Professor Mohamed Khayett is a world leading expert on membrane science and technology (membrane design and fabrication, membrane processes, emerging technologies), renewable energy applications (solar thermal and photovoltaic energy), nanocomposites, nanofibres and nanofluids among others. He is a co-editor of Journal Desalination. Professor Takeshi Matsuura is a senior academic with a career spanning more than 50 years and has held several distinguished posts in many countries including the USA, Canada, Japan, Germany and Singapore. Most recently he joined the University of Ottawa (1992) as the British Gas/NSERC Industrial Research Chair. He served as professor of the Department of Chemical Engineering and the director of the Industrial Membrane Research Institute (IMRI) until he retired in 2002 and was appointed as professor emeritus in 2003. He received the Research Award of International Desalination and Environmental Association in 1983. He is a fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada and a member of the North American Membrane Society. He has delivered plethora of invited lectures and presentations to many of the world’s foremost scientific events and conferences. He has published over 400 papers in refereed journals, authored and co-authored 6 books and edited 8 books. A special symposium was held at the Eighth Annual Meeting of the North American Membrane Society to honour Prof. Matsuura (together with Dr. S. Sourirajan) for life-long contributions to membrane research and a similarly the International Conference on Membrane Science and Technology 2013 was held in his honour. In addition, he has received the George S. Glinski Award for Excellence in Research and the occasion of his 75th birthday was marked with a special edition of the journal Desalination.