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Committee and Staff Biographical Sketches
COMMITTEE
Joan F. Brennecke (NAE), Chair, is a professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering of the University of Texas at Austin. Earlier, she was the Keating-Crawford Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Notre Dame and was the founding director of the Center for Sustainable Energy at Notre Dame. She joined Notre Dame after receiving her PhD and MS (1989 and 1987, respectively) at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and her BS at the University of Texas at Austin (1984). Her research interests are primarily in the development of less environmentally harmful solvents, including supercritical fluids and ionic liquids. In developing those solvents, Dr. Brennecke’s primary interests are in the measurement and modeling of thermodynamics, thermophysical properties, phase behavior, and separations. Major awards include the 2001 Ipatieff Prize from the American Chemical Society (ACS), the 2006 Professional Progress Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the J. M. Prausnitz Award at the Eleventh International Conference on Properties and Phase Equilibria in Greece in May 2007, the 2008 Stieglitz Award from ACS, the 2009 E. O. Lawrence Award from the U.S. Department of Energy, and the 2014 E. V. Murphree Award in Industrial and Engineering Chemistry from ACS. Dr. Brennecke serves as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Chemical & Engineering Data. Her 170-plus research publications have garnered over 18,000 citations. She was inducted into the National Academy of Engineering in 2012.
Jared L. Anderson is a professor of chemistry at Iowa State University, where he joined the chemistry faculty in August 2015. He earned his BS from South Dakota State University in 2000 and his PhD from Iowa State University in 2005. He joined the chemistry faculty of the University of Toledo, where he rose through the ranks as an assistant professor (2005–2009), associate professor (2009–2011), and full professor (2011–2015). His research focuses on the development of stationary phases for multidimensional gas chromatography; alternative approaches in sample preparation, particularly in nucleic acid isolation and purification; and developing analytical tools for trace-level analysis in active pharmaceutical ingredients. Dr. Anderson received the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the Emerging Leader in Chromatography Award given by LCGC magazine, and the American Chemical Society Young Investigator in Separation Science Award. In 2014, he was included in the “Top 40 under 40 Power List” by The Analytical Scientist magazine. In 2016, he received the Pittsburgh Conference Achievement Award. He has published over 170 peer-reviewed publications and five book chapters and has co-edited a book series published by Wiley, Analytical Separation Science. He holds five patents and serves on the editorial advisory boards of Analytica Chimica Acta, Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, Journal of Liquid Chromatography and Related Technologies, and LCGC. He serves as editor of the Journal of Chromatography A.
Georges Belfort (NAE) is Institute Professor and member of the Howard P. Isermann Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and the Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Earlier, he was on the faculty of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. His research and teaching interests are primarily in the field of separations, particularly in liquid membrane filtration science and technology. His major contributions include fluid mechanics across, transport through, and surface modification of polymeric membranes. Dr. Belfort has also proposed and published a new mechanism of Alzheimer disease, has developed surfaces that maximize stem-cell expansion and that enable retinal pigment epithelium cells to grow on cobblestone surfaces, and, with Dr. Marlene Belfort, has offered a new approach to treatment for tuberculosis. His major awards include the 1995 American Chemical Society (ACS) Award in Separa-
tions Science and Technology, the 2000 American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Separations Division’s Clarence G. Gerhold Award in Separations Science and Technology, the 2008 ACS E. V. Murphree Award in Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, the 2011 ACS Division of Biochemical Technology’s Alan S. Michaels Award in the Recovery of Biological Products, the 2014 North American Membrane Society (NAMS) Alan S. Michaels Award for Innovation in Membrane Science and Technology, and the 2017 AIChE Food, Pharmaceutical, and Bioengineering Division’s Distinguished Service Award in Chemical Engineering. He was also honored with a research and best teacher award from RPI. Dr. Belfort is a member of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers; is a co-founder, ex-president, and member of NAMS since 2005; was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2003; is a foreign member of the Bologna Academy of Science, Italy, since 2012; is a fellow of AIChE since 2013; and is chair of the board of the Society for Biological Engineering since 2015. His 242 peer-reviewed archival research publications have garnered 15,321 citations. He completed his BS (1963) in chemical engineering at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and his MS and PhD degrees (1969 and 1972, respectively) in engineering at the University of California, Irvine.
Aurora Clark is the director of the Center for Institutional Research Computing and a professor of chemistry at Washington State University. She received a BS in chemistry from Central Washington University in 1999 and her PhD in physical chemistry from Indiana University in 2003. Dr. Clark studied the electronic structure of chemical systems that contain highly correlated f-block elements as a postdoctoral researcher at Los Alamos National Laboratory. She joined the chemistry department of Washington State University in 2005 as an assistant professor, receiving tenure in 2011 and promotion to full professor in 2016. Her research uses both quantum and statistical mechanics to study chemical processes in extreme and complex chemical environments with an emphasis on solution chemistry and liquid interfaces. She has pioneered new theoretical approaches for data fusion and analysis in molecular simulations in high-performance computing environments. Those interests are reflected in her role as deputy director of a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Energy Frontier Research Centers, on Interfacial Dynamics in Radioactive Environments and Materials. Dr. Clark has received several awards for scientific achievement and leadership, including the American Chemical Society (ACS) Dreyfus Lectureship, and in 2017 was elected a fellow of ACS. She is a member of the editorial advisory board of the Journal of Chemical Physics and a member of the DOE Council on Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences.
Brian Kolthammer is a retired industrial scientist with over 35 years of experience with Dow Chemical Company. Most of his career was spent in the development of new technologies and their implementation in commercial practice and in the resolution of issues encountered with application of laboratory discoveries to complex industrial processes. Those endeavors involved a variety of experimental approaches, from practical piloting and analytical determinations to modeling and simulation, to identify and lessen risks posed by the influence of byproduct and secondary chemistry in the presence of multicomponent process streams. The research resulted in the commercialization of more than a dozen new processes and products and gained a number of IR100 Awards for the company and recognition of Dr. Kolthammer as one of the American Chemical Society’s Heroes of Chemistry in 2015. Dr. Kolthammer earned his BS and PhD from the University of British Columbia and spent 2 years as a NATO science fellow at Texas A&M University before joining the chemical industry.
Bruce Moyer is a corporate fellow of Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), specializing in fundamental and applied aspects of separation science and technology, especially the chemistry of solvent extraction and ion exchange, over a 38-year career. His graduate work dealt with fundamental mechanisms of redox catalysis. In 1979, he joined the staff of ORNL and has worked on a variety of problems in separation chemistry, always with an eye toward incorporating principles of molecular recognition. In addition to his duties as group leader for chemical separations in the ORNL Chemical Sciences Division, Dr. Moyer leads three programs for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE): Principles of Chemical Recognition and Transport in Extractive Separations (Office of Science), the Sigma Team for Advanced Actinide Recycle (Office of Nuclear Energy), and the Diversifying Supply Focus Area of the Critical Materials Institute, a DOE Energy Innovation Hub (Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy). He has also provided leadership for the chemical development of the Caustic Side Solvent Extraction (CSSX) process for cesium removal from millions of gallons of legacy nuclear waste at the Savannah River Site, which won the Secretary of Energy’s Award in 2013. Dr. Moyer serves as co-editor of the journal Solvent Extraction and Ion Exchange and the book series Ion Exchange and Solvent Extraction. His most successful technology application is the development of the CSSX process, which has been operating in the Modular CSSX Unit at the Savannah River Site, processing over 6 million gallons of high-level waste. He has published over 200 refereed open-literature articles, book chapters, proceedings papers, and reports. His 12 patents range from solvent extraction of cesium for nuclear-waste cleanup to supported liquid-membrane systems and novel anion-exchange resins. In 2008, Dr. Moyer served as the technical chair of the 2008 International Solvent Extrac-
tion Conference (ISEC ’08) and editor-in-chief of its proceedings; in 2011, he served as a member of the advisory committee, program chair for nuclear separations, and co-editor of the Proceedings of ISEC 2011. He received his BS degree summa cum laude with chemistry honors from Duke University in 1974 and his PhD in inorganic chemistry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1979.
Susan Olesik has been a faculty member at Ohio State University (OSU) since 1986, being promoted to associate professor in 1992 and professor in 1997. She is currently the Dow Professor and chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. She continues as the director of the Ohio House of Science and Engineering, a K–16 science outreach center. Her awards include the 2014 American Chemical Society (ACS) Helen M. Free Award for Public Outreach, the 2014 ACS Award in Chromatography, a 2012 American Association for the Advancement of Science fellowship, the 2010 OSU Building Bridges Excellence Award, a 2009 ACS fellowship, the 2008 ACS National Award for Encouraging Disadvantaged Students into Careers in the Chemical Sciences, the 2008 Stanley C. Israel Regional Award for Advancing Diversity in the Chemical Sciences, the 2006 OSU Alumni Association Heinlen Award, the 2005 Columbus Technical Council Technical Person of the Year award, the 2004 ACS Columbus Section Award for Outstanding Achievement and Promotion of Chemical Sciences, the 2000 AWISCO Woman in Science Award, and a commendation from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for contributing a gas-chromatography column to the Cassini-Huygen’s probe. She received her AS degree from Vincennes University in 1975, a BA from DePauw University in 1977, and a PhD in 1982 from the University of Wisconsin–Madison under the auspices of James W. Taylor in the field of analytical mass spectrometry. She was also a postdoctoral fellow for Milos Novotny at Indiana University from 1982 to 1984 and for Tomas Baer at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1984 to 1986.
