Ali Erdemir is a Distinguished Professor and Halliburton Chair in the Mechanical Engineering Department of Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, USA. In recognition of his research accomplishments, Dr. Erdemir has received numerous coveted awards and honors including being elected as a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the European Academy of Sciences, the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, the World Academy of Ceramics, The Science Academy of Turkey (2021). He is also an elected Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors. He was the President of the International Tribology Council from 2017 to 2022 and STLE from 2016 to 2017. Dr. Erdemir is also an Honorary Member of ASME and STLE; as well as a Fellow of AAAS, ASME, STLE, AVS, and ASM-International. He is the recipient of 37 U.S. patents and has authored/co-authored more than 350 research articles (250 of which are peer-reviewed journal articles), co-edited five books, presented more than 250 invited/keynote/plenary talks at national/international conferences. His current research focuses on bridging scientific principles with engineering innovations towards the development of new materials, coatings, and lubricants for a broad range of industrial applications in manufacturing, transportation, and other energy conversion and utilization systems.

Ali Erdemir

Distinguished Professor and Halliburton Chair
J. Mike Walker ‘66 Department of Mechanical Engineering
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX, USA

The global efforts for a sustainable transportation future have pushed electric vehicles (EVs) to the forefront of technological innovations, promising a green, reliable, and economically viable mobility for humanity [1]. However, rapid transition from century-old combustion engine-based technology hinges on overcoming many critical materials and tribological challenges. Specifically, EV drivetrains operate under significantly higher torque, load, speed, and temperature conditions than internal combustion engine vehicles [2]. The situation is further exacerbated by the risk of frequent electrical discharges at tribological interfaces that call for far more advanced materials and lubrication solutions. In particular, the shift to a torque-centric drivetrain operation, coupled with extreme contact pressures and shear forces, accelerates wear, fatigue, and scuffing, threatening long-term reliability of EVs. Overall, EVs' thermal, electrical, and tribological phenomena are deeply intertwined, demanding a holistic and combinatorial approach. This plenary address will provide a comprehensive overview of these interdisciplinary issues, emphasizing the pivotal role of advanced materials, innovative coatings, and next-generation lubrication technologies that can ensure efficiency, reliability, and thus sustainability of future EVs.

[1] K. Holmberg and A. Erdemir, The impact of tribology on energy use and CO2 emission globally and in the combustion engine and electric cars, Tribology International, 135 (2019) 389-396.
[2] “Electric Vehicle Tribology: Challenges and Opportunities for a Sustainable Transportation Future”, Editors: Leonardo Farfan-Cabrera and Ali Erdemir, Elsevier, Amsterdam, 2024, ISBN: 9780443140747

Dr. Bharat Bhushan is an Academy Professor (San Jose, CA), and has served as an Ohio Eminent Scholar and The Howard D. Winbigler Professor in the College of Engineering, the Director of the Nanoprobe Laboratory for Bio- & Nanotechnology and Biomimetics (NLB2) and affiliated faculty in John Glenn College of Public Affairs at the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. In 2013-14, he served as ASME/AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow, House Committee on Science, Space & Technology, United States Congress, Washington, DC. He has served as Expert Investigator on IP related issues in the U.S. and International Courts. He holds B. S., two M.S., a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering/mechanics, an MBA, and five honorary doctorates, a total of 10 College degrees. His research interests include Fundamental studies in the interdisciplinary areas of Bio/nanotribology/nanomechanics, Nanomaterials Characterization, Scanning Probe Techniques, Magnetic Storage, Bio/nanotechnology, Nanomanufacturing, Bioinspired Liquid Repellency, Self-cleaning, Anti-icing, Anti-fouling, and Water Harvesting, Science and Technology Policy. He is an internationally recognized expert of bio/nanotribology and bio/nanomechanics using scanning probe microscopy, and biomimetics. He is considered by some one of the pioneers of tribology and mechanics of magnetic storage devices, nanotribology, green tribology, and biomimetics. He had introduced the word nanotribology in the title of a Nature paper in 1995 and in the title of a first book on green tribology in 2010. He is one of the most prolific authors. He has authored 11 scientific books, 100+ handbook chapters, and 900+ scientific papers. He is Google Scholar’s one of 1248 Highly Cited Researchers in All Fields, h-index - 147+ with 110 k+ citations; Scopus’s one of 401 Scientists for Career-long Citation Impact Across All Fields out of over 8 million scientists from around world; 4th Highly Cited Researcher in Mechanical Eng.; 149th Most Cited in Materials Science in the World; and ISI Highly Cited Researcher in Materials Science and in Cross-field Category. His research was listed as one of the Top Ten Science Stories of 2015. He holds more than 25 U.S. and foreign patents. He has given more than 400 invited presentations including 300+ keynote/plenary addresses at major international conferences on six continents. He delivered a TEDx 2019 lecture. He is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards and international fellowships including the Alexander von Humboldt Research Prize for Senior Scientists, Max Planck Foundation Research Award for Outstanding Foreign Scientists, Fulbright Senior Scholar Award, International Tribology Gold Medal, Institution of Chemical Engineers (UK) Global Award, and NASA’s Certificate of Appreciation to recognize the critical tasks performed in support of President Reagan’s Commission investigating the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident. He has organized various international conferences and workshops. He is a member of various professional societies, including the International Academy of Engineering (Russia). He has previously worked for various industrial research labs including Mechanical Technology Inc., SKF, and IBM Almaden Research Center, San Jose, CA. He has held visiting professorship at University of California at Berkeley, University of Cambridge, UK, Vienna University of Technology, Austria, University of Paris, Orsay, ETH Zurich, EPFL Lausanne, Univ. of Southampton, UK, Univ. of Kragujevac, Serbia, Tsinghua Univ., China, Harbin Inst., China, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, BITS Pilani and Hyderabad, and KFUPM, Saudi Arabia.

