Faris Ali is a Professor of Structural Engineering at the Ulster University, the Built Environment Research Institute. He is the Founder and Executive Director of the spin-out company Vifkon Ltd developing smart blast-fire protection systems.  Prof. Ali is the award winner of the best invention in Hi-Tech in Northern Ireland for the year 2012. Additionally, he is the Founder and the Editor-in-Chief of the first ever research journal specializing in structural behavior in fire, "Journal of Structural Fire Engineering". Professor Ali is the holder of three patents related with fire and blast technologies. He has attracted more than £1.9 million of industrial and research grants. He is a visiting professor at Warsaw University of Technology and NITK, India. Professor Ali is a member of the BS committee FSH/22, member of the scientific committee of the SIF and the Protect conferences. Faris is an advisor for the United Nations, the Swiss Science Foundation, the European Research Council, the Science Foundation of the Czech Republic. He has more than 100 research outputs and is also a member of scientific and steering committees of many international conferences and a reviewer for a significant number of research journals.