Tadeusz Marek Editor

Waldemar Karwowski, PhD, DSc, PE, is a professor and the chairman of the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Systems at the University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida. He is also the executive director of the Institute for Advanced Systems Engineering at the University of Central Florida. He earned a master’s (1978) in production engineering and management from the Technical University of Wroclaw, Poland, and his PhD (1982) in industrial engineering at Texas Tech University. He earned a D.Sc. (dr habil.) in management science at the State Institute for Organization and Management in Industry, Poland (2004). He also received honorary doctoral degrees from three European universities. He is a past president of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (2007) and the International Ergonomics Association (2000–2003). Dr. Karwowski served on the Committee on Human Systems Integration, National Research Council, the National Academies, USA (2007–2011). He is a co-editor of the Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing journal and the editor-in-chief of Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science journal. He is an author or editor of over 400 scientific publications in the areas of human systems integration, cognitive engineering, activity theory, systems engineering, human–computer interaction, fuzzy logic and neuro-fuzzy modeling, applications of nonlinear dynamics to human performance, and neuroergonomics.

Jussi Kantola is a professor in the Industrial Management Department at the University of Vaasa, Finland. Before that, he was an associate professor in the Knowledge Service Engineering Department at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. From 2003 to 2008, he worked at the Tampere University of Technology, Finland, and the University of Turku, Finland, in various research roles, including research director in the IE and IT departments. He earned a PhD in industrial engineering at the University of Louisville, Kentucky, USA, in 1998 and a second PhD at the Industrial Management and Engineering Department at the Tampere University of Technology, Finland, in 2006. From 1999 to 2002, he worked as an IT and business and process consultant in the United States and in Finland. His current research interests include service and new product development as well as various soft-computing applications.

Tadeusz Marek is a chair professor and the head of the Department of Neuroergonomics and the Neurobiology Department of the Malopolska Center of Biotechnology at Jagiellonian University in Krakow and a professor of psychology at Warsaw School of Social Science and Humanities, Warsaw, Poland. He is the author or a co-author of over 300 scientific publications. His research deals with mental stress and workload, fatigue, professional burnout, cognitive neuroscience, chronopsychology, neuroadaptive technologies, and neuroergonomics. His current scientific interests include the neuronal mechanisms of mental fatigue and stress, chronic sleep restriction influence on activity of neuronal networks related to the processes of visual attention, and executive functions, and diurnal variability of brain activity. Professor Marek is a past president of the Committee on Ergonomics of Polish Academy of Sciences and past vice-rector of Jagiellonian University. He was the editor of the international journal Ergonomics. He is a member of many Polish and international learned societies.

Marek Frankowicz is an associate professor at the Theoretical Chemistry Department of Jagiellonian University in Krakow. He is also the vice-chair of the Jagiellonian University Centre for Research on Higher Education. He was a post-doctoral fellow at the Free University of Brussels (1981–1982) and Tokyo University (1982–1983) and a senior lecturer at University Paris 6 (1988–1990). He is a member of the advisory board of the International Journal Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems (INDECS). He is also a member of EURASHE Council and Bologna Expert for Poland. His current research interests include stochastic dynamics of onlinear chemical systems, foundations of thermodynamics, applications of complexity theory (complex adaptive systems, active walks in adaptive landscapes) to natural and social systems, and modeling of dynamics of higher education reforms in Europe.

Pavel Zgaga is a professor in the philosophy of education and education policy at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. During the period of social and political transition, he was the State Secretary for Higher Education (1992–1999) and Minister of Education (1999–2000). In 2001, after his return to academe, he cofounded the Centre for Educational Policy Studies at the university. He has held several research grants, directed a number of national and international projects on education, and published extensively in the area of his expertise. He has also led projects concerned with policy issues and the development of higher education (particularly the Bologna Process) and teacher education as a specific segment of higher education. In this area, he has been cooperating as an expert or invited speaker with the European Commission (DG EAC), the Council of Europe, UNESCO, OECD, the World Bank, and other organizations. In the Bologna process, he was engaged as a general rapporteur (2001–2003), as a member of the Board of the Bologna Follow-Up Group (2004–2005), and as the rapporteur of the Working Group on External Dimension of the Bologna Process (2005–2007). He is a cofounder of the South East European Educational Cooperation Network (SEE ECN, 2001) and Teacher Education Policy in Europe (TEPE, 2006) network. He has published broadly in domestic and international journals and written ten monographs, including Looking Out: The Bologna Process in a Global Setting (Oslo, 2006) and Higher Education in Transition: Reconsiderations on Higher Education in Europe at the Turn of Millennium (Umeå University, 2007).