Prof.dr.ir. Gustaaf Schoukens is professor of polymer technology at the Ghent University (Belgium), faculty of Engineering. He received his degree in Chemical Engineering from the K.U. Leuven (Belgium) in 1971 where he also obtained his Ph.D. in 1978. The subject of his Ph.D. research was “Non-linear viscoelastic behaviour of dispersions”. He worked as senior researcher from 1978 till 2004 in the private industry (Solvay; Central Research Laboratory) in the field of polymerization and polymer processing. In 1994 he obtained the part-time position of lecturer at the Ghent University, teaching “polymer processing”. In 2004 he obtained the fulltime position of professor at the Ghent University teaching all courses concerning polymer technology, including processing and polymerization processes. He is also involved in the courses concerning “environment and sustainable development” in general and teaching the course of “rational use of materials” in particular. Polymer technology in general and polymer processing, including synthetic and biopolymers, in particular are the main leads in his research program and of its publications. The main research topics are now the development of artificial turf for sport applications and the development of biopolymers based on chitin or chitosan with biomedical properties. A more recent research is the study of nanostructures, especially nanoparticles obtained by reaction engineering. These nanoparticles are already used in large quantities for the coating of paper and paperboards.

Sustainable development and environmental technology Polymers Materials processing