Description
Emmanuel Defay is the head of the Smart Materials Unit (60 researchers) at the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology. He is interested in materials able to transform one form of energy into another one, and, more specifically, in those related to electrical energy, such as piezoelectric micro-pumps, haptic actuators, mechanical or thermal energy harvesters or more recently electrocaloric solid-state coolers. He wrote 200 papers, 2 books, gave 35 invited talks and filed 42 patents. He obtained over the years a balanced portfolio between competitive and collaborative projects with industry and a large experience in supervising young researchers (21 PhD students and 11 post docs). In 2024, he obtained an ERC Advanced grant (pyroelectric energy harvesting), an EIC Pathfinder as coordinator (cooling with electrocaloric polymers) and a Proof-of-Concept ERC in 2025. The same year, he was appointed affiliate professor in Physics and Materials Science at the University of Luxembourg.
