Luca Cannas

Luca Cannas is a third-year Ph.D. candidate at the Faculty of Engineering Technology of KU Leuven. He obtained his B.Sc. in Chemical Process Technology from University College Leuven-Limburg (UCLL) in 2020, where his thesis focused on the design and characterization of a continuous-stirred thin-film batch evaporator, under supervision of the CIPT research group of KU Leuven (Diepenbeek). After completing his bachelor’s degree, he pursued a bridging program, leading to an M.Sc. in Chemical Engineering Technology, which he earned in 2022. His M.Sc. thesis focused on microinjection molding and material testing of polyolefins on a small scale, in collaboration with the Polymer Processing & Engineering (Diepenbeek) and Soft Matter, Rheology and Technology (SMaRT) (Diepenbeek / Leuven) research groups of KU Leuven. Currently, Luca's Ph.D. research focuses on developing a miniaturized high-throughput experimentation (HTE) method to study multifunctional, phase-separated polyolefin blends with (non-)reactive interfacial agents. His work is in close collaboration with SCG Chemicals and SENFI Research Lab at Oxford University. Additionally, Luca serves as a work package lead in the European Horizon project, INCREACE, which focuses on sorting, screening, and ranking post-consumer recyclate (PCR) waste streams for mechanical recycling. To screen and rank PCRs within INCREACE he applies his HTE method, serving as a real-case valorization study for later stages of his research.