Professor Christopher W. Jones, the John F. Brock III School Chair of Georgia Tech’s School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (ChBE), is winner of the American Chemical Society’s 2025 E. V. Murphree Award in Industrial and Engineering Chemistry.

Jones will receive the award at the American Chemical Society (ACS) meeting in San Diego, in March 2025. The ACS National Awards encourage the advancement of chemistry in all its branches, support research endeavors, and promote the careers of chemists.

The Murphree Award (including $5,000) won by Jones recognizes fundamental research in industrial and engineering chemistry, the development of chemical engineering principles, and its application to industrial processes.

Srinivas Garimella, Hightower Chair in Engineering and professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, has been awarded the 2024 American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Heat Transfer Memorial Award.

The Heat Transfer Memorial Award, established in 1959 by the Heat Transfer Division and elevated to a Society award in 1974, is bestowed on individuals who have made outstanding contributions in the field of heat transfer through teaching, research, practice, design, service, leadership, and inventions.

"It is very gratifying to receive this recognition from the premier heat transfer research community," said Garimella.

Garimella joined Georgia Tech in 2003 as an associate professor and director of the Sustainable Thermal Systems Laboratory. His research includes sustainable energy systems, such as absorption and vapor compression heat pumps, waste heat recovery and upgrade, electrochemical and thermochemical energy storage, power plant cooling, advanced nuclear reactor thermalhydraulics, and water conservation and purification.

Read Full Story on ME Webpage

Matthew McDowell, Carter N. Paden, Jr. Distinguished Chair and associate professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, has been selected to participate in Georgia Tech’s Emerging Leaders Program. He is among 16 faculty members who will join the program’s ninth cohort.

“On behalf of Institute leadership, we are proud to welcome the next cohort of the Emerging Leaders Program,” said Steven W. McLaughlin, provost and executive vice president for Academic Affairs. “Opening the program to a broader pool of individuals, including our talented research faculty, has been an important programmatic expansion as we seek to foster the leadership aspirations of faculty of all paths. This intensive program is an excellent professional investment, and we applaud the new cohort’s commitment to their careers and to the Institute.”  

Starting in Fall 2024 and continuing through Spring 2025, McDowell and other participants will take part in leadership development activities that include a kick-off retreat, regular workshops, small group work, and leadership coaching.

Read Full Story on the Woodruff School Webpage

Professor Krista Walton was selected as the recipient of the 2024 Institute Award for Excellence in Industrial Gases Technology from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).

Walton, Georgia Tech’s associate vice president for Research Operations and Infrastructure and the Robert "Bud" Moeller Faculty Fellow in Georgia Tech’s School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (ChBE), will receive the award at the AIChE meeting in San Diego, California, this October. 

Walton focuses her research on the synthesis, characterization, and scale-up of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and other porous materials for adsorption-based gas separations.

Starting more than a decade ago, Walton became one of the few researchers in the world to focus on understanding the chemical stability of MOFs and has gained an international reputation for her work by helping shape the landscape of MOF applications in separations. She has published more than 135 peer-reviewed articles, including a seminal review on the water stability of MOFs in 2014.

Read Full Story on ChBE Newspage

Meisha Shofner, professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering (MSE), has been selected for the 2024-2025 class of Drexel University’s Executive Leadership in Academic Technology, Engineering and Science (ELATES) program.

The ELATES program is a national leadership development program designed to promote women in academic STEM fields and faculty allies of all genders into institutional leadership roles.

“I am excited to be selected as an ELATES Fellow. I am grateful for the support from Georgia Tech’s College of Engineering that made this opportunity possible and especially support from Dean Raheem Beyah, Associate Dean Kim Kurtis, and MSE School Chair Natalie Stingelin. I am looking forward to learning from this amazing community of women leaders in higher education,” Shofner said.

“I was drawn to the ELATES program because of its focus on developing the skills needed to lead university initiatives with an operational focus, and I will be putting that knowledge into practice as I develop an institutional action project as part of the program.”

Read Full Story on the MSE Webpage

Akanksha Menon, assistant professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, has been selected to receive the 2023 American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Pi Tau Sigma Gold Medal. The award is presented for demonstrating outstanding achievement in the field of mechanical engineering, within ten years following graduation with a bachelor’s degree.

“I am very grateful to be selected for this award,” said Menon. “As an undergrad just over a decade ago, I served as the President of both the ASME and Pi Tau Sigma student chapters; to now receive this prestigious medal for contributions to the field of mechanical engineering is truly humbling – the journey has come full circle!”

Menon directs the Water–Energy Research Lab (WERL) at Georgia Tech, which focuses on applying thermal science and functional materials to develop sustainable and efficient energy and water technologies. Her research aims to unlock critical fundamental knowledge pertaining to thermally responsive materials with interactions across multiple length and time scales and to engineer them for applications ranging from desalination to thermal energy storage.

The full story is available on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering News Page

Devesh Ranjan, Eugene C. Gwaltney, Jr. School Chair and professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech, has been selected to receive the 2023 Gustus L. Larson Memorial Award from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and Pi Tau Sigma. The award is presented to an engineering graduate who has demonstrated outstanding achievement in mechanical engineering, within ten to twenty years following graduation.

Full story is available on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering news page. 

Tim Lieuwen has been selected to serve as interim chair of Georgia Tech’s Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering, effective August 1. Lieuwen is a Regents’ Professor; the David S. Lewis, Jr. Professor; and has been an AE School faculty member since 1999.

He’s also the executive director of the Strategic Energy Institute, managing overall strategy and external relations for more than 315 faculty members and 1,000 Georgia Tech researchers working in energy research, development, and demonstration. Lieuwen will continue in the role while serving as interim chair.