René Rossi

René Rossi has been working at Empa, the Swiss Federal Labo­ra­to­ries for Mate­rials Science and Tech­nology for over 20 years in the field of the inter­ac­tions between mate­rials and the human body (espe­cially the human skin). In 1999 he was awarded a PhD for his disser­ta­tion “Exper­i­mental inves­ti­ga­tion of the inter­ac­tion of protec­tion and phys­i­ology in fire fighters protec­tive clothing” by the Insti­tute of Hygiene and Applied Phys­i­ology at ETH Zurich. Since 2003, he has been leading the Labo­ra­tory for Protec­tion and Phys­i­ology at Empa, a group of 40 researchers devel­oping new mate­rials and systems for the improve­ment of health and perfor­mance of the human body. His partic­ular interest is the influ­ence of clothing on comfort, espe­cially in sports­wear and protec­tive clothing. In the field of smart textiles, his group is devel­oping new fibers and membranes for sensing and drug delivery purposes. He is a founder member of the Euro­pean Society for Protec­tive Clothing and Member of the General Council of the Fiber Society. René Rossi is lecturer for Ther­moreg­u­la­tion and Sports Textiles at ETH Zurich and author of over 120 peer-reviewed publi­ca­tions and book chap­ters.