Prabhat Kumar is an Assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Hyderabad. He is also the principal investigator of the Topology Optimization Computational Design and Experimental (TOCoDE) Laboratory. He completed his B.Tech. at National Institute of Technology, Warangal, and his Ph.D. at IIT Kanpur. He held research positions at TU Delft (Netherlands), DTU (Denmark), and Technion (Israel). He also served as a prestigious Ramanujan fellow faculty at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. His research areas include single-/multi-physics/scale and small-/finite-deformation topology optimization, soft robotics, data (AI/ML)-driven design, compliant mechanisms, inverse design, and computational contact mechanics. Dr. Kumar has also developed several beginner-friendly coding tools, including HoneyTop90, TOPress, SoRoTop, and TOPress3D, to help students and newcomers learn topology optimization through various concepts.
Anupam Saxena is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and currently serves as the Director of the Compliant and Robotics Systems Laboratory at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kanpur. He is an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow and a visiting professor at RWTH Aachen University in Germany. His research and design methodologies primarily focus on two major areas: optimization of biomedical and engineered systems and design of complex contact interactions. Specifically, his work encompasses structural and topology optimization for large deformations, human motion analysis, biomimetics, robotics, and sustainable design. Furthermore, he is dedicated to developing advanced applications for soft robotics, wearable and medical devices, energy harvesting, automotive systems, aerospace engineering, and Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS). He has guided numerous graduate students across a diverse spectrum of research initiatives, including projects focused on hand exoskeletons, contact-aided compliant mechanisms, swarm robotics, and biped gaits. He has served as an Associate Editor for the ASME Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics for two terms, and as Faculty Advisor and Associate Dean for International Relations at IIT Kanpur. He earned his undergraduate degree from IIT Bombay in 1995, followed by a master's degree from the University of Toledo in 1997, and a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 2000.
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Dr. h. c. Burkhard Corves is the Director of the Institute of Mechanism Theory, Machine Dynamics and Robotics of RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany, since 2000. He is the chairman of the VDI-Committee of the VDI-Scientific Board on “Mechanism and Machine Theory” and chair of IFToMM MO Germany. His almost 700 publications cover different topics such as industrial and mobile robotics, navigation and control of robotic systems, linkages, cam mechanism, glass and packaging machinery, pneumatic mechanisms, computer-aided graphical analysis and synthesis in mechanism theory, mechatronic development, and machine design strategy.
Safvan Palathingal is an Assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Hyderabad. He earned his B.Tech. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the National Institute of Technology Calicut, obtained his M.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees from the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. His research focuses on developing engineering applications through the understanding and control of nonlinear solid mechanics associated with large deformations. His lab is particularly interested in the mechanics and design of slender structures, compliant mechanisms, structural optimization, and related interdisciplinary areas.
