Biography of Johannes Frantti
Johannes is a founder and member of the Board of Directors of FRE and Reciprocal Engineering – RE Ltd. He holds an M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering and a Dr.Tech. (with honors) in Materials Physics from the University of Oulu. His early career included research positions at the University of Oulu, the Tokyo Institute of Technology, and the Naval Research Institute in Finland (military service). He later received an Academy Research Fellowship and worked at the Helsinki University of Technology.
In 2005 he was ranked first for the Technical Physics Professorship at the University of Oulu by Professor Mike Glazer (University of Oxford). In 2010 he was one of three finalists for the Professorship in the International Energy Science Program at Kyoto University.
He has more than twenty‑five years of experience in materials physics, spanning both experimental and theoretical studies of functional materials including ferroelectric, magnetic, photocatalytic, and gas‑sensor oxides. He is a Docent at the University of Oulu, and his teaching experience includes courses and invited lectures at universities and research institutes worldwide.
His interest in neutron diffraction began during graduate studies while modeling Raman scattering data from ferroelectric perovskites. While in Japan, he initiated collaborations with Professor Sten Eriksson, leading to his first neutron diffraction experiments at the Studsvik Neutron Research Laboratory in Sweden. Neutron diffraction has since played a central role in his work on magnetic materials.
Johannes has collaborated with major research centers including Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, Brookhaven, and Argonne National Laboratories; the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory; the Paul Scherrer Institut; and international universities such as the University of Oxford, Simon Fraser University, Chalmers University of Technology, and King Abdulaziz University. He also participates in activities related to the European Spallation Source. In 2013 he transitioned into Deep Tech to develop materials and processing technologies for the semiconductor industry.
He is enthusiastic about applying new materials to industrial applications and prefers hands‑on involvement in synthesis, analysis, modeling, code development, and facility design. His experimental work includes neutron and synchrotron X‑ray scattering, Raman spectroscopy, electron microscopy, electrical and magnetic characterization, and thin‑film deposition. Early in his career, he built and tested a pulsed‑laser ablation deposition chamber. He has also studied materials under extreme conditions, such as high‑pressure neutron powder diffraction. Raman scattering has been a long‑standing focus, highlighted by seven years at the Tokyo Institute of Technology working on Raman and resonant Raman spectroscopy.
To analyze experimental data, he uses a wide range of theoretical and computational methods, including codes developed by him and his collaborators for parallel computing platforms. His work incorporates density functional theory, Rietveld refinement, and various quantum‑mechanical models. He has written software for computing X‑ray scattering from thin films and nanoparticles—initially on supercomputers and later on desktop systems as their performance increased. He has also developed a fully working finite‑difference time‑domain (FDTD) simulation code capable of modeling complex mixed circuits, including optical structures, waveguides, and traditional thin‑film electronic devices. These results have been published in numerous scientific articles, and key features have been patented.
His current interests include new insulating room‑temperature ferromagnetic materials for all‑spin logic, memory, microwave and RF devices, and computational electromagnetics. This includes ongoing development of advanced modeling tools such as his in‑house FDTD code for hybrid optical–electronic circuit simulations. Additional patented work includes multistate memory and high‑temperature superconductors. In collaboration with the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, he developed a resettable photoresist and etch‑free direct‑writing patterning technology.
Johannes has authored or co‑authored approximately 100 scientific publications with over 2000 citations, including journal articles, book chapters, and conference papers, and he holds issued and pending patents. He serves as a reviewer for several leading journals in materials physics and chemistry. While he values publications as documentation, he believes that new discoveries—materials, methods, and technologies—should always remain the primary focus.
He is a native Finnish speaker and also speaks Japanese.