Linkedin

Bharat Bhushan

Academy Professor, The Ohio State University (San Jose, CA)
Bhushan100@outlook.com
Linkedin

Living nature, through some 3 billion years of evolution, has developed materials, objects, and processes that function from the nanoscale to the macroscale. The understanding of the functions provided by species and processes found in living nature can guide us to design and produce bioinspired surfaces for various applications1,2,3. There are a large number of flora and fauna with properties of commercial interest. Nature provides many examples of surfaces that repel (hydrophobic) or attract (hydrophilic) water. The most famous is the lotus leaf. Its surface contains a hierarchical structure that, combined with specific surface chemistry, results in a water repellant surface that is self-cleaning, as water droplets collect contaminants as they roll off. Some plant leaves, such as fagus leaves, are hydrophilic, allowing water to rapidly spread into a thin layer, increasing evaporation, leading to a dry and self-cleaning surface. By taking inspiration from nature, it is possible to create hierarchically structured surfaces with re-entrant geometry and surface chemistry that provide multifunctional properties including superliquiphilicity/phobicity, self-cleaning/low biofouling, and/or low drag. A facile, substrate-independent, multilayered nanoparticle/binder composite coating technique has been developed to produce various combinations of water and oil repellency and affinity with self-cleaning properties1,2,4. These coatings having a so-called re-entrant geometry can also repel surfactant-containing liquids. Some of the nanostructured surfaces have been found to be anti-bacterial1,2. These coatings provide the basis to fabricate surfaces for a range of applications including self-cleaning, anti-fouling, anti-smudge, optical transparency, anti-fogging, anti-icing, low drag, water purification, and oil–water separation1-7. The coatings have been found to be mechanically durable and self-healing1,2.

Bhushan, B., Biomimetics: Bioinspired Hierarchical-Structured Surfaces for Green Science and Technology, third ed., Springer (2018).
2Bhushan, B., Introduction to Biomimetics and Bioinspiration: Materials and Surfaces for Green Science and Technology, Springer (2024).
3Nosonovsky, M. and Bhushan, B., Multiscale Dissipative Mechanisms and Hierarchical Surfaces: Friction, Superhydrophobicity, and Biomimetics, Springer (2008).
4Bhushan, B., “Lessons from Nature for Green Science and Technology: An Overview and Superliquiphoboc/philic Surfaces,” Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 377, 20180274 (2019).
5Nosonovsky, M. and Bhushan, B., Green Tribology: Biomimetics, Energy Conservation and Sustainability, Springer (2012).
6Bhushan, B., Bioinspired Water Harvesting, Purification, and Oil-Water Separation, Springer International, Cham, Switzerland (2020).
7TED Talk - Lessons from Nature: Bioinspired Surfaces for Green Tech, 2019

