Prof. Dr. ir. Gert Desmet

General introduction

Gert Desmet (°1967) has a Master’s degree in chemical engineering and obtained his PhD in chemical engineering (fermentation technology) from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Brussels, Belgium, where he currently is a full professor in chemical engineering. In 2012-2015, he was the vice-dean of the Faculty of Sciences and Bioengineering.

Research

His research focuses on the miniaturization of separation methods and on the investigation and the modeling of flow effects in chromatographic systems. He is a past co-chair and chair of the Chemistry Panel of the Belgian National Science Fund (FWO) and is an Associate Editor of the journal Analytical Chemistry from the American Chemical Society. In 2016, he was rewarded an ERC Advanced Grant. He is also a member of the permanent scientific committee of the “International Symposium on High Performance Liquid Phase Separations and Related techniques” (HPLC) and the “International Symposium on Chromatography (ISC)” conference series, as well as of the SCM and HTC conference series.Up to date, he has been the promoter of 28 successfully finished PhDs and has been authoring over 250 peer reviewed papers in international peer-reviewed journals and 10 patent applications. He and his students presented over 250 lectures at international conferences and symposia in the past 10 years and have received numerous awards for their oral or poster presentations, including Nanotech Montreux, and HTC conference and HPLC conference series. In 2006, he received the Desty Memorial award. In 2008, he received the “Emerging Leader in Chromatography”-award from LC-GC North America and the “Agilent Technologies Award” from the Agilent Technologies foundation. In 2009, he received the Silver Jubilee Medal of the Chromatographic Society of the UK.

Selected publications

• Desmet, G. and Baron G. V., 1999, On the possibility of shear-driven chromatography: a theoretical performance analysis, Journal of Chromato­graphy A 855, 57
• Desmet, G. and Baron G. V., 2000, The possibility of generating high speed shear-driven flows and their potential application in liquid chromatography, Analytical Chemistry 72, 2160-2165.
• Clicq, D, Pappaert, K., Vankrunkelsven, S., Vervoort, N., Baron, G. V. and Desmet, G., 2004, Shear-driven Flows: A New Approach to LC and Macro-molecular Separations, Analytical Chemistry 76(23); 430A-439A.
• Gzil, P., Vervoort, N., Baron, G. V. and Desmet, G., 2004, General Rules for the Optimal External Porosity of LC Supports, Analytical Chemistry, 76(22); 6707-6718
• Desmet, G., Clicq, D. and Gzil, P., 2005, Geometry-independent Plate Height Representation Methods for the Direct Comparison of the Kinetic Performance of LC Supports with a Different Size or Morphology, Analytical Chemistry, 77, 4058-4070.

Teaching

• Introduction to reactor design
• Biochemical Engineering
• Analytical (bio) Chemistry
• Micro- and Nanobiotechnology
• Design of multiphase reactors
• Modelling of (bio-)chemical processes
• Molecular technology
• Reaction and Transport