Nine leading Greek expatriates are on the list of distinguished personalities to be honored this year by Hellenic Republic President Karolos Papoulias.

They are former US House Representative Michael Bilirakis from Florida, world famous singer Nana Mouskouri, director and publisher of the New York-based Greek-American newspaper “The National Herald” Antonios Diamantaris, vice-president of the Archdiocese Council of America Michael Jaharis, Western Policy Centre founder Angelo Tsakopoulos, Greek-American businessmen Alex Spanos and George Bechrakis, the director of the University of Chile Byzantine and Greek Studies Centre, professor Castillo Didier and Boston MIT University thermodynamics professor and entrepreneur George Hatsopoulos.  
     
Dr. Hatsopoulos was also recently interviewed by the New York-based Greek-American daily “The National Herald”, in which he outlined his latest breakthrough that is expected to bring radical changes to cardiology and heart surgery, the invention of a new and improved artificial heart that will last over 20 years and is replaceable.

Hatsopoulos' colleagues in the field of Thermodynamics and electronic inventions call him modern Einstein because his inventions have a decisive effect on science and humanity.
The artificial heart pump developed by one of the subsidiaries in his company Pharos - one of his most innovative inventions - is a replica of the human heart and has already been used successfully on patients particularly, as temporary replacement in heart patients awaiting transplant.  

 Hatsopoulos stated that if he was to begin his career now he would study biology because he is interested in technological inventions only if they help the people, which was the reason that led him to make the artificial heart. 
His training began in Greece at the Athens Polytechnic and continued at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he received his bachelor’s (1949), master’s (1950), engineer’s (1954), and doctorate (1956) degrees all in mecha-nical engineering.

In 1965, he and Joseph Keenan published their famous text-book Principles of General Thermodynamics, which restates the second law of thermodynamics in terms of the existence of stable equilibrium states.

In 1965, Hatsopoulos was president and founder of the Thermo Electron Engineering Corporation and Senior Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering at M.I.T., while in 1996 he won the John Fritz Medal, the highest American award in the engi-neering profession.

Source: Athens News Agency

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