prof. Leopoldo Massimilla

prof. Antonio D'Alessio

Italian contributions spanned over the whole range of topics included in the Symposium program at an extent resembling the general relevance of fields in the international combustion research community. This to testify the integration of the Italian combustion researcher community in the international scenario. As matter of facts, along the years many and significant collaborations with international research groups contributed to integrate Italian combustion community in the international network.

A recognition of the Italian contribution to the research in combustion come from the Combustion Institute awards that have been presented to Italian members:

1986: The Silver Combustion Medal and illuminated certificate, presented by professor C.T. Bowman to Professor Antonio D'Alessio, Dr. Federico Beretta, and Dr. Antonio Cavaliere (Istituto di Ricerche sulla Combustione) "for an outstanding paper presented at the Twentieth International Symposium on Combustion, University of Michigan, 1984" entitled "Ensemble Laser Light Scattering Diagnostics for the Study of Fuel Sprays in Isothermal and Burning Conditions".

2000: The Bernard Lewis Gold Medal "for brilliant research in the field of combustion, particularly on optical diagnoses of soot formation and coagulation" presented by Professor W. A. Sirignano to Professor Antonio D'Alessio of the Università di Napoli "Federico II".

2006: Distinguished Paper Award for the 31^st International Symposium on Combustion "for a paper which is judged to be most distinguished in quality, achievement and significance of the colloquium on Soot, PAH and Other Large Molecules", titled "Characterization of nanoparticles of organic carbon (NOC) produced in rich premixed flames by differential mobility analysis" presented to L.A. Sgro, A. de Filippo, G. Lanzuolo and A. D'Alessio, of the Università di Napoli "Federico II", .

The late sixties, early seventies represented the time when significant effort to generate combustion research up to recognized international quality standards was triggered in Italy. A number of events contributed to this. In 1968 prof. Leopoldo Massimilla founded the Laboratory for Combustion Research of C.N.R. in Naples, to become later Institute for Combustion Research, which has gained international reputation over the years for the quality and the variety of contributions given to combustion science. Since then, a number of individuals and research centers disseminated throughout Italy have steadily contributed to preserve and increase the visibility and the reputation of the Italian Section. Among the others have to be mentioned the groups at Politecnico di Milano, Universities of Pisa, Torino and Rome, research institutes of CNR in Milano and Napoli and The research Division of ENEL in Pisa.

The growth of the Italian Section culminated with the decision taken by The Combustion Institute in 1992, thanks to the efforts made by the Italian Chairman Antonio Cavaliere, to select Italy, and Naples in particular, as the host of the XXVI Combustion Symposium to be held in 1996. About 1600 people gathered in Naples for this event, which turned out to be one of the most successful ever since.

The liveliness of the Italian Section in the International Combustion Community is also witnessed by the active involvement of several Italians in the Executive panel of The Combustion Institute. A. D'Alessio and A. Cavaliere served as members of the Board of Directors of The Combustion Institute and A. Cavaliere is currently member of the Executive Committee as Vice president for Sectional Affairs. Along the years many other Italian researchers were involved in the organization of Combustion Symposia either as members of Awards Committees (Leopoldo Massimilla, Antonio D'Alessio, Piero Salatino, Antonio Cavaliere, Anna Ciajolo) or as Co-chairs of the Technical Program Committee (Leopoldo Massimilla, Antonio Cavaliere, Colomba Di Blasi, Anna Ciajolo, Piero Salatino, Andrea D'Anna). In the average, about 30 members of the Italian Section serve as members of the Review Committee for each Combustion Symposium.

The Italian Section of the Combustion Institute organizes meetings and other events on a regular basis with the aim of stimulating dissemination of scientific and technical knowledge on Combustion and to provide an informal forum for discussion among specialists. The first six national events (since 1976 to 1982) were informal meetings. Starting with the 7^th event (in 1984), meetings were organized in a more structured way and summaries of contributed lectures and/or proceedings were distributed to participants and published. Since its birth to date, the Section has organized 31 Annual Combustion Meetings. Many of them have been bilateral or multilateral events jointly organized with other Sections of the Combustion Institute (French, 1987 and 1992; German, 1989; Soviet Union, 1990; Swedish, 1992; Spanish, 1993; Portuguese, 1994; Scandinavian-Nordic, 2003, and Greek, 2004).

Number of papers presented, by italian researchers, at the Italian Combustion Meetings stabilized in the last years between 60 and 80, with some peaks in correspondence of the meetings organized jointly with other organizations.

In addition to national or joint meetings, the Italian Section hosted the XXVI International Symposium in Naples (1996), contributed to the organization of the series of Mediterranean Combustion Symposia and to the 2003 European Combustion Meeting. The section also collaborated in organizing the "10^th International Congress on Combustion by-Products and their Health Effects" in 2007 and several other workshops and events in the Combustion or in closely related areas.

The membership of the Italian Section is steadily around 120 people, rather evenly shared between different geographical areas and between academic research, applied research and industry.

The board of the Italian Section is composed by the president and 6 members, including the secretary and the treasurer. The actual composition of the board is the following: