Prof. Dr. Larisa Rybak currently serves as a professor and head of the Research Center Robotics and Control Systems at the Belgorod State Technological University, named after V.G. Shukhov. She received a specialist degree in engineering from the Kharkov Aviation Institute in 1985. In 1992, she received a Ph.D. degree in the theory of mechanisms and machines from the Moscow Academy of Instrument Engineering. In 1998, she received a Ph.D. Hab. Degree (Doctor of Technical Sciences) in the theory of mechanisms and machines. From 1985 to 1994, she worked at the Moscow State Open University as an assistant professor in the theory of mechanisms and machines. From 1994 to 2002, she worked at the Mechanical Engineering Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences.  Her research interests include the mechanics of machines and robots, intelligent control systems for machines and robots, mathematical simulation, and optimization and computational methods.