FACTA UNIVERSITATIS (NIS)
Series: Electronics and Energetics
Professor Dr. Wolfgang Weber was born on December 20th, 1937, in Berlin. He graduated in electrical engineering at the University of Darmstadt in 1961, and defended his doctoral dissertation in the same field at the University of Karlsruhe in 1966. The title of a Doctor Habilitatus in the field of control engineering he obtained in 1969 at the same University. He is presently living in Bochum, is married and has three children.
Professional activities of Professor Weber have been extremely plentiful. At the beginning of his career, from 1958 to 1966, he had worked in various industrial electronic firms, having held different posts, such as the development engineer and the head of the Development Sector in AEG-Telefunken Institute of Automatic Control in Frankfurt, Hamburg and Berlin.
His pedagogic activities began in 1966 at the University of Karlsruhe, where he was engaged as an assistant professor with the Institute of Control Engineering. Main field of his scientific research interest were in adaptive control systems, identification methods, simulation and design of industrial section for steel mills and forges, mining systems, and alike. These researches resulted in his doctoral dissertation in 1966 and habilitation in 1969 at the mentioned University.
In 1970, Professor Weber was appointed full professor at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering as the first full professor of the newly formed University of Kaiserslautern. The scope of the activities he had at that University included the position of the Dean of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Dean of the Faculty of Computer Science, University Senate member, and many other leading offices.
He transferred to the Ruhr University in Bochum in 1973 as a full professor of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering. Within this Faculty, he is presently the Head of the Computer Technics Department, as well as the Director of the Institute of Information Science. Since his appointment, Professor Weber has held various important positions, like the Dean of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Vice-Rector of the University, and other duties bearing full responsibility.
Apart from the teaching in the undergraduate and postgraduate studying programs, Professor Dr. Weber has given a great number of different courses intended for the employees in industry, as well as numerous invited lectures at many universities in USA, China, Yugoslavia, Philippines, Malaysia, India, Brasil and other countries.
Along with the mentioned activities, Professor Weber's participation in editing and reviewing scientific and professional journals is of an equal importance. Prof. Dr. Weber has been the editor-in-chief of the Journal "Digitaltechnik" (VDI-Verlag, Dusseldorf) since 1977, editor of the Journal "Tachenbuch der Informatik" (Springer--Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York) since 1977, as well as a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal "FACTA UNIVERSIATIS" - Series "Electronic and Energetics" of the University of Nis. Professor Dr. Weber is also the permanent reviewer and scientific critic for "ELECTRONIC LETTERS" from Great Britain and for several German scientific and professional magazines.
Professor Dr. Wolfgang Weber is a member of various professional associations, such as: VDE (Association of German Electrical Engineers), VDI (Association of German Engineers), GMR (Society for Measurement and Control), GI (Society for Information Science), IEEE-USA (International Association of Electronic and Electrical Engineers), FES (Friedrich Ebert Foundation), Humboldt Foundation, New York Academy Of Science, and other.
Professor Dr. Weber was awarded numerous academic and professional acknowledgements for his successful scientific and educational work. Among the academic awards, the most significant are the honorary doctorate of the University Marquis Giuseppe Scicluna, USA (1985), and Order of Honor "Theodor Vogel" (1982). He has been a member of the Humboldt Foundation Academic Senate since 1976, and a co-opted member of the New York Academy of Science since 1982. Moreover, in 1985 Dr. Weber was appointed a honorary professor and adviser at the Northwestern Jiao Tong University of Beijing, Peoples' Republic of China. The most prominent professional award that he has received is the Order of Honor "Albert Einstein", which he was awarded in USA in 1985.
The scientific opus of professor Dr. Wolfgang Weber is exceptionally rich in width and variety of subject matters. It may particularly be pointed out that Professor Weber, together his associates, has accomplished worldwide acknowledged results, which were presented to the world scientific and professional public through his papers and patents. His results achieved in the direct collaboration with industry may also be highly evaluated, for many of his research achievements were applied in real systems and certain high-technology products.
Until the end of the 1990, Professor Dr. Weber published more than 25 books and 85 papers in various languages. He advised 350 master's theses and 88 doctoral dissertations. Seven habilitations were done under his mentorship, and 8 of his doctoral candidates have become full or associate professors so far.
Aware of the fact that such a short review cannot encompass all of Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Weber's activities, both in the field of computer science and in other fields of his lengthy and prolific work, we have presented only a part of the results from his research and pedagogical work. Therefore, on the occasion of Prof. Dr. Weber's 60th birthday, in "FACTA UNIVERSITATIS" we express our deep gratitude and respect, with best wishes for his good health and personal happiness. We hope that he will continue his productive and creative work with the same energy, perservance, zeal and success as shown to date.
Vidosav Stojanovic Series Editor