She obtained her PhD from Cambridge University, UK. She has worked with tribology for over 30 years, with a main focus on reducing friction losses using surface modification and coatings or lubrication. She has authored around 200 manuscripts in journals, book chapters and conference proceedings. She is the editor-in-chief for Surface Topography: Metrology and Properties, a member of IFToMM and the Brazilian representative at IEA/AMT.
Henara Costa is a Full Professor at the Federal University of Rio Grande, Brazil, where she is the head of the Surface Engineering Group. She has authored around 250 manuscripts in journals, books and conference proceedings. She holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Federal University of Uberlândia (1992), a master's degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Federal University of Uberlândia (1995), a PhD in Engineering from the University of Cambridge (2005). She was a visiting scholar at Imperial College London (2013 and 2025) and a professor at the Laboratory of Tribology and Materials at the Federal University of Uberlândia from 1993 to 2016. She was editor-in-chief of the journal "Surface Topography: Metrology and Properties from 2022 to 2025, where she remains in the editorial board. She is the coordinator of the National Institute of Science and Technology (INCT) in Green Tribology and Energy Transition (CT-Trib). The Brazilian Ministry of Mines and Energy officially appointed Henara Costa to represent Brazil at the IEA/AMT (International Energy Agency/Agreement on Advanced Materials for Transportation). She is a member of the Technical Committee on Tribology of the journal International Federation for the Promotion of Mechanisms and Machines Science (IFToMM). Currently she is an associate editor of the "Journal of the Brazilian Society of Mechanical Sciences and Engineering" and is part of the editorial committee of various journals in the area of Tribology.

Henara Lillian Costa^1,2

¹Universidade Federal do Rio Grande, Rio Grande, RS, Brazil
²National Research Institute on Green Tribology for the Energy Transition (CT-Trib), CNPq, Brazil

In transport, the role of low carbon fuels is fundamental to bridging the current situation towards a clean and sustainable future. In passenger cars, the use of renewable ethanol fuel reduces gas emissions and pollution particulates. In Brazil, bioethanol fuel is key in the mobility sector, where the cars can run at any proportion of ethanol/gasoline (up to E100). Ethanol production also contributes for electric energy generation in Brazil; in the state of Sao Paulo 30% of the electric energy comes as a by-product from the ethanol production. Ethanol can also produce green hydrogen, which has been explored in three main routes in the mobility sector: i. hydrogen ICEs to substitute diesel, ii. fuel cells by green hydrogen from ethanol reformation, and iii. fuel cells from on-board ethanol reformation, bypassing the challenges associated with hydrogen storage and distribution. Another low-carbon fuel explored in the talk is syngas produced from waste. Some of the research results will focus on the tribological aspects regarding the use of ethanol fuel and how it affects the main lubricant properties, friction and wear, in particular the formation and durability of tribofilms. Another important route is the return to the use of biolubricants, but they are more vulnerable to oxidation than petroleum-based lubricants. Alternatives to optimize the tribological performance of green lubricants are presented, with a special focus on green nano-additives and the use of inert atmospheres. Finally, tribological aspects related to green steels will be discussed.

Affiliation: Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
Jacob Klein is the Herman Mark Professor of Soft Matter Physics at the Weizmann Institute in Israel. From 2000-2007 he was the Dr. Lee’s Professor of Chemistry at the University of Oxford and Head of its Physical and Theoretical Chemistry Department (2000-2005). His research interests have ranged from the dynamics and interfacial properties of polymers to the behaviour of confined fluids and biological lubrication. His honours include the High Polymer Physics Prize of the American Physical Society (1995), the 2011 Soft Matter and Biophysical Chemistry Award of the UK Royal Society of Chemistry, the 2012 Tribology Gold Medal, the 2015 David Turnbull Lectureship Award of the Materials Research Society, the 2017 Liquid Matter Prize of the European Physical Society, the 2019 Gold Medal of the Israel Chemical Society, the 2020 Rothschild Prize, the 2021 Irving Langmuir Award in Chemical Physics of the American Physical Society and the Overbeek Gold Medal of the European Colloid and Interface Society. In 2009 and 2017, he received ERC Advanced Grants. In 2013 he was elected to the European Academy and in 2016 he was elected to the Israel Academy of Science and Humanities.

Jacob Klein

Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel

Over the past two decades hydration lubrication, where sub-nanometer water layers surrounding charges provide remarkable reduction in friction between sliding surfaces, has emerged as a key organizing principle in reducing friction in aqueous and particularly biological environments. Early work described the basic nanotribological aspects of such lubrication1-6, while later studies identified bio-relevant vectors such as lipid bilayers as boundary lubricants7. In practical terms, osteoarthritis (OA), the most common and debilitating joint disease affecting some 500 millions world wide and of growing prevalence due to increasing human longevity and progressive aging of populations8, is associated with friction and wear of the articular cartilage coating the joints. Strategies to alleviate this disease by reducing cartilage friction are being developed, with remarkable new technologies becoming available9, and such approaches turn out also to be useful for novel materials properties10-13. The talk will describe advances and progress in exploiting biolubrication and mimicking Nature’s solutions for novel treatments.

