Jian S. Dai

Professor Jian S. Dai received his BSc in Mechanical Engineering in 1982 and his MSc in Machine Systems in 1984 at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in Shanghai. He was appointed Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering in 1985 and joined the University of Salford in the UK in late 1980s as a research scholar in the area of kinematics, mechanisms and robotics. He received his PhD in 1993 and then continued his employment with the same University as Post-Doctoral Research Fellow since 1993. From 1996, he was leading member and coordinator in an international project at Unilever Research as project manager/Senior Industrial Research Fellow and subsequently spent three months in Makino Robotics Laboratory at Yamanashi University in Japan. He was appointed in 1997 Senior Lecturer in Mechanisms and Robotics at the University of Sunderland and joined King's College London, University of London in 1999. He was promoted to Reader in Mechanisms and Robotics and then to Chair Professor of Mechanisms and Robotics at the Division of Engineering. Since 2007, he is Head of the Centre for Mechatronics and Manufacturing Systems (CMMS).
 
Professor Dai has published over 250 refereed journal and conference papers and has been awarded research grants and contracts totalling over 3.0 million GBP. He has successfully graduated and is supervising 18 PhDs and has supervised 10 post doctoral researchers and research assistants. He has been invited to be ajunct Chair Professor by the Ministry of Education of China and by Italian Institute of Technology. 
 
Professor Dai is a Chartered Engineer, a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE), and a member of the Institution of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). He is also member of the IFToMM Permanent Commission for History of Machine and Mechanisms Science, member of the ASME Mechanisms and Robotics Committee, member of the IMechE Mechatronics, Informatics and Control Group Committee, member of the EPSRC Peer College, referee and panellist for China NSFC and Canada NSERC, and evaluator and panelist of European Commission FP7 programme. He serves as Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Robotics , Associate Editor of ASME Transactions: Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics and Associate Editor of international journal Robotica.

His research interests cover the following areas and topics.

• Theoretical Development: Kinematics, Screw Theory, Lie Algebra and Lie Group, Rigid Body Displacement.
  
• Mechanisms Development: Mechanisms, Metamorphic Mechanisms (Topology-Varying Mechanisms), Reconfigurable Mechanisms, Parallel Mechanisms, Redundantly Actuated Mechanisms, Underactuations, Applied Mechanics of Advanced Machinery.
  
• Robotics: Multi-fingered Robotic Hand, Metamorphic Robotic Hand, Dexterous Grippers, Serial and Parallel Manipulators, Robotic Ironing, Mobile Robots.
  
• Industrial Applications: Folding Origami, Complex Carton Packaging, Flimsy Material Handling, Motion Control, High Speed Machinery, Automated Assembly, Cost Modelling in Manufacturing.
  
• Biomechanical Sciences: Sprained Ankle Rehabilitation, Robotic Massaging, Prosthesis, Dental Robotic Devices, Assistive Surgical Robotic Devices.
  
• Artiomimetics: Folding Origami, Origami Oriented Mechanisms, New Robot Structures.