UW-Madison chemical and biological engineering news, fall-winter 2016

FALL/WINTER

2016-17

CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ENGINEERING

FELLOWSHIPS SET OUR GRAD STUDENTS UP FOR SUCCESS HONORING OUTSTANDING ALUMNI 1

CHAIR’S MESSAGE

FORWARD TOGETHER:

Alumni, faculty and students are accomplishing great things.

Engineers’ Day Manos Mavrikakis provides us with an annual opportunity to recognize some of the many accomplishments of our alumni. This year, we honored Stephen H. Siegele (BS ’84), a serial entrepreneur, with the Distinguished Achievement Award, for his impact and leadership in advancing various branches of the chemical industry at the global scale.

James R. Hillier (BS ’00), chief of staff for Global Manufacturing and Refining at LyondellBassell, received the Early Career Award for his outstanding record of technical and business leadership in the petrochemical and polymer industries.

In recent departmental news, ImBed Bioscience, a UW spinoff based on work in Nick Abbott’s group, received FDA clearance to market its patented wound dressing for human use. Virent, a spin-off company based on Jim Dumesic’s work, was acquired by Tesoro Corporation. Students in my research group have made significant computational

SUPPORT CBE ! allwaysforward.org/giveto/cbe

ENGINEERING

Or contact: Ann Leahy (608) 316-5874 ann.leahy@supportuw.org

developments in designing catalysts to help power fuel cells, and Jennie Reed’s group has made great strides towards optimizing cell processes to increase the production of products such as ethanol.

I would also like to congratulate Insoo Ro, the 2016 Doh Wonsuk Memorial Award winner. The award is presented each year by the U.S. chapter of the Korean Institute of Chemical Engineers (KIChE) to one or two Korean student(s) studying chemical engineering in doctoral programs in the United States. Insoo is working on his PhD thesis with George Huber and Jim Dumesic in the area of bimetallic catalysts.

This fall, we recognized the scholarly and educational achievements of some of our faculty members and the generosity of our alumni donors at investiture ceremonies in which new professorships were conferred. Professorship recipients and donors to the corresponding endowments included Dave Lynn (Duane and Dorothy Bluemke), Eric Shusta (Jeff Curler),

Read more about these distinguished alumni award recipients, James Hillier (above) and Stephen Siegele (right) on page 4. We honored Jim for an outstanding record of technical and business leadership within his company and his industry.

Stephen has spent nearly three decades as an inventor, executive, investor, and consultant and we recognized him for his entrepreneurial impact and leadership role in advancing the chemical industry worldwide.

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and Jim Dumesic (Ernie and Sally Micek/WARF).

A separate group investiture event honored our faculty members Victor Zavala, Brian Pfleger, Christos Maravelias, Jim Rawlings, John Yin and George Huber. It was delightful to listen to our donors speak of the value that this department provided to them as students, and honorees explain how these funds will enable them to pursue new research directions.

We are most grateful for other recent major gifts, including an estate gift from the family of Lou and Phyllis Jacobs, the Roger Harrison graduate fellowship (matched with the Nicholas gift) and the Ihlenfeld Faculty Scholarship, which was awarded to Reid Van Lehn.

Inspiring stories such as these are featured in this newsletter and on our department’s website.

Funding for graduate scholarships continues to be a top priority for the department, as well for the renovation of labs and facilities. In the most recent U.S. News and World Report graduate rankings, our department was ranked 6th in the nation. We continuously work toward defining the cutting-edge of modern chemical engineering and feel that this can only be achieved by providing first-rate facilities and by continuing to recruit and retain world-class faculty who can open new research directions for chemical engineering.

Your assistance by contributing to our campaign will continue to help us research and develop solutions that benefit society and the environment. If you are considering endowing a scholarship, please help us reach our goals through our annual fund: allwaysforward.org/ giveto/cbe or by contacting Ann Leahy, (608) 316-5874 or ann.leahy@supportuw.org, for more information.

As one family, this department and its alumni are doing great things. Working together, we can assure many more great things to come. I am consistently heartened by your very generous support for our department. As part of our extended family, I encourage you to drop us a note and send us your latest news by e-mailing che@che.wisc.edu.

