Dr. Ricardo Lima is a Research Scientist in the Extreme Computing Research Center (ECRC) working with Professor Omar Knio at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST).

Education and early career

Ricardo has a Chemical Engineering Diploma (5 years degree) and a PhD in Chemical Engineering in the area of Process Systems Engineering. He obtained his Diploma and PhD at the Faculty of Engineering from the University of Porto (FEUP), Portugal, under the supervision of Professor Romualdo Salcedo and Professor Domingos Barbosa.

After completing his PhD studies, Ricardo became a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), USA, where he worked with Professor Ignacio Grossmann. During his stay at CMU, he collaborated with PPG Industries in several projects. He was an invited researcher in the Glass Process Engineering/Process Control group located in the PPG Glass Business and Discovery Center, where he worked with Dr Yu Jiao.

In 2011, Ricardo was awarded a Marie Curie Fellowship to pursue research on sustainable power systems at the National Laboratory of Energy and Geology in Portugal.

Ricardo joined KAUST in 2014, where he has been involved in problems concerning chemical processes flexibility, optimization of isolated and hybrid energy systems, the motion planning of autonomous underwater vehicles, optimal operation of virtual power plants, optimization under uncertainty, robust optimization, and in a project with the Ministry of Health of Saudi Arabia.

Research interests

My research interests lie at the intersection of optimization, modeling, uncertainty, and computer science. I am interested in the modeling and optimization of complex problems related to energy systems, chemical engineering, and oil industries. Target applications include integration, planning and scheduling of renewable energy systems, process synthesis, planning and scheduling of chemical engineering systems, and path planning of autonomous under-water vehicles. Development of mathematical programming methodologies, namely combinatorial optimization models, continuous optimization models, deterministic global optimization solution approaches, optimization under uncertainty models, and decomposition algorithms to solve large-scale problems.

Education Profile

• PhD, Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering​ University of Porto, Portugal
• Diploma of Chemical Engineering (5 years degree), Faculty of Engineering University of Porto, Portugal

Professional Memberships

• ​Portuguese Association of Engineers
• ​AIChE
• ​INFORMS
• October 2014 - Present: ​​​Research Scientist​, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology.
• December 2011 - October 2014: Marie Curie fellow, National Laboratory of Energy and Geology, Portugal.
• August 2008 - August 2011: Invited researcher, Glass Business and Discovery Center, PPG Industries, USA.
• June 2006 - August 2011: Postdoctoral fellow, Department of Chemical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, USA.

Awards and Distinctions

• Marie Curie Fellowship – DFRH/WIIA/67/2011, Welcome II Programme, co-funded by the Portuguese "Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia" (FCT) and the Marie Curie Action Cofund, under the People Programme of the European Commission’s 7th Research Framework Programme.​
• Post-doc fellowship – SFRH/BPD/26115/2005, funded by the Portuguese "Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia" (FCT). ​
• PhD fellowship - PRAXIS XXI/21481/99, funded by the Portuguese "Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia" (FCT). ​