Professor Liang Yun has more than 40 years’ experience at the Marine Design & Research Institute of China, Shanghai (MARIC). He graduated from the Shipbuilding Engineering Faculty of Da-Lian Polytechnic University in 1953 and completed a postgraduate diploma at the Military Engineering Academy of China in 1955. He has been involved in ACV development in China since the first prototypes were constructed in Harbin in the 1950s. He was involved in the design and prototype construction of WIG craft in the 1990s and the development of high-speed catamarans and air cavity vessels through the millennium. He was director of the HPMV division, MARIC, from 1983 to 1987 and Deputy Chief Naval Architect of MARIC from 1980 to 1997. He has been a Guest Professor supporting HPMV postgraduate students at Harbin Engineering University and Wu Han Water Transportation University in the early 1990s. Prof. Yun has been Chairman of HPMV Design subcommittee of the China Society of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, CSNAME, over the last 20 years and vice chairman of the organizing committee of the annual International HPMV Conference, Shanghai, China, since 1996. He continued to play an active role in promoting and developing HPMV technology in China through his association with the industry and Chinese Universities. Professor Yun has partnered with Alan Bliault on five textbooks covering ACV, WIG, and HPMV technology before the current volume on monohull and hydrofoil vessels. Liang Yun died in Shanghai on 26th December 2020.Prof. Zu-shun Dong graduated from Naval Engineering University (NEU), Peoples Liberation Army (PLA), China, in 1959. After graduation, he was appointed as an assistant professor, associate professor, and professor in the NEU, working on the teaching, research, and design of hydrodynamics of High-Performance Marine Vessels (HPMV), such as high-speed monohull craft, hydrofoils, air cushion craft, wing in ground effect craft, hydroplanes, catamarans, and multihulls. He was appointed as a member of the Hydrodynamics Committee of the General Armament Department (GAD), PLA, from 1987 to 2007 and the first specialist on hydrodynamics of the HPMV Committee of GAD, PLA. He was a professor at Harbin Industrial University from 2011-2014 and Qian-Dao Science & Technology University from 2010-2015. He was a technical consultant to the Special Airplane Research Institute from 1995-1996; a member of the Academic Committee on Key Hydrodynamics Laboratory of National Defense Technology from 2001-2009; and a member of the Academic Committee of National Key Laboratory on Multihull in Harbin Engineering University, from 2009-2012. He has also been the editor of China Shipbuilding and deputy chief director of the Yacht Design & Production Academic Committee of the China Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers.Raju Datla is a Research Associate Professor in Naval and Ocean Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology. He manages the experimental marine hydrodynamics research at the Davidson Laboratory. His expertise is in the areas of high-speed craft hydrodynamics and ocean engineering, in which he has so far prepared more than 50 technical articles. He teaches courses to undergraduate and graduate students in naval engineering and ocean engineering at Stevens. He has served as principal advisor to six Ph.D. dissertations and more than 50 master’s and undergraduate theses and design projects so far. He received his Ph.D. in Ocean Engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology. He is a fellow of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers. Dr. Datla has previously participated in editing a compendium of the first 20 years of papers presented to the International HPMV Conference held regularly in Shanghai by CSNAME, which the RINA also supports. During the 2000s, he worked on hydrodynamic planing research together with Daniel Savitsky at the Davidson Laboratory, publishing original papers on the spray boundary in partnership with him.A Naval Architect and Offshore Engineer, Alan Bliault is a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects and graduated from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. His initial career was at Vosper Thornycroft, working with the design and operation of hovercraft and air cushion platforms. Subsequently, he worked in the offshore industry, developing new offshore loading systems. He was responsible for hydrodynamic design for the Conoco Hutton field Tension Leg Platform in the UK and subsequently at Norske Shell for Draugen Platform substructure mechanical outfitting, hydrodynamics, tow-out, and installation in Haltenbanken. In the mid-1990s, he led the development of new API and ISO standards for subsea flexible flowlines and risers based in Holland. Throughout the millennium, he led Shell International’s development of the Floating LNG production system for remote gas fields. Since then, he has held various project management, construction, and R&D roles. He has worked as a senior auditor in Shell’s central Internal Audit group evaluating risk and management controls at major projects and operating companies worldwide from 2013 to 2016. He has maintained a close interest in high-speed marine craft throughout his career, leading to his partnership with Liang Yun on maritime engineering textbooks, including the present volume on High-Speed Monohull Vessels and Hydrofoils. This work has, since the late 1980s, been a continuous research project alongside his “day job”!
