Biography

Wilfried Kurz is Professor Emeritus of Materials Science at "Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, EPFL" (the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne). He received his diploma and doctor’s degree from University of Leoben, Austria. In 1964 he joined the staff of the Battelle Geneva Research Laboratories, which he left in 1971 as head of the physical metallurgy group. In the same year he was appointed at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, where, until his retirement in 2003, he directed the Laboratory of Physical Metallurgy as well as of the Laser Materials Processing Centre. After participating in 1972/73 in the foundation of the curriculum in Materials Science and Engineering at EPFL he was twice Head of Department. Under others he served as president of SVMT (Swiss Assoc. for Materials Science & Technology) and of FEMS, the Federation of European Materials Societies. Author of four books, he published some 250 papers and patents, principally on the science and technology of solidification microstructures and processes. Professor Kurz is corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, highly cited researcher and the recipient of awards from Eisenhuette Oesterreich; The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society (TMS, USA); ASM International, USA; Société Française de Métallurgie et de Matériaux; Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Materialkunde; Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, London; Associatione Italiana di Metallurgia; People’s Republic of China; Federation of European Materials Societies; and Iron and Steel Institute of Japan. Selected publications of recent years: 
“Fundamentals of Solidification”, W Kurz, DJ Fisher, M Rappaz, Trans Tech Publ., Switzerland,, 5th revised edition 2023,  “Solidification”, H Müller-Krumbhaar, W Kurz, E Brener, in: Phase Transformations in Materials, G Kostorz, ed., Wiley-VCH, 2001, p.81-170 “Single-crystal laser deposition of superalloys: Processing-microstructure maps”, M Gäumann, C Bezencon, P Canalis, W Kurz, Acta Mater., 49 (2001) 1051-1062 “Solidification microstructure – processing maps: Theory and application”, W Kurz, Adv. Eng. Mater., 3 (2001) 443-452 “Dendritic growth”, W Kurz, R Trivedi, in: Proc. MC Flemings Symposium on Solidification and Materials Processing, eds R Abbaschian, H Brody, A Mortensen, TMS, Warrendale, PA, 2001, p. 87-99 “Massive Transformation and Absolute Stability“, M. Lima, W. Kurz, Metall. Mater. Trans. 33A (2002) 2337-2345 “Introduction to Materials Science”, JP Mercier, G Zambelli, W Kurz, Elsevier, Paris, 2002, 461 p. “Epitaxial deposition of MCrAlY coatings on a Ni-base superalloy by laser cladding”, C Bezencon, A Schnell, W Kurz, Scripta Mater. 49 (2003) 705-709 “Peritectic Coupled Growth”, S Dobler, TS Lo, M Plapp, A Karma, W Kurz, Acta Mater., 52 (2004) 2795-2808 “Solidification cracking of superalloy single- and bi-crystals”, N Wang, S Mokadem, M Rappaz, W Kurz, Acta Mater., 52 (2004) 3173-3182 “Laser Repair of Superalloy Single Crystals with Varying Substrate Orientations”, S Mokadem, C Bezencon, A Hauert, A Jacot, W Kurz, Metall. Mater. Trans. 38A (2007) 1500-1510 “Plane Front Solidification”, W. Kurz, ASM Handbook Vol. 15: Casting, 2008, 293-298 “Solidification microstructures and solid-state parallels: Recent developments, future directions”, M Asta, C Beckermann, A Karma, W Kurz, R Napolitano , M Plapp, G Purdy, M Rappaz, R Trivedi, Acta Mater., 57 (2009) 941–971 “Solute Trapping-Free Massive Transformation at Absolute Stability”, A. Jacot, M. Sumida, W. Kurz, Acta Mater. 59 (2011) 1716-1724