytical, and numerical aspects of mechanical responses. He has significantly contributed to the understanding of finite strain theories applied to biomechanics, damage mechanics, fiber-reinforced tissues, and nonlinear electro-magneto-mechanical coupling. His work includes the development of nonlinear mathematical models describing the mechanical response of materials under finite deformations, with applications extending to biological and engineered tissues, functional constructs, and their cellular and molecular components. He has also advanced the understanding of electro-magneto-mechanical interactions, aiming to explore the use of electromagnetic fields to control deformation and motion in highly deformable solids.

Dr. Souhayl Sadik received his Ph.D. in Engineering Science and Mechanics and an M.Sc. in Mathematics from the Georgia Institute of Technology, and an M.Eng. in Civil Engineering from École des Ponts ParisTech and École Centrale Paris, France. He also holds a Diplôme d’Ingénieur from École Hassania des Travaux Publics, Morocco. His research focuses on nonlinear elasticity and the mechanics of soft and morphoelastic materials, combining applied mathematics, theoretical mechanics, and numerical methods. He has contributed to the development of geometric theories for morphoelastic shells, nonlinear anisotropic viscoelasticity, and the modeling of growth and morphogenesis. Through analytical and computational tools, he investigates the large-deformation response of complex materials, with applications spanning from biological systems to engineered structures. He is currently a Tenure Track Assistant Professor at Aarhus University, Denmark, in the Department of Mechanical and Production Engineering.

Dr. Ondřej Faltus has recently earned his PhD. in Physical and Material Engineering at the Czech Technical University in Prague in collaboration with the Eindhoven University of Technology. He is currently employed in a post-doctoral position with the SOFFA ERC CZ project, where his research focuses on computational modeling of multiphysical magnetoelastic problems and on third medium methods of contact mechanics. More broadly, his research interests comprise mechanics of solid continua, numerical computational methods, and pneumatically actuated metamaterials and structures.

Dr. Marco Amato is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Czech Technical University in Prague, working within the SOFFA ERC-CZ project. He received his Ph.D. in Solid and Structural Mechanics from the University of Trento, Italy. His research focuses on the nonlinear behavior of deformable solids under multiphysics loading, integrating analytical, variational, and computational approaches in solid and structural mechanics. Dr. Amato has made significant contributions to the understanding of configurational forces in nonlinear elasticity, instabilities in contact problems, and the mechanics of magneto-responsive materials. His work includes the development of variationally consistent constitutive models for magnetorheological elastomers, with an emphasis on polyconvex formulations that capture finite strain effects and complex multiphysics couplings. These models have been implemented in open-source finite element software to enable accurate simulations of smart materials and structures. In his current research, he advances the application of magneto-mechanical coupling in soft active materials, with the goal of designing and controlling programmable structures through external magnetic fields.