Keynote speakers

Professor Dr. Ahmed Ennaoui obtained his MSc and Doctoral thesis in Solid State Electronic from “University de Bourgogne”, France. He began his career as assoc. Professor in 1979 at University Mohamed V and joined the Hahn-Meitner Institute-Berlin (HMI) in 1983 as a scientist conducting research for his Habilitation. In April 1987, he obtained his habilitation (summa cum laude) on new earth abundant materials for solar energy conversion. He workes as head of a research group in the Institute for Heterogeneous Material Systems at Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) for materials and energy, Berlin, he serves in the tutorial evaluation of renewable energy seminar program for graduate students at Free University Berlin, Germany. He serves as visiting professor at the Research Center for Solar Energy Chemistry Osaka University, Japan. He serves as Research Director at Qatar Environmental and Energy Research Institute (QEERI) and Joint Professor at Hamad Bin Khalifa University (2015-2017). Ennaoui’s published mostly on transition metal chalcogenide, binary and ternary thin film solar cells. Recently he conducted research on inkjet printed thin film solar cells, and PV soiling solution. He published more than 300 scholarly contributions, including 300 peer-reviewed research papers and numerous invited conference keynotes. Recently, he is listed by Stanford University as one of the top 2% of researchers in the world out of 224,856 researchers in applied physics ranked by the prestigious American university. Per the AD Scientific Index, his Morocco Country rank is among the top 2%. He is a permanent member of the Editorial Board of Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells, and senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). During his career he supervised more than 40 completed thesis and ca. 15 Postdoctoral have worked in his group. Professor Ennaoui has contributed to the development of renewable energies by following the completion of IRESEN’s research and development projects, by organising and/or participating to several international conferences in Morocco and worldwide on green energies and through the virtual university of which he is the founder.

Professor Dr. Ivan Gordon obtained his PhD in the field of novel magnetic materials for sensor applications from the University of Leuven, Belgium in February 2002. He started to work in the field of photovoltaics in June 2003 at IMEC. Currently, he is director of the IMOMEC department of IMEC, and vice-director of the Institute of Material Research (IMO) of Hasselt University in Belgium. Next to this, he is also part-time professor in Digital Photovoltaics at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and Editor-in-Chief of the international scientific journal Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells. Since January 2016, he is the coordinator of the joint program on Photovoltaics of the European Energy Research Alliance (EERA) and a steering committee member of the European Technology and Innovation Platform Photovoltaics (ETIP-PV). He has authored and co-authored more than 240 journal and conference papers (~4500 citations, h-factor 36, October 2024). He is a member of the scientific committee of many international conferences (e.g. European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, Silicon Photovoltaic Conference, International Renewable and Sustainable Energy Conference, …) and has himself presented more than 30 invited talks at international conferences, workshops and schools.  

Professor Dr. Ismael Saadoune, a Full Professor at Mohammed VI Polytechnic University, completed his academic journey with a French PhD from the University of Bordeaux in 1992 and a Moroccan PhD from the University Cadi Ayyad UCA-Marrakech in 1996. His dual doctoral pursuits centered on advancing Active Materials for Lithium and Sodium-ion Batteries, offering promising solutions for energy storage challenges.
In 2002, Dr. Saadoune established the Laboratory of Materials and Environmental Chemistry, where he mentored over 100 graduate and 40 Master students. Guiding the research endeavors of 25 PhD candidates, all now active in industry or research laboratories, Dr. Saadoune has left an indelible mark on academic and industrial landscapes.
As the principal investigator, he spearheaded 19 national and 23 international research projects on Battery Materials, demonstrating his commitment to advancing energy storage technologies. His contributions extend beyond academia, as he played pivotal roles in two European Master ERASMUS MUNDUS programs: ‘Materials for Energy Storage and Conversion’ and ‘Functionalized Advanced Materials and Engineering’.
Dr. Saadoune’s expertise has been sought after globally, with invitations to prestigious universities and research centers including Uppsala University (Sweden), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Germany), ICMM-CSIC (Spain), Jilin University (China), and Bordeaux University (France). His prolific academic output encompasses over 160 articles, conference papers, and project reports, underscoring his significant contributions to the field of electrochemical energy storage and conversion.

For more information, please visit the links :
GOOGLE SCHOLAR: https://scholar.google.fr/citations?user=zgCkaZwAAAAJ&hl=fr 
ORCID ID: 0000-0003-1322-361X 

Professor Dr. Nazeeruddin is a Professor of Chemistry at the EPFL Sion campus, and his current research at EPFL focuses on Perovskite Solar Cells and Light-emitting diodes. He has published more than 785 peer-reviewed papers, ten book chapters, and he is the inventor/co-inventor of over 90 patents. His work’s high impact has been recognized by invitations to speak at over 300 international conferences. He appeared in the ISI listing of most cited chemists and has more than 150’335 citations with an h-index of 171. He teaches the “Functional Materials” course at EPFL and Korea University. According to the Web of Science in 2016, he is the 5th most cited chemist in the world and is one of the 19 scientists identified by Thomson Reuters as the World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds in 2015. He has been named Thomson Reuters “Highly Cited Researcher” from 2014 to 2021 and listed among the Top 10 researchers in the perovskite solar cell research field by the Times Higher Education. He is directing and managing several industrial, national, and European Union projects. He has been appointed as World Class University professor by Korea University and Adjunct Professor by King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah. He has been elected to the European Academy of Sciences, Fellow of The Royal Society of Chemistry, and Fellow of Telangana Academy of Sciences and has won the 34th Khwarizmi International Award (KIA) Laureate in Fundamental Sciences, 2021.

Professor Dr. Abdelilah Benyoussef is graduated from Paris-Sud University in 1983 (Doctorat d´État). Since 2006, he is a permanent member of the Moroccan Hassan II Academy of Science and Technology. He established at the university Mohamed V, faculty of science, Rabat a group with strong expertise dedicated to advancing scientific methodologies for exploring First Principe calculation and density Functional Theory (DFT) at atomic and microscale levels. His group achieves precise computation and a deeper understanding of materials for energy and storage. Abdelilah Benyoussef is founder and National coordinator of the Competences Pole of Condensed Matter and Systems Modeling. The main interest topics of Abdelilah Benyoussef are Ab initio calculation and Monte carlo method in modeling and simulation of new materials for renewable energy, Magnetism and phase transition in condensed matter; complex systems and critical self-organization in statistical physics. He is a co-author of more than 600 research publications and book chapters and about 100 conference presentations including numerous invited talks. He has co-chaired or co-organized several international conferences. He holds a number of patents and supervised more than 40 postgraduates.

Dr. Ilias Belharouak is a Corporate Fellow and the Head of the Electrification Section at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee. He is also a professor at the Bredesen Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Education of the University of Tennessee Knoxville. Dr. Belharouak, with his 25-year expertise in lithium-ion batteries, leads multidisciplinary R&D programs sponsored by multiple government agencies and industries. The programs specifically target battery energy storage and advanced manufacturing. He is also an advisory board member for several U.S. universities and government agencies. Dr. Belharouak has received several awards, including 7 R&D 100 awards and four U.S. Federal Laboratory Consortium Awards. He has published over 200 peer-reviewed papers, 50 U.S. patents and patent applications, and 5 books. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Power Sources.