Dr. Maia is an Associate Professor of the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering at Case Western Reserve University, where he moved to from the University of Minho, Portugal, in 2009. Dr. Maia’s research interests cover a number of topics, including: i) Extensional Rheology of highly viscous systems; ii) Viscoelasticity of complex multiphase fluids, such as polymer blends and copolymers, nanocomposites, pastes and suspensions and biological and food fluids; iii) On- and in-line sensoring of extrusion-based processes; iv) Computational Rheology. This work has produced over 270 scientific publications, including more than 80 scientific papers in international refereed journals, 7 scientific book chapters, 8 patents and 175 communications to conferences of which 18 were Plenary or Invited. He is or has been the Principal Investigator, PI, or co-PI of 24 scientific (13), technological (9) and curricular (2) projects with external funding, for a total of nearly $14,000,000, of which more than $5,000,000 were in direct industrial funding. He is currently implementing at CWRU the Center for Advanced Polymer Processing, CAPP, a state-of-the-art center for advanced polymer blending and compounding and reactive extrusion able to perform basic research and applied research and development in support of the Ohio and US plastics industry.

He is the Organizer and Co-Chairman of the XVIth International Congress on Rheology, to be held in Lisbon, Portugal, in August 2012 (the ICR congresses are the most important Rheology meetings in the world and only take place once every four years) and was the Coordinator of the EURHEO – European Masters in Engineering Rheology, one of only 103 Erasmus Mundus Masters in all areas of knowledge (and the only one in Rheology), involving 6 Universities from 5 different countries, destined to promote the European Union as a centre of excellence in learning around the world, until 09/2009. He was one of the Co-Chairs of the AERC 2003 – First Annual European Rheology Conference, held in Guimarães, Portugal in September 2003.

In addition to being the 2011 recipient of the Morand Lambla Award of the Polymer Processing Society, its most important award, and of the 2010 Annual Award of the British Society of Rheology, one of the oldest and more prestigious awards in the area of Rheology. He was a Fulbright Fellow in 2007. He also had the position of Invited Professor at both the University of Yamagata, Japan, in 2004, and University of Calabria, Italy, in 2005 and 2009.

Degrees

• Aggregation, University of Minho, Portugal, 2007
• Ph.D., University of Wales Aberystwyth, UK, 1996
• B.Sc. Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal, 1972

Current Research Interests and Experience

• Extensional Rheology and Rheometry
• Viscoelasticity of complex multiphase systems, including polymer blends and composites and micro- and nano-layered polymer films
• On- and in-line sensoring for materials processing
• Computational Rheology and Processing