Kevin M. Rosso joined the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in 1998 and was promoted to PNNL’s highest rank of laboratory fellow in 2010. He is an associate director of the Physical Sciences Division and the lead principal investigator for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Basic Energy Sciences (BES) geosciences program at PNNL. He has held associate editor posts for Geochimica et Cosmochi-mica Acta and American Mineralogist and currently serves on the Editorial Board of ACS Earth and Space Chemistry. He is a life fellow of the Mineralogical Society of America. He is a recipient of the 2016 Hallimond Lectureship; the 2008–2009 Outstanding Recent Alumnus Award from the College of Science, Virginia Tech; a 2009 Outstanding Research Award, BES Geosciences Symposium; the 2004 PNNL Laboratory Director’s Award; and the 2004 Mineralogical Society of America Award. He holds visiting professorships at the University of Manchester and the University of New South Wales and is a SERENADE Invited Professor at the University of Grenoble. He has served as a panelist and writer in several BES Basic Research Needs workshops. Dr. Rosso’s research is centered on molecular interfacial science, a topic that is foundational over a wide array of disciplines, including geochemistry, materials and corrosion science, biology, heterogeneous catalysis, and electrochemistry. His work has clarified the basis of structure–reactivity relationships in a variety of systems of interacting components of inorganic crystalline materials, proteins, solvated metal species, and organic molecules. He applies and integrates various theories, computational molecular simulation, and laboratory and synchrotron experimental techniques. His recent research focuses on unraveling rates and mechanisms of electron transfer across abiotic and biotic interfaces in natural and energy device systems. Dr. Rosso has published more than 260 journal articles and book chapters on various fundamental aspects of oxide-electrolyte interface chemistry, the oxidation of metal sulfide surfaces, crystal growth and dissolution, and biologic electron transfer—a body of work with an H-index of 51 and cited more than 10,000 times. He received his PhD in 1998 in geochemistry from Virginia Tech.
Mark B. Shiflett is a distinguished foundation professor in the School of Engineering of the University of Kansas (KU). He joined KU in 2016 after retiring from the DuPont Company as a technical fellow. He received his PhD and MS in chemical engineering from the University of Delaware in 2001 and 1998, respectively. He received his BS degree in chemical engineering from North Carolina State University in 1989. Dr. Shiflett was an adjunct professor at the University of Delaware in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. He is an inventor on 44 U.S. patents and has published 80 articles on his research. He was awarded the DuPont Bolton Carothers award in 2005, the American Chemical Society (ACS) Hero of Chemistry award in 2006, the University of Delaware presidential citation in 2007, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Institute Award for Industrial Research in 2016 for his development of refrigerant mixtures to replace chlorofluorocarbons, which had been linked to the depletion of Earth’s ozone layer. Dr. Shiflett was elected in 2014 to be a fellow of AIChE, in 2016 to be a division fellow of ACS for his professional accomplishments and contributions to the chemical engineering profession, and in 2018 into the National Academy of Inventors. He is a licensed professional engineer, and his research at KU focuses on environment-friendly, energy-efficient processes and products for the chemical industry.
David Sholl is the John F. Brock III School chair of chemical and biomolecular engineering at Georgia Tech. His research uses computational materials modeling to accelerate
development of new materials for energy-related applications, including generation and storage of gaseous and liquid fuels and carbon dioxide mitigation. Before his appointment at Georgia Tech, Dr. Sholl was on the faculty of Carnegie Mellon University for 10 years. He has published over 300 papers that have received over 13,000 citations. He has also written a textbook on density functional theory, a quantum-chemistry method that is widely applied through the physical sciences and engineering. He is a senior editor of the American Chemical Society journal Langmuir, and he was instrumental in the development of the Rapid Advancement in Process Intensification Deployment (RAPID) Institute, a $70 million, U.S. Department of Energy–funded manufacturing institute focused on process intensification and run by the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. Dr. Sholl received a PhD in applied mathematics from the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Zachary P. Smith joined the Department of Chemical Engineering of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an assistant professor in January 2017. His research focuses on the molecular-level design, synthesis, and characterization of polymers and inorganic materials for applications in membrane and adsorption-based separations. Those efforts are promising for gas-phase separations critical for the energy industry and the environment, such as the purification of olefins and the capture of carbon dioxide from flue stacks at coal-fired power plants. Dr. Smith is a co-author of over 30 peer-reviewed papers and has been recognized with several awards, including the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Early Career Award, the American Chemical Society Doctoral New Investigator Award, and a DOE Office of Science Graduate Fellowship. He was also selected as a U.S. delegate to the Lindau Nobel Laureate meeting on chemistry in 2013. Dr. Smith earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the Pennsylvania State University Schreyer Honors College and his PhD in chemical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. While at the University of Texas, he developed structure–property relationships for gas diffusion and sorption in polymer membranes. His postdoctoral training at the University of California, Berkeley examined the design of metal-organic frameworks for selective adsorption-based separations.
