Keynote Speaker
Wei-Hsin Liao
Choh-Ming Li Professor of Mechanical and Automation Engineering,
Department Chairman and Graduate Division Head;
Director, Institute of Intelligent Design and Manufacturing, the Chinese University of Hong Kong
Biography: Wei-Hsin Liao received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, USA. At Penn State University, he received the Inventor Incentive Award and Sigma Xi Graduate Research Award. Since August 1997, Dr. Liao has been with The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), where he is currently Department Chairman and Choh-Ming Li Professor of Mechanical and Automation Engineering. His research has led to publications of over 360 technical papers in international journals and conference proceedings, and 23 patents. He was the Conference Chair for the 20th International Conference on Adaptive Structures and Technologies in 2009; the Active and Passive Smart Structures and Integrated Systems, SPIE Smart Structures/NDE in 2014 and 2015. He received the T A Stewart-Dyer/F H Trevithick Prize 2005, awarded by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE). He is a recipient of the 2008 Best Paper Award in Structures, 2017 Best Paper Award in Mechanics and Material Systems, and 2021 Energy Harvesting Best Paper Award, from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). He also received four best paper awards in IEEE international conferences. At CUHK, Prof. Liao was awarded the Young Researcher Award 2007, the Research Excellence Award (2010-11), and Outstanding Fellow of the Faculty of Engineering (2014-19). As the Chair of Joint Chapter of Robotics, Automation and Control Systems Society (RACS), IEEE Hong Kong Section, Dr. Liao received 2012 Chapter of the Year Award from the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society. Prof. Liao is the recipient of 2020 ASME Adaptive Structures and Material Systems Award and 2018 SPIE SSM Lifetime Achievement Award, to recognize his outstanding contributions to the advancement of smart structures and materials. He is also the recipient of 2023 ASME Leonardo Da Vinci Award for the eminent achievement in the design and invention which are universally recognized as an important advance in machine design. He currently serves as an Associate Editor for Journal of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures, and on the Executive Editorial Board of Smart Materials and Structures. Dr. Liao is a Fellow of ASME, HKIE, and IOP.
Zhaojie Ju
Professor of Machine Learning and Robotics
University of Portsmouth, UK
Biography: Zhaojie Ju is Chair in Machine Learning and Robotics at the University of Portsmouth, Principle Investigator of EU Interreg Project, Director of Healthcare and Wearable Robotics Research, and Chair of IEEE SMC Portsmouth Chapter. He has attracted over €10 million research fund as PI/CoI and authored/co-authored over 250 publications in journals, book chapters, and conference proceedings (over 100 SCI-index papers). He has received 7 Best Paper Awards and 1 Best AE Award in ICRA2018. His research interests include machine intelligence, pattern recognition and their applications in human robot interaction/collaboration, robot skill learning and healthcare & wearable robotics.
Prof. Ju is an Associate Editor of several journals, such as IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CYBERNETICS, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NEUROL NETWORKS AND LEARNING SYSTEMS and IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON COGNITIVE AND DEVELOPMENTAL SYSTEMS. He is JSPS Fellow and IEEE Senior Member.