ON, WISCONSIN!

Manos Mavrikakis Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and Paul A. Elfers Professor, and Chair emavrikakis@wisc.edu (608) 262-9053

ALL WAYS FORWARD

ANN LEAHY is the associate vice president and managing director of development for the College of Engineering. She collaborates closely with Department Chair Manos Mavrikakis and Dean Ian Robertson on raising financial resources to support the department’s highest priority initiatives. Contact Ann at ann.leahy@supportuw.org or (608) 316-5874.

• Annual fund support, which provides department leadership with the flexible resources needed to respond to changing opportunities and challenges.

Through the course of the campaign, I’ve had the privilege of meeting many of the extraordinary UW chemical and biological engineering alumni who have stepped forward with their very generous support. Thank you!

I am profoundly grateful for and inspired by your commitment to the department and its future, as well as your own fascinating careers and lives.

If you haven’t made a campaign commitment yet, I hope you will consider joining your fellow alumni in doing so. You could make a leadership contribution to the department’s annual fund, establish a named endowed fund to support a specific priority, and/or create a legacy gift through your estate. Please feel free to contact me to discuss the specific opportunities you have to help shape and ensure our future impact on the world, while transforming the lives of our students and contributing to the well-being of Wisconsin.

ON, WISCONSIN!

Ann Leahy THIS IS A NEW ERA FOR the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at UW-Madison.

Founded in 1905, the department is one of the oldest and highest-ranked chemical engineering departments in the United States, and the first to award a PhD. During the department’s rich history, it has established a reputation as a community of exceptional educators with an unflagging dedication to providing the very best education to generations of chemical engineers. In turn, our talented and inventive alumni go on to become international leaders of industry, launch and grow start-ups, and educate engineers at universities around the world.

Through interdisciplinary collaborations, our faculty and graduate students work side by side to solve global challenges through rigorous problem-solving and innovation. This inventive spirit has been the catalyst for advances and discoveries—such as the establishment of transport phenomena as a pillar in chemical engineering education.

Today, we stand at the crossroads of our past and our potential. In order to continue being an inspiration and a force for change, we need to move forward. In October 2015, UW–Madison launched its comprehensive campaign, called All Ways Forward, to raise the necessary funds to advance our entire university. The campaign will touch every aspect of the UW–Madison experience, with particular emphasis placed upon providing student support, improving the educational experience, maintaining faculty excellence, and supporting research and innovation.

The Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering needs your support to help us continue to excel. Our areas of most critical need are:

P.S. If you’ve remembered the department in a bequest through your estate, please be sure to let me know so I can enroll you in the Wisconsin Legacy Society and confirm that the appropriate will language was used.

This will assure that your legacy gift supports your intended beneficiaries.

SHOP!

store.engr.wisc.edu

• Graduate fellowships that provide resources to recruit the very best graduate students, who, in turn, are magnets for outstanding faculty and provide hands-on research opportunities for undergrads.

• State-of-the-art research and learning environments designed to support cutting-edge research, educational innovation and outreach.

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TWO CBE ALUMS RECEIVED COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING AWARDS DURING THE ENGINEERS’ DAY CELEBRATION NOV. 11, 2016

Read even more about our recipients: www.engr.wisc.edu/eday

DISTINGUISHED ACHIEVEMENT AWARD

STEPHEN H. SIEGELE Chief Executive and Consultant BSChE ’84

Why did you choose to attend college at UW-Madison?

I’m from Chicago, and I followed my older brother. He was a business major four years ahead of me.

I visited the school during my high school years and enjoyed the time and what I saw. I followed him into business school.

Who was your favorite engineering professor?

Professor Crosby; I had him for ChE 426, Mass Transfer Operations. It was a very challenging class with him. I then had him for summer lab, and actually, during summer lab I got to be fairly close to him. I very much enjoyed summer lab and taking it from him. He was a very interesting professor.

He tended to be a very difficult professor in a number of ways, and I took that on as a challenge and built a very positive relationship with him so that after I graduated and had success in my first business, I asked him to do some consulting with me, and so it came full circle.

