Dragan Uskokovic

Abstract:

Research in the field of material science and engineering has had a long history and tradition in Serbia. The seminal steps were made in the early 1950s, first at the University of Belgrade and the Institute of Nuclear Sciences in Vinča, after which important contributions were made by the associates of the Institute of Technical Sciences of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. The International Institute for the Science of Sintering (IISS) is certainly one of the most beautiful examples of how a very successful international scientific organization can be formed in a small country and how it can encourage the development of this discipline. The IISS was founded in 1968 in Belgrade, and the founding conference was held in Herceg-Novi, Montenegro in 1969. It was organized by 15 scientists from around the world who all agreed to develop this area with joint forces. The IISS had the important role of bringing together scientists in this field from a variety of international institutions, taking advantage of the fact that Yugoslavia, at the time, was a rare meeting place for the scientists from the East and from the West. Today, the IISS counts 12 honorable members, 45 full members, 16 correspondent members and 33 inactive members from 20 countries from all over the globe. The IISS has organized 10 international conferences on sintering (World Round Table Conferences on Sintering, WRTCS), all at the territory of former Yugoslavia. The IISS has also organized 7 international topical symposia on sintering, only the first of which was held in Herceg-Novi in former Yugoslavia and all others were held around the world: Warsaw in 1979, New Delhi in 1983, Tokyo in 1987, Vancouver in 1991, Haiko in 1995, and New Delhi in 2000. The IISS has been also publishing its Science of Sintering Journal for 50 years now.
The Materials Research Society of Serbia (MRS-Serbia) was established in 1997 to promote multidisciplinary, goal-oriented research in material science and engineering, similarly to other MRS societies in the world. The main task and objective of MRS-Serbia is to encourage creativity in researching materials and model the evolution of this field in Serbia according to the analogous activities elsewhere in the world. MRS-Serbia has held twenty conferences so far and all of them, starting from the first one in 1995, were organized in Herceg-Novi in Montenegro. On average, 200 scientific presentations are given per conference, with more than 4 000 works being presented so far in total. This includes 500 plenary lectures by world-renowned researchers from some of the world’s most famous universities.
The research program on "Molecular Designing of Nanoparticles and Functional Materials" [1] has been conducted throughout the last ten years within this environment. Since the methods for producing nanoparticles are at the basis of advanced materials science and engineering, a particular emphasis in this program is placed on soft, eco-friendly, bottom-up and easily technologically transferable fabrication methods. The materials that are the topics of our investigation can be potentially applicable in numerous technological fields: electronics, energy-storage, sensors, optics, catalysis, and biomedicine. Research activities such as those deployed in our labs may prove to be relevant for ensuring a sustainable development of humanity in energy, health, environment, water and other global sectors [2-5].

[1] N. Ignjatovic, S. Markovic, D. Jugovic, D. Uskokovic, " Molecular designing of nanoparticles and functional materials", Journal of the Serbian Chemical Society, 2017, https://doi.org/10.2298/JSC1612070011I.
[2] Vuk Uskokovic and Dragan P.Uskokovic (eds.), Nanotechnologies in Preventive and Regenerative Medicine, Elsevier, 2018, 614 p.
[3] D. Jugovic, D. Uskokovic, "A review of recent developments in the synthesis procedures of LiFePO4 powders", Journal of Power Sources, vol. 180, no. 2 (2009) 538-544,doi:10.1016/j.jpowsour.2009.01.074.
[4] N. L. Ignjatovic, K. M. Penov-Gaši, J. J. Ajdukovic, V. V. Kojić, S. B. Marković, D. P. Uskoković, "The effect of the androstane lung cancer inhibitor content on the cell-selective toxicity of hydroxyapatite-chitosan-PLGA nanocomposites", Materials Science and Engineering C, 89 (2018) 371-377, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msec.2018.04.028.
[5] Lj. Veselinovic, M. Mitric, M. Avdeev, S. Markovic, D. Uskokovic, "New insights into BaTi1-xSnxO3 (0 ? x ? 0.20) phase diagram from neutron diffraction data", Journal of Applied Crystallography, 49, 5 (2016) 1726-1733, https://doi.org/10.1107/S1600576716013157.