Max Jair Ortiz Catalan

Associate Professor, Electrical Engineering

+46317725149 Find me http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6084-3865

Dr. Max Ortiz Catalán is an Associate Professor and Head of the Bionics Research Unit at the Department of Electrical Engineering. He is also the founding Director of the Center for Bionics and Pain Research (@CBPR.se), a multidisciplinary collaboration between Chalmers, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, and the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg, all in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Dr. Ortiz Catalan's research focuses on bionics and pain due to sensorimotor impairment. This involves neural engineering, osseointegrated implants, neuromuscular interfaces, neurostimulation, bio-electric signals acquisition and processing, and machine learning for the decoding of motor volition. He is also interested in neuromuscular rehabilitation and the study and treatment of neuropathic pain due to sensorimotor impairment.

Dr. Ortiz Catalan is leading the development and clinical implementation of the novel concept of Neuromusculoskeletal Prostheses. This technology made possible, for the first time, the direct connection of a robotic prosthesis to the patients' nerves, muscles, and skeleton. He has also developed novel treatments for phantom limb pain, and a theoretical framework describing the condition and its potential origin. These projects have in common the use of bioelectric pattern recognition (BioPatRec) for the decoding of motor volition. Dr. Ortiz Catalan has made the algorithms necessary for such tasks available in an open-source platform for research and development called BioPatRec.

Dr. Ortiz Catalan is the founder and Director of the Center for Bionics and Pain Research, and previously the  Biomechatronics and Neurorehabilitation Laboratory (2016-2020). He is an Associate Editor for the Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation (JNER), for the IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics (T-MRB), and for Frontiers in Neuroscience (RT). 

Dr. Ortiz Catalan was the recipient of the "Chalmers Foundation Award" in 2020, the "Henry Wallman Prize" in 2019, the "Swedish Embedded Award" in 2018, the "Dr. Per Uddén Stipendiet" in 2018, "Brian & Joyce Blatchford Award" in 2017,  the "Delsys Prize" in 2016, the "European Youth Award" in 2014, and the "You Can Make a Difference Award" in 2006.


 

 
 
Talk at TEDx Göteborg about osseointegrated prostheses with neural control (Nov. 2014). A more recent lecture on prosthetics can be seen online as a keynote at the ISPO World Congress (Oct. 2019).

 

Publications: ResearchGate or Google Scholar
Reviewer record: Publons

Invited speaker - Keynotes (10)
05/2018    European Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine, Vilnius, Lithuania.
10/2017    Congress of the French Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine, Nancy, France.
05/2017    Osseo 2017, Nijmegen, Netherlands.
04/2017    Annual Conference of the Swedish Technical Audiology Society, Gothenburg, Sweden.
03/2017    Int. Conf. Advances in Orthopaedic Osseointegration, San Diego, USA.
11/2016    Orto Medical Care, Madrid, Spain.
06/2016    User Body Experience and HMI Assistive Robotics, Darmstadt, Germany. 
05/2016    OT World, Leipzig, Germany.
​06/2015    Conference of the International Graphonomics Society, Guadeloupe, France.

Invited speaker - Conferences (30+)​
07/2020    Online Workshop on Upper-limb Prosthetics, Newcastle University, England.
03/2020    ISPO Sweden, Stockholm, Sweden.
10/2019    World Congress of Neurology (XXIV), Dubai, United Aram Emirates.
08/2019    27th Scandinavian Hand Society Congress, Tallin, Estonia.
06/2019    10th Congress of World Society for Reconstructive Microsurgery, Bologna, Italy.
03/2019    Leva & Fungera (Nordic conf. for Assistive Technology and Accessibility), Gothenburg, Sweden.
11/2018    Association for Quality Assurance in Arm Prosthetics – Dialogue 2018, Dusseldorf, Germany.
10/2018    Workshop 1010: The Maths of Biology, Mittag-Leffler Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
10/2018    iMed Conference, Lisbon, Portugal.
06/2018    Young Scientist Association 14th Symposium, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria.
06/2018    IV Jornadas de Ortoprotesia, Escola Superior de Tecnologia da Saúde de Lisboa, Portugal.
04/2018    Elektronikindustriföreningen i Göteborg (EIG), Gothenburg, Sweden.
01/2018    ISPO UK Osseointegration Workshop, London, England.
11/2017    ARMADA Talsk 2017, Stockholm, Sweden.
10/2017    Svenskt Smärtforum (Swedish Pain Forum), Gothenburg, Sweden.
07/2017    Rehabilitation Medicine Society of Australia and New Zealand, Canberra, Australia.
03/2017    Handdagar (Swedish Society for Hand Rehabilitation), Malmö, Sweden.
02/2017    Nordiskt Tvärfackligt Forum för Dysmeli och Armamputation, Stockholm, Sweden.
05/2016    Restoration of Sensory and Motor Function Symposium, Göttingen, Germany. 
02/2016    TEDx Mexico City, Mexico City, Mexico.
01/2016    Kshitij, IIT Kharagpur, India.
12/2015    Go:LIFE, Gothenburg, Sweden.
10/2015    Epicenter Stockholm, Stockholm, Sweden.
10/2015    The Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, Stockholm, Sweden.
03/2015    Int. Conf. Advances in Orthopaedic Osseointegration (6th), Las Vegas, USA 
11/2014    TEDx Göteborg, Gothenburg, Sweden.
10/2014    Trans. Eng. in Neurorehabilitation (DEMOVE Symposium), Göttingen, Germany. 
09/2015     Life Science – National Day, Sep 30, 2014, Stockholm, Sweden.
08/2014     Annual IEEE EMBC 2014, Chicago, USA.
06/2014     Neural Interface Conference, Dallas, USA.
05/2014     MedTech West Conference, Gothenburg, Sweden.
04/2014     Myo-Seminar by Ottobock, Gothenburg, Sweden.
02/2014     DARPA Sensorimotor Prosthetic Workshop, Phoenix, USA.
06/2013     International TMR Symposium, Vienna, Austria.
09/2010     Young Scientists Forum 2010 “From Laboratory to Clinics”, Gothenburg, Sweden.
09/2010     Int. Conf. Advances in Orthopaedic Osseointegration (3rd), Gothenburg, Sweden.

