Prof. David Levy is Research Professor at the Institute of Materials Science of Madrid (ICMM-CSIC), where he heads the Sol-Gel Group (SGG) in the Department of Photonic Materials. He started his research in 1982–89 at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, with the pioneering first application of the Sol-Gel process to the preparation of organically doped silica gel-glasses, and joined ICMM-CSIC in 1989. In 1991 he received the First Ulrich Prize for the most innovative work presented by a young scientist at the VI International Workshop on Glasses and Ceramics from Gels, and he was later nominated by CSIC for the “Rey Juan Carlos I” research award.
He has authored or co-authored a large body of research articles, reviews and book chapters, with 9,673 citations, an h-index of 43 and an i10-index of 109 (Google Scholar). He is Co-Editor of The Sol-Gel Handbook (Wiley, 2015) and of Transparent Conductive Materials (Wiley, 2018), and inventor of more than 10 patents and patent applications on optical Sol-Gel materials and their applications. He has been Principal Investigator of 31 research and industry projects. He chaired the XVII International Sol-Gel Conference (Madrid, 2013), serves on the International Advisory Board of the International Sol-Gel Conferences and on SPIE program committees (Sol-Gel Optics; Optoelectronics and Optical Science and Technology), and is an expert evaluator for EU research programmes (GROWTH, FP7, H2020 and Horizon Europe).
For 11 years he also headed LINES at the National Institute of Aerospace Technology (INTA), developing space materials, instrumentation and micro/nanotechnologies for satellite optical instruments. His current research focuses on optical Sol-Gel materials, including functional and protective thin-film coatings, oxide nanoparticles and liquid-crystal-based electro-optical materials, with a strong focus on smart windows. He is co-founder of INNOVAGLASS, a CSIC technology for outdoor-ready smart windows.