References
1. Raviv, U., Laurat, P. and Klein, J., ‘Fluidity of water confined to subnanometre films’ – Nature, 413, 51-54 (2001);
2. Raviv, U. and Klein, J., ‘Fluidity of bound hydration layers’ – Science 297, 1540-1543 (2002);
3. Raviv, U., Giasson, S., Kampf, N., Gohy, J-F., Jerome, R. and Klein, J., ‘Lubrication by charged polymers’, Nature, 425, 163-165 (2003);
4. Briscoe, W.H., Titmuss, S., Tiberg, F., McGillivray, D.J., Thomas, R.K., Klein, J., ‘Boundary lubrication under water’, Nature 444, 191-194 (2006);
5. Chen, M., Briscoe, W.H., Armes, S.P. and Klein, J., ‘Lubrication at physiological pressures by polyzwitterionic brushes’, Science, 323 1698-1702 (2009);
6. Klein, J., ‘Repair or replacement: A joint perspective’, Science, 323, 47-48 (2009);
7. Goldberg, R. and Klein, J., ‘Liposomes as lubricants: beyond drug delivery’, Chemistry and Physics of Lipids, 165, 374-381 (2012);
8. WHO. “Osteoarthritis”, https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/osteoarthritis. (2023);
9. IUPAC’s 2024 Top Ten Emerging Technologies in Chemistry, F. Gomollon-Bel, Chemistry International 2024 Vol. 46 Pages 8-16;
10. Lin, W-F, Kluzek, M., Iuster, N., Shimoni, E., Kampf, N., Goldberg, R., Klein, J. ‘Cartilage-inspired, lipid-based boundary-lubricated hydrogels’, Science, 370, 335–338 (2020);
11. Cao, Y., Jin, D., Kampf, N. and Klein, J., ‘Origins of synergy in multi-lipid lubrication’, PNAS 121 e2408223121 (2024);
12. Zhang, Y., Jin, D., Tivony, R., Kampf, N. and Klein, J., ‘Cell-inspired, massive electromodulation of friction via transmembrane fields across lipid bilayers’, Nature Materials, 23(12), 1720-1727 (2024);
13. Klein, J., ‘Nature’s lubrication solutions’, Friction, 13, 9440965 (2025)

Jianbin Luo, a professor at Tsinghua University, received his Ph.D. from Tsinghua University in China in 1994. He joined the State Key Laboratory of Tribology (SKLT) in 1994, was elected to be an academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2011, and an academician of TWAS (The World Academy of Sciences) in 2022. He is working in superlubricity and thin film lubrication. The total funding of the projects he has/had been responsible for over 700 million RMB. He has published more than 600 pieces of papers, 2 books and more than 200 authorized patents. He has won the China State Invention Award, the National Natural Science Award, etc. In 2013, he won the highest Award of American Society of Lubrication Engineers (STLE) - International Award and the Highest Achievement Award of Chinese Tribology Institute (CTI). He also won the Chen Jiageng Technology Science Award in 2021.

Jianbin Luo

State Key Laboratory of Tribology in Advanced Equipment, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Email: luojb@tsinghua.edu.cn

Superlubricity has been developed quickly in the past 10 years and attracted more and more attentions from researchers over the world. Especially since the solid-liquid composite superlubricity system was proposed, the carrying capacity of the superlubricity state has been increased more than 10 times, the kinds of lubricants and friction pair materials that can achieve superlubricity state become more extensive. These conditions are closer to the actual working conditions of the industry and the possibility of superlubricity to be used in industry is greatly increased. These advances will be introduced in the presentation.

Key words: superlubricity, liquid superlubricity, solid-liquid combined superlubricity

Dr. Noritsugu Umehara is a professor in Department of Micro-nano Mechanical Science and Engineering at Nagoya University in Japan. He has interests in both fundamental and applied aspects of manufacturing and tribology, especially in new polishing method of advanced ceramic using magnetic field and water lubrication of advanced ceramics. He began his carrier at the Tohoku University in 1988 as a research associate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering before coming assistant professor in 1993, associate professor in 1995 and move to Nagoya University as Professor in 2003. He received a Bachelor, a Master and a Doctor of Engineering from Tohoku University, Sendai, Miyagi in 1983, 1985 and 1988, respectively. He published research papers more than 250 in various journals, and hold 6 Patents on Magnetic Fluid Grinding and more than 20 Patents on Tribology. Dr.Umehara received the JSME Young Engineering award in 1991, 1995 LaRoux K. Gillespie Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineer Award from the society of manufacturing engineers in 1995, F.W. Tayler Medal from the CIRP in 1995 and JSME paper awards in 2010、2019 and 2022. He is member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME) as a fellow, the Japan Society for Precision Engineering (JSPE) as a fellow, the Japan Society of Tribologist (JAST) and the Japan Society for Grinding Engineering. He was a past President of Japanese Society of Tribologist in 2022-2023. He is Editorial Board Members as the following Journals of Journal of Engineering Tribology, Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers Part J, Friction, Springer and Journal Tribologi, Malaysian Tribology Society.

