Nam-Trung Nguyen (Vietnamese: Nguyễn Nam Trung; born on 14 April 1970) is a Vietnamese-Australian researcher in the fields of

Microfluidics Microfluidics refers to the behavior, precise control, and manipulation of fluids that are geometrically constrained to a small scale (typically sub-millimeter) at which surface forces dominate volumetric forces. It is a multidisciplinary field tha ...

and

Nanofluidics Nanofluidics is the study of the behavior, manipulation, and control of fluids that are confined to structures of nanometer (typically 1–100 nm) characteristic dimensions (1 nm = 10−9 m). Fluids confined in these structures exhibit p ...

. He is notable for his work on nerve agent detector, PCR, Micromixer,

Droplet-based Microfluidics Droplet-based microfluidics manipulate discrete volumes of fluids in immiscible phases with low Reynolds number and laminar flow regimes. Interest in droplet-based microfluidics systems has been growing substantially in past decades. Microdroplets ...

, Micro Magnetofluidics, Liquid Marbles and Micro Elastofluidics. He is currently a ''Professor'' and ''Director'' o
Queensland Micro and Nanotechnology Centre
at

Griffith University Griffith University is a public research university in South East Queensland on the east coast of Australia. Formally founded in 1971, Griffith opened its doors in 1975, introducing Australia's first degrees in environmental science and Asian s ...

. He was a former ''Associate Professor'' at

Nanyang Technological University The Nanyang Technological University (NTU) is a national research university in Singapore. It is the second oldest autonomous university in the country and is considered as one of the most prestigious universities in the world by various inte ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

. Nguyen is a Fellow of ASME and a Senior Member of IEEE.

Early life

Nguyen was born in 1970 in

Hanoi Hanoi or Ha Noi ( or ; vi, Hà Nội ) is the capital and second-largest city of Vietnam. It covers an area of . It consists of 12 urban districts, one district-leveled town and 17 rural districts. Located within the Red River Delta, Hanoi is ...

, to an engineer father and schoolteacher mother. He started school in 1975, the year Vietnam war ended. After graduating from high school, he took the entrance examination into

Hanoi University of Science and Technology ) Hanoi University of Technology (HUT) (-2010) , colors = Red, green, white, yellow , website www.hust.edu.vn Hanoi University of Science and Technology (HUST; vi, Đại học Bách khoa Hà Nội, fornerly known in English as ''Hanoi Univer ...

. With the high score in this examination, he was awarded a scholarship for overseas undergraduate education in the former

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...

.Grit: A Combination of Passion, Perseverance and Persistence
/ref> As one of the top-ranked candidates, he could select the country he wanted to go to. His father, an engineer, trained in the former

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

, advised him to go to former

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

. After completing a German language course in Hanoi in 1987 and a preparation course in

Zwickau Zwickau (; is, with around 87,500 inhabitants (2020), the fourth-largest city of Saxony after Leipzig, Dresden and Chemnitz and it is the seat of the Zwickau District. The West Saxon city is situated in the valley of the Zwickau Mulde (German: ' ...

in 1988, he started studying precision engineering and microsystems technology at

Chemnitz University of Technology Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt , ) is the third-largest city in the German state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden. It is the 28th largest city of Germany as well as the fourth largest city in the area of former East Germany a ...

, Germany. The Eastern Bloc collapsed in 1989 when he was in the second year of his undergraduate study. He continued his study at the same university after the

German reunification German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...

. During this time, he also worked part-time as a worker on an assembly line, data entry personnel at a bank and waiter at restaurants. He worked as a student researcher at

Robert Bosch GmbH Robert Bosch GmbH (; ), commonly known as Bosch and stylized as BOSCH, is a German multinational engineering and technology company headquartered in Gerlingen, Germany. The company was founded by Robert Bosch in Stuttgart in 1886. Bosch is 9 ...

, where he was introduced to

microelectromechanical systems Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), also written as micro-electro-mechanical systems (or microelectronic and microelectromechanical systems) and the related micromechatronics and microsystems constitute the technology of microscopic devices, ...