Lynda Soderholm is a senior scientist in the Chemical Sciences and Engineering Division of Argonne National Laboratory and an Argonne Distinguished Fellow. She serves as the Group Separation Science Group leader and the Molecular-Scale Science Theme lead. Dr. Soderholm is involved in a broad research program centered on using advanced instrumentation, computation, theory, and data science to advance fundamental understanding of solute–solvent correlations in solutions and their interrelationship with chemical stability, reactivity, and energetics. Using a variety of in-house and synchrotron-based spectroscopic and scattering techniques, she focuses on understanding hierarchical structuring and dynamics in solutions and their effects on chemical separations. Her awards include the University of Chicago Board of Governor’s Distinguished Performance Award (2009) and election as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2013). She also served as a co-chair of the recently published workshop report Basic Research Needs for Synthesis Science. She received her PhD from McMaster University in Canada.
Michael Tsapatsis (NAE) is Bloomberg Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University. He had been a chemical-engineering professor at the University of Minnesota and held the Amundson Chair and the McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Chemical Engineering and Materials Science. He has published more than 250 papers and has presented more than 150 lectures around the world. He is the inventor or co-inventor on 10 issued patents and 10 patent applications, several of which have been licensed and one commercialized. He also contributed to the development of materials that are in industrial use for natural-gas purification. Dr. Tsapatsis has received several awards, including the Alpha Chi Sigma Award for Chemical Engineering Research, the Breck Award from the International Zeolite Association, the Charles M.A. Stine Award from the Materials Engineering & Sciences Division of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, a David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellowship, a National Science Foundation CAREER Award, and a Camille Dreyfus Teacher–Scholar Award. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Tsapatsis received an engineering diploma (1988) from the University of Patras, Greece, and MS (1991) and PhD (1994) from the California Institute of Technology, working with George Gavalas; he was a postdoctoral fellow (1994) with Mark E. Davis.
Mary J. Wirth is the W. Brooks Fortune Distinguished Professor in the Department of Chemistry of Purdue University. Her research is on new materials for protein separations, which span the fields of bioanalytical chemistry and materials science. Applications include characterization of heterogeneity of protein drugs, particularly monoclonal antibodies, and top-down proteomics, particularly polyubiquitination. Dr. Wirth’s research has been recognized by awards that include the American Chemical Society Analytical Division Award in Spectrochemical Analysis, the Gold Medal of the New York Society for Applied Spectroscopy, the ANACHEM Award, the Eastern Analytical Symposium Award for Outstanding Achievements in the Fields of Analytical Chemistry, and the Dal Nogare Award. She is a fellow of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Wirth received her BS in 1974 from Northern Illinois University and her PhD in 1978 from Purdue University.
STAFF
Ellen K. Mantus, Scholar and Director of Risk Assessment
Dr. Mantus is a scholar and the director of risk assessment of the Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine with more than 20 years of experience in toxicology and risk assessment. She has served as the study director on numerous projects, including ones that have assessed the health implications of various chemical exposures, developed strategies for applying modern scientific approaches in toxicology and risk assessment, provided guidance to federal agencies on risk-based decision-making, and evaluated barriers to the deployment of electric vehicles and the associated charging infrastructure. Before joining the National Academies, Dr. Mantus was a project manager with ICF Consulting where she served as a primary reviewer for numerous toxicological studies and provided risk-assessment and regulatory support on a wide array of projects. Dr. Mantus received a PhD in chemistry from Cornell University.
Camly Tran, Senior Program Officer
Dr. Tran joined the Board on Chemical Sciences and Technology of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in 2014 as a postdoctoral fellow. During her time at the National Academies, she led and supported over 10 consensus studies and workshops at the intersection of chemistry and policy in four main areas: education, workforce, defense, and research. As a senior program officer, she led a study on advancing separations science in the United States, supported the activities of the Chemical Sciences Roundtable, and co-led an Academies-wide transformation effort on workforce. She received her PhD in bioinorganic chemistry from Brown University and her BS in chemistry from Carnegie Mellon University.
Jessica Wolfman, Research Assistant
Ms. Wolfman is a research assistant for the Board on Chemical Sciences and Technology (BCST) of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She joined the National Academies in August 2017 as a senior program assistant working with both BCST and the Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology. Ms. Wolfman graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dickinson College in May 2017 with a BS in earth sciences and a minor in mathematics.