Noritsugu Umehara

In order to avoid global warming caused by greenhouse gases as chlorofluorocarbons and carbon dioxide gases, alternative refrigerant, fuel and lubricants in combustion engine should be developed in Tribology. The use of biofuels and bio-lubricants is considered to achieve carbon neutrality which fixes carbon dioxide gases even if they are generated. However, severe corrosion and wear could be a problem after generation of various acids during combustion. In order to overcome these problems, proper hard coatings as DLC are required for the protection of corrosion and wear in bio-fuel and bio-lubricants. Olive oil shows low friction coefficient as 0.02 in the sliding of CNx coated disk against Si3N4 ball under boundary lubrication condition because of large amount of oleic acid in olive oil. Wear is small because both sliding pair is fine for anti-corrosion. Also there are some problems in renewable energy plant as geothermal power plant. Clogging of steam pipes and turbine blades with silica and calcium oxides is occurred after the precipitation from high-temperature and high-pressure water. In order to overcome this problem, low adhesion strength coating against the precipitation of impurities in high temperature and high pressure water should be developed. It has been found that DLC films with high hydrogen content, low dangling bond density and small density of edges with small ID/IG ratio showed low silica adhesion for practical application.

Prof. Dr. Feng Zhou is a full Professor in Lanzhou Institute of Chemical Physics, CAS and Deputy director of State Key Laboratory of Solid Lubrication. He gained PhD in 2004 and spent three years (2005-2008) in the Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge as a research associate. He has published more than 500 journal papers that received more than 40000 citations and has an H-index of 100 according to Google Scholar. His research interests include the biomimic surfaces/interfaces of soft matters, drag-reduction and antibiofouling, and bioinspired tribology, functional coatings. He has gained a number of awards including“Outstanding Youth Award” of International Society of Bionic Engineering, 2013. The Second Class National Prize of Natural Science, 2015; Distinguished Visiting Fellowship, Royal Academy of Engineering, UK, 2016 and Peter Jost Award of International Tribology Council. He serves as co-editor-in-chief of Tribology International and associate editor of Lubrication Science.

Feng Zhou

State Key Laboratory of Solid Lubrication, Lanzhou Institute of Chemical Physics, CAS.
18 Middle Tianshui Road, Lanzhou, 730000 China

In 1991, the Nobel laureate P. G. de Gennes introduced the concept of "soft matter" (materials that assume an intermediate state between solids and ideal fluids, typically distinguished by their susceptibility to deformation under the influence of feeble external forces and frequently associated with intricate molecular - level interactions). This concept has, ever since, garnered widespread international acclaim. The employment of soft matter materials to dissipate the contact stress at the interface of rigid - acting components constitutes a cardinal principle within the realm of material system design. Through such utilization, it becomes feasible to mitigate friction and wear, thereby guaranteeing the seamless and dependable operation of machinery. This accomplishment not only makes a substantial contribution to the objectives of energy conservation and emission reduction but also assumes paramount significance in the domains of both high - end civilian and military equipment. The research has pioneered an innovative methodology for the design and synthesis of soft matter materials. They have triumphantly fabricated an array of such materials, encompassing oils, greases, polymer brushes, composite hydrogels, and coatings. The team has methodically probed into the friction - related behaviors and lubrication mechanisms of these materials. Furthermore, they propounded the scientific tenet of "wet - adhesion - sliding" research, thereby clarifying the intricate correlations among wetting and lubrication, wetting and adhesion, as well as adhesion and lubrication. On the basis of these research outcomes, they engineered wet - adhesion - sliding and protective materials that are characterized by their low - friction properties and high load - bearing capabilities. In addition, they contrived novel materials such as ionic lubricants and supramolecular gel lubricants, thereby effectively propelling the advancement and practical application of soft matter materials in the high - end equipment sector.

Dr. Juliette Cayer-Barrioz is the CNRS Director of Research of the Laboratory of Tribology and System Dynamics (LTDS) at Ecole centrale de Lyon, France. She was awarded the 2025 Peter Jost Award in Tribology for her fundamental interfacial studies of fluid lubrication mechanisms across all regimes, from boundary and elastohydrodynamic to hydrodynamic, at length scales from nanometers to micrometers under both steady-state and transient conditions over a wide range of temperature.