EARLY CAREER AWARD

JAMES HILLIER Chief of Staff for Global Manufacturing and Refining, LyondellBassell BSChE ’00, BS Biochem ’00, BS Molecular Biology ’00

Why did you choose engineering as your major?

In high school, I was really lucky. I took a chemistry class that was co-taught by teachers who extolled the virtues of chemical engineering as a career. They found ways to integrate that into their classes.

It was basically a preparatory class for going into an engineering major.

Who was your favorite UW-Madison engineering professor?

It would be Professor Charles Hill in chemical engineering. He taught kinetics; he has my utmost respect for the high standard of education he provided, holding people accountable and giving tons of homework. Everyone was really bright, but it wasn’t enough to be smart in his classes; you had to work and apply your work to the problems you were working on. He made us sweat.

What’s your fondest memory of your time on campus?

Most of my fondest memories are tied in one way or another to marching band. I did marching band for five years as a tuba. There’s no other opportunity like it to experience the Wisconsin Idea firsthand.

We played at Rose Bowls, a Final Four tournament run, several other bowl games, every hockey 4

Why did you choose engineering as your major?

About a year and a half or so into my business curriculum, I made a decision that I wanted to pursue business opportunities in technical companies.

I felt it would be the right approach to receive an engineering degree. I started thinking about engineering degrees and my father, who is a chemist, suggested I take chemistry. I found chemistry, and then chemical engineering, very interesting.

Of what professional accomplishment are you most proud?

Four years after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in ChE from Madison I came up with an idea that I believed had commercial merit. I focused on a startup plan and let nothing hold me back. I started small in R&D materials that I thought would grow with adoption in the semiconductor industry. My company grew rapidly into the international leader in our market. I developed a strategy to take our company public via a pooling of interests transaction.

We successfully implemented this and I was able to retire from the company after integration to continue my entrepreneurial efforts.

Who played the greatest role in your achievements?

My mother had a great influence on me while I was growing up. She was instrumental in my character

and volleyball game we could get to, and got to tour around Wisconsin and the country, playing in parades and concerts. A lot of our lifelong friends are reformed band members, and that’s where I met my wife.

What was your favorite engineering class?

There is no doubt that it would be the summer lab in Madison. It was the ChE capstone lab course that was taught predominantly in the basement of the engineering building. There was no more hands-on and applicable class than that summer lab to prepare me for the petrochemical industry.

What advice would you give students in your discipline today?

One piece of advice that I always give young engineers here is if someone takes the time to ask you to do something that maybe you don’t really want to do, the right answer is always yes.

There’s probably a reason they’re asking you to do it, whether it is a special skill set or the capability that you have or they want to see you perform in a step-out role. Those types of roles have always given me differential opportunities to develop as an engineer. Even if something is

growth. My father was busy building his companies and traveled a great deal when I was young. When I was in high school and college I was able to work with my father. He became a great mentor. As a young founder and CEO I asked my father to be part-time chairman of my company. This helped greatly, especially with working in Asia. We gained a level of respect that was difficult to achieve for a young startup company there. Also, my family: It’s very important for an individual who tries to do the things I did to have a very supportive spouse; Julie, my wife, was very supportive. I spent about 80 percent of my time on the road. I couldn’t have done it without Julie. We had our first child, Nicholas, and then when our second child, Lauren, came along, I said now we’re at a point in time to exit, and it was very important for me to finally be home with my family.

If you had to do it all over again and pick a major other than engineering, what would you choose?

I would absolutely not change my focus of chemical engineering. I would certainly pursue some of the business classes I think are necessary; I probably wouldn’t have done it in the order I did, which was business first and then chemical engineering.

The proof is with my son; he got a business minor with a chemical engineering major at Berkeley. I guess that was my chance to “do it all over again.”

hard, unglamorous, or out of your comfort zone, take it on.

Of what professional accomplishment are you most proud?

Advancing co-op and new-hire engineer development with the company. This has been a focus area almost since I started with the company, and it’s become a strength of the company because we have a group who is passionate around earlycareer development.

If you had to do it all again and pick a major other than engineering, what would you choