Juan H. Vera is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Chemical Engineering, McGill University, Montreal, Canada. He earned a doctorate (Ing. Quim.) at the Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria, Chile, and a Master of Science in chemical engineering at the University of California, Berkley. He co-authored the first edition of this book, a manual on copper metallurgy (in Spanish), a module in Elsevier Encyclopedia, co-edited the book Ionic Surfactants and Aqueous Solutions: Biomolecules, Metals and Nanoparticles (2018), and authored more than 200 refereed publications in international journals. He has an international patent on the extraction of proteins and a Canadian patent on the extraction of heavy metals.
Grazyna Wilczek-Vera is a chemist who has taught and conducted research in various areas of thermodynamics at several universities. During her more than 30-year academic career, she served as a Faculty Lecturer and the Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Chemistry and as a Research Associate in the Department of Chemical Engineering at McGill University, Montreal, Canada, and as an Adjunct in the Department of Chemistry, University of Warsaw, Poland. She received the 2008 Principal's Prize for Excellence in Teaching at McGill University. She earned a PhD in chemical sciences (with distinction) and a Master of Science in chemistry (with distinction) at the University of Warsaw. She has authored 60 refereed publications in journals, given 38 conference presentations, and co-authored three books.
Claudio Olivera-Fuentes is a Professor Emeritus in the Thermodynamics and Transport Phenomena Department and Coordinator of Applied Sciences and Engineering in the Dean's Office of Research and Development at Universidad Simón Bolívar, Caracas, Venezuela. He earned a chemical engineering degree at the Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, Chile, and an MSc in chemical engineering at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, UK. He has been an Invited Researcher at the University of Concepción, Chile, and a Visiting Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. He has authored over 120 publications in conference proceedings and scientific journals, three book chapters, and one textbook on vector and tensor analysis applied to transport phenomena. Among other recognitions, he received the 2003 Procter & Gamble of Venezuela Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 2016 Simón Rodríguez Award for Lifetime Academic Achievement.
Costas Panayiotou is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Chemical Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. He earned a PhD at McGill University, Montreal, Canada. He was a Visiting Professor at the University of Texas, Austin, and at Ecole Polytechnique Federale, Lausanne, Switzerland, and he was an Otto Monsted Professor at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU). He has published more than 250 peer-reviewed articles in international journals, ten book chapters, and two textbooks, and he has served on the editorial boards of ACS and Elsevier journals.