(MEMS) for automotive applications. He contributed to the development of the MEMS-based fuel injection systems as well as sensing systems for pressure and mass flow rate. Nguyen received his Dipl-Ing and Dr Ing degrees from Chemnitz University of Technology in 1993 and 1997, respectively. These formative years in post-war Vietnam and reunified Germany have strongly shaped his character and future career. He returned to

Chemnitz Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt , ) is the third-largest city in the German state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden. It is the 28th largest city of Germany as well as the fourth largest city in the area of former East Germany a ...

in 2004 to defend his

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in many European countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excellence in research, teaching and further education, usually including a ...

degree. The habilitation degree (Dr Ing Habil) is the respected qualification for a full professorship in Germany. After the formal normalization of diplomatic relations between the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

of America (USA) and Vietnam in 1995, he could continue his training in the USA. Following the award of his doctoral degree in 1997, he moved to the USA and worked as a postdoctoral research engineer in the Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center (

University of California at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

, United States).

Career

From 1999 to 2012, Nguyen was a Research Fellow, Assistant Professor and Associate Professor at

’s Nanyang Technological University (NTU).Nam-Trung Nguyen’s Curriculum Vitae
/ref> He was also the Director of the successful part-time education program of the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at NTU. From 2000-2013, he led a competitive and independent research group at NTU. In 2013, he joined Griffith University in Australia and has been serving as a Professor and the Director of Queensland Micro- and Nanotechnology Centre. Nguyen has served as a member of the

Australian Research Council The Australian Research Council (ARC) is the primary non-medical research funding agency of the Australian Government, distributing more than in grants each year. The Council was established by the ''Australian Research Council Act 2001'', ...

br>College of Experts
from 2014-2017 and is an active investigator for Australian industries through research contracts and Cooperative Research Centres. Nguyen’s work focuses on advancing fundamental fluid physics in microscale and applying those advancements to produce practical engineering solutions in the form of lab-on-a-chip and point-of-care diagnostics. He has three US patents (US7975531B2, US7736788B2, US7534097B2) covering microfluidics applications such as fuel cells and fluid instrumentation. Nguyen has established and developed a number of enabling technologies and fluid handling concepts, with international recognition particularly in polymeric micromachining, micro acoustofluidics, micro mixing and micro magnetofluidics. Nguyen has published over 470 articles in international journals, 9 books, 24 book chapters. He has supervised 36 PhD students to successful completion. The 2020 edition of the Research Special Report of The Australian recognized Nguyen as an Australia’s research leader in analytical chemistry, and one of the top 17 scholars in chemical and material sciences.The Australian Research
/ref> Nguyen is an elected Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. His international reputation and leadership led to roles with key microfluidics and micro/nanotechnology journals of the field, including Editor-in-Chief (Micromachines), Associate Editor (Microfluidics and Nanofluidics, Biomedical Microdevices, Journal of Sensors and Sensor Systems, Journal of Science: Advanced Materials and Devices, Technologies and advisory board member of Lab on a Chip.

Honors

Nguyen is the First Runner Up of Inaugural ProSPER.Net-Scopus Young Scientist Awards in Sustainable Development in 2009 and the Runner Up of ASAIHL-Scopus Young Scientist Awards in 2008.Winners of the 2008 ASAIHL-Scopus Awards Announced and Honored
/ref> The following is the full list of his achievements: *2020, Australia’s research leader in analytical chemistry *2018, Vice Chancellor’s Research Excellence Award for Research Leadership *2017, Pro Vice Chancellor’s Research Excellence Award for Research Leadership *2014, Member of Australian Research Council College of Experts *2012, SMART Faculty Fellow, Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology

Selected bibliography

* * * *

Notes

External links

N. T. Nguyen's homepage

N. T. Nguyen's university website

N. T. Nguyen's Google Scholar profile

N. T. Nguyen's ResearchGate profile

N. T. Nguyen's Scopus profile

N. T. Nguyen's Microsoft Academic profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nguyen, Nam-Trung 1970 births Living people Vietnamese scientists Academics of Vietnamese descent Vietnamese emigrants to Australia Senior Members of the IEEE Nanyang Technological University faculty