Dr. Manuel Cardona is a distinguished Salvadoran scientist and a pioneer in the fields of robotics, automation, digital transformation, and disruptive technologies. With extensive experience in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, his expertise encompasses research, development, and innovation in robotic systems, the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence, Computer Vision, Industry 4.0, and the application of advanced technologies in medicine. He is recognized as the first Doctor in Automation and Robotics from El Salvador, marking a significant milestone in the country's scientific and technological development.Dr. Cardona holds a degree in Electrical Engineering (Summa Cum Laude), a Master’s in Automation and Robotics (Highest Honors), and a PhD in Automation and Robotics (Cum Laude) from the Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM), Spain. He also holds a postgraduate degree in Scientific Research and Innovation Management. In 2023, he completed a postdoctoral fellowship in modeling and simulation of sobotic systems for muscle rehabilitation at UPM. He has been awarded four prestigious scholarships from Fundación Carolina, solidifying his academic and scientific career. Dr. Cardona serves as the Research Director at Universidad Don Bosco in El Salvador. He is also the co-founder and CEO of STEAM Robotics Academy, an academy focused on robotics, artificial intelligence, and disruptive technologies, and the CEO and founder of SARA Robotics, a company that integrates disruptive technologies and develops smart automation solutions for industry. As a consultant, he advises national and international universities and companies on research, innovation, automation, and digital transformation.With over 95 published scientific articles and more than 350 lectures delivered in countries such as Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Spain, Vietnam, India, and Japan, Dr. Cardona is a leading figure in his field. He has edited five books with Springer, one with Taylor & Francis, and one with Elsevier . He also serves as a reviewer for around 15 prestigious international journals included in Journal Citation Reports (JCR) on Web of Science. With more than 80 articles indexed in Scopus, he is the Salvadoran researcher with the highest presence on this platform and has been awarded numerous international congress prizes for his scientific contributions. His main research areas include rehabilitation robotics, kinematics and dynamics of serial and parallel robots, IoT, smart cities, computer vision, artificial intelligence, Industry 4.0, and disruptive technologies. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE and a professional member of the IEEE Honor Society Eta Kappa Nu (IEEE-HKN).Fernando E. Serrano is working and collaborating as an associated researcher with the Institute of Energy Research (Instituto de Investigación en Energía) at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras (UNAH). He received his BEng from the Central American Technical University (UNITEC), Tegucigalpa, Honduras, in 2003 and his M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Florida International University, Miami, in 2007. Currently he is a PhD student in automatic control at the Universidad Politécnica de Cataluña in Barcelona, Spain. He is the author of a number of journal articles, conference papers, and book chapters and a collaborating researcher with professors from Egypt, Spain, Honduras, El Salvador, and Mexico. His research areas are control of complex systems and adaptive control.
