Piezo-Active Composites, Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 2014 Orientation Effects and Anisotropy Factors Springer Series in Materials Science Series, Vol. 185

Vitaly Yuryevich Topolov was born in Rostov-on-Don, Russia (former USSR) on November 8th, 1961. He received the qualification “Physicist. Educator” (honours degree) in 1984 along with the degrees “Candidate of Sciences (Physics and Mathematics)” and “Doctor of Sciences (Physics and Mathematics)” in 1987 and 2000, respectively, all from the Rostov State University, Russia. He received the Professor Certificate from the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia in 2011. He has been Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Natural Science (Moscow, Russia, 2010). 
From 1987 to 1991, Dr. V. Yu. Topolov worked as a Research Scientist of the Institute of Physics at the Rostov State University. From 1991 to 2000, he worked as a Senior Lecturer (1991–1992) and an Associate Professor (1992–2000) of the Department of Physics at the Rostov State University. Since 2000, he has been Professor of the same Department. Since December 2006, after reforming the Rostov State University, he is a Professor of the Department of Physics at the Southern Federal University (Rostov-on-Don, Russia), and since February 2011, after reforming the departments, he is a Professor of the Department of Physics and High Technologies at the Southern Federal University.   
Dr. V. Yu. Topolov was also a visiting scientist at the Moscow State University, Russia (former USSR, 1989), University of Saarland, Germany (1994–1995), Aachen University of Technology – RWTH Aachen, Germany (1998), Karlsruhe Research Center, Germany (2002 and 2003–2004), University of Bath, UK (2006 and 2007), and University of Roma “Tor Vergata”, Italy (2008). His research interests include heterogeneous ferroelectrics, smart materials, domain and heterophase structures, as well as electromechanical effects in ferroelectrics and related materials. He earned the special award from the International Science Foundation (1993) and the Soros Associate Professor title and awardsfrom the International Soros Science-Ed