Invited Lectures (30+)
06/2020   Guest lecture, University of Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy.
06/2019   Guest lecture, University of Michigan, Michigan, USA.
06/2019   Guest lecture, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark.
03/2019   Guest lecture, Lund University, Lund, Sweden.
02/2019   Guest lecture, Uni. of North Carolina & North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, USA.
08/2018   Guest lecture, Shirley Ryan AbilityLab (formerly RIC), Chicago, USA.
03/2018   Guest lecture, Rigshospitalet – University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
02/2018   Guest lecture, Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany.
02/2018   Guest lecture, Ibaraki Prefectural University of Health Sciences, Ibaraki, Japan.
01/2018    Guest lecture, Kepler University Hospital, Linz, Austria.
09/2017    Guest lecture, University of Monash, Melbourne, Australia.
09/2017    Guest lecture, The Alfred Hospital, Melbourne, Australia.
04/2017    Guest lecture, Hospital del Trabajador, Santiago, Chile.
03/2017    Guest lecture, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
03/2017    Biomed series, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, Canada.
11/2016    Guest lecture, Lund University, Lund, Sweden.
11/2016    Guest lecture, Univ. of Applied Sciences for Health Professions Upper Austria, Wels, Austria.
09/2016    MedTech West Seminar, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, Gothenburg, Sweden.
07/2016    Guest lecture, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
05/2016    Guest lecture, University Medical Center Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany.
12/2015    Guest lecture, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands.
12/2015    Guest lecture, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden.
11/2015    Guest lecture, University Hospital Ghent, Ghent, Belgium.
11/2015    Guest lecture, Örebro University Hospital, Örebro, Sweden.
06/2015    Guest lecture, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.
04/2015    Guest lecture, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburg, USA.
03/2015    Guest lecture, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA.
11/2014    Guest lecture, University Rehabilitation Institute, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
04/2014    Colloquium, Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany.
03/2014    Café-å-lär, Applied Physics Dept., Chalmers University of Technology (CTH), Sweden.
07/2013    Workshop on Advances in Hybrid Organs (2nd), Osaka University, Osaka, Japan.
05/2013    Medical Physics (MSc course), Applied Physics Department, CTH, Sweden.
04/2013    MedTech West Seminar, CTH, Gothenburg University (GU), U. Borås, and VGR, Sweden.
04/2013    Lunch Bunch (PhD seminar), Applied Physics Dept., CTH, Sweden.
03/2013    Guest lecture, LIRMM, U. Montpellier and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France.
03/2013    Biomaterials and Regenerative Medicine (PhD course), Biomaterials Dept., GU, Sweden.
10/2012    Graduate School (PhD seminar), Applied Mechanics Dept., CTH, Sweden.
12/2015    Medicine for Engineers (MSc course), Signals and Systems Dept., CTH, Sweden.
’12 –’16      Biomedical Instrumentation (MSc course), Signals and Systems Dept., CTH, Sweden.
’11 –‘13      Biomedicine for Business Creation and Entrepreneurs (MSc course), Gothenburg
                   International Bioscience Business School, GU, Sweden.
02/2011    Biomedical Electromagnetics (PhD seminar), Signals and Systems Dept., CTH, Sweden.


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