Executive Committee

Soren Balling Engelsen , President (2021-2025)

Søren Balling Engelsen is Professor and head of the section for Spectroscopy & Chemometrics at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. He has a PhD (1992) in vibrational spectroscopy and molecular modelling from the Technical University in Denmark including one year stay abroad at Cornell University (US) to study molecular dynamics simulations. From 1992 to 1995, he worked as a post-doctoral fellow at Ingénierie Moléculaire, INRA-Nantes (France). Since 1995 he was employed as assistant professor in ”Spectroscopy and molecular modeling” in the research group of Professor Lars Munck and started to use NIR spectroscopy for diverse applications within high-throughput non-invasive industrial quality control and academic food and health research. Since 2004 he has been professor in Biospectroscopy and been heading the Spectroscopy & Chemometrics group at University of Copenhagen (now approx. 40 persons). The research focus is on the development- and application of multivariate high-throughput quantitative spectroscopic methods for biological samples in quality control, process analytical technology, foodomics and metabolomics. He has authored and co-authored more than 170 peer-reviewed scientific papers and been granted two patents.

Email :  se@food.ku.dk

Dolores Peréz-Marin, President-Elect (2021-2025)

Prof. Dr. Dolores Peréz-Marín, PhD in Agriculture Engineering (University of Córdoba-UCO, Spain). She holds the position of Full-Professor in Fundamentals and Technology of Livestock Production and in Non-destructive Spectral Sensors for Quality, Safety and Traceability of Agro-Food Products in the Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry Engineering (ETSIAM, University of Cordoba, Spain).

She is a worldwide recognized expert in the used of sensors and new technologies applied to feed & food integrity. Her expertise in non-destructive spectral sensors (mainly, NIR and hyperspectral sensors) covers both fundamental and applied research. She began in 1999 working in the topic concerned the application of nonlinear calibration methodology to the difficult problem of measuring the ingredient composition of unground animal compound feeds. Since then, she has worked on an ever widening range of applications in food and agriculture − feed, fats and oils, meats, protein animal by-products, milk and dairy, and various fruits and vegetables − using NIRS, alone or combined with other sensors. One of her main expertise in linked to the processing of spectral big data with multivariate analysis tools and nonlinear methods.

This research has resulted in well over 250 publications; with 119 of these being peer-reviewed papers in top quality journals and several contributions as invited speakers in national and international conferences and workshops (H index 28). She has experience in the participation, management and scientific co-ordination of several national and European R + D NIRS projects, and in technology transfer contracts with companies. In the framework of the ICNIRS (International Council on NIRS), she was member of the Council Management Committee (2013-2019)and currently she is the President of its Educational Group of ICNIRS and member of the President’s Advisory Committe. She is currently editor of the Journal of NIRS, FAO consultant and member of the International Scientific Advisory Board of the Institute for Global Food Security- Queens University (UK). She was awarded in 2014 with the International Tomas Hirschfeld Award and in 2020 with the International G. Birth Award for her outstanding contribution in the field of NIR spectroscopy. She is currently the coordinator of the European Action Cost “European Network for assuring food integrity using non-destructive spectral sensors” (2020-2024).

Email: dcperez@uco.es

Tom Fearn, Immediate Past President (2021-2025)

Tom Fearn is Professor of Applied Statistics at University College London, UK. Before joining UCL in 1989 he worked for the Flour Milling and Baking Research Association (FMBRA) at Chorleywood, where he first began to calibrate NIR instruments (a 6-filter InfraAlyser 2.5) in 1978. His interest in NIR and in chemometrics more generally has continued to the present. Since Statistics departments generally don’t have NIR instruments his research has involved many international collaborations, most notably an ongoing link with Ana Garrido’s group at the University of Córdoba. As well as 140 or so papers his publications include joint authorship of the books Practical NIR Spectroscopy, with Osborne and Hindle, and A User Friendly Guide to Multivariate Calibration and Classification, with Næs, Isaksson and Davies. He is chemometrics editor of the Journal of Near Infrared Spectroscopy and wrote the Chemometric Space column in NIR News for 20 years. He received the Tomas Hirschfeld award for contributions to near infrared spectroscopy in 2001.

Email :  tom@stats.ucl.ac.uk

Sirinnapa Saranwong, Secretary (2013-2023)

Sirinnapa Saranwong, aka Mui, is an NIR/Process Application Scientist with Bruker Optics, Tokyo, Japan. Mui obtained her Ph.D. in Biology from Chiang Mai University at the age of 25 in 2003. Her thesis project involved measuring the maturity of on-tree mango fruit with a hand-held NIR instrument. During her doctoral studies she was admitted to the prestigious Royal Golden Jubilee Ph.D. program and invited to work in Sumio Kawano’s lab at the National Food Research Institute (NFRI) in Tsukuba, Japan, where she studied NIR basics and applications to perishable products. After graduation, Mui continued working as a researcher with Dr Kawano for eight years. During that time, she conducted NIR research not only on fruit, but also milk, blood, meat and other commodities At NFRI, Mui had the opportunity to welcome prominent researchers from around the world, giving her access to the NIR network worldwide. She has been deeply involved in the Japan Council for Near Infrared (JCNIRS) as well as the Asian NIR Consortium, helping to organize the annual Japanese NIR Forum since 2003, the Japan-Thailand Joint Symposium on Nondestructive Technology in 2004, the Japan-Korea Joint Symposium on Near Infrared Spectroscopy in 2006 and the biannual Asian NIR Symposium since 2008. Mui is most recognized as the Secretary for the 14th International Conference for Near Infrared Spectroscopy, held in Bangkok in November 2009. For the international society, Mui attended her first ICNIRS meeting in 2001 (Korea) and has attended every subsequent meeting. She became Asian Editor for NIRNews in 2006 and has been a member of ICNIRS Management Committee from 2007 to 2013.

Mui has authored a number of peer reviewed publications, as well as a Book chapter on NIR spectroscopy. She has been invited to present her work in many countries, including Thailand, USA, Australia, Germany, and the Philippines. Since 2011, Mui has worked to support the sales team at Bruker Optics, not only for R&D or QC applications but extending her expertise to online/inline applications.

Email : mui.saranwong@bruker.com

Peter Tillmann, Treasurer (2017-2023)

Peter works for the Association of German of Agricultural and Analytic Research Institutes (VDLUFA), the association inside agricultural sciences that has developed, harmonised and administered analytical methods for 130 years. Peter’s main field of work is networking of NIRS instruments across Germany and beyond. He is an agricultural scientist with degrees from the Universities of Hohenheim and Göttingen, both Germany. During his studies he visited Michigan State University at East Lansing, MI, U.S.A. His mentors were Christian Paul at FAL Braunschweig, Germany and John Shenk and Mark Westerhaus, from ISI, State College, PA, U.S.A. who led him into the world of NIRS. Together with Christian Paul he organized the “NIR onsite” meeting in 2007 in Braunschweig devoted to mobile applications of NIR on harvesting machine.

Email : peter.tillmann@vdlufa-nirs.de