13 Oct 2022

The Linnaeus Academy's Research Foundation names Professor Stavros Avrimidis as the recipient of Ternryd’s award 2022

This year’s recipient of Carola and Carl-Olof Ternryd’s award is Professor Stavros Avramidis at the University of British Columbia (UBC). The prize, which is of SEK 1 million in total, will be presented on 20 October, at Linnaeus University’s Växjö campus, with the award winner attending.

Carola and Carl-Olof Ternryd’s award is given to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to forestry – especially in terms of wood processing – and to education, research, and development at Linnaeus University.

The recipient of Ternryd’s award 2022, Professor Stavros Avramidis – who is a researcher on the physical properties of wood, with a special interest in wood drying – works at the Department of Wood Science, Faculty of Forestry, at the University of British Columbia in Canada (UBC).

Professor Stavros Avramidis works at the Department of Wood Science, Faculty of Forestry, at the University of British Columbia in Canada.

The award money is evenly split between the award winner and Linnaeus University, where the SEK 500 000 going to the university is earmarked for research collaboration with the award winner.

“We are happy to once again be able to give out Ternryd’s award for the benefit of Linnaeus University and its research in the field of forestry”, says Fredrik Åberg, chair of the Linnaeus Academy's Research Foundation.

As in previous years, the fact that the award ties highly qualified researchers more closely to Linnaeus University and Småland – just as the Ternryds expressly wished – lends it extra weight.

The Linnaeus Academy’s Research Foundation’s citation for the award

In wood physics, he has been instrumental in the modelling of wood-water relationships under static and dynamic isothermal and nonisothermal conditions.

His work has resulted in interesting discoveries in the area of cell-wall nanopore configuration and distribution in correlation with molecular modelling of water sorption at those levels. In the area of wood drying, Prof. Avramidis has been the leading researcher for the last twenty-five years in developing and commercializing radio frequency vacuum (RFV) drying as a high tech alternative drying to kilns for timbers and high quality wood.

Research involved the whole spectrum of basic, modelling and applied work at lab, pilot and commercial scales. RFV has also been tested as an alternative to pure thermal phytosanitation of green wood with excellent results.

He is currently developing a decision support system (hardware and software) to improve drying of wood based on pre-sorting strategies relying on wood fibre attributes. T

he research encompasses proof of concept and the development of a system that requires swift sawmill evaluation systems based on near-infrared spectroscopy. Prof. Avramidis has published more than 200 papers.

Given Prof. Avramidis distinguished scientific record, his diverse research portfolio and his international experience, a fruitful and long term collaboration, relevant for several research groups at Linnaeus University, is foreseen.

Ternryd’s award has been given out by the Linnaeus Academy’s Research Foundation every other year since 2016. The award consists of two parts, with half of the prize money going to the researcher, and the other half going to Linnaeus University, to be used to develop long-term research and education collaboration with the researcher.

Since the 2020 awards ceremony was moved online due to the pandemic, that year’s recipient of Ternryd’s award, Professor Heli Peltola, will also join the ceremony in Växjö, to be properly celebrated along with Professor Avrimidis.

The award ceremony will be held in room Weber, in the K building at the Växjö campus, on 20 October, at 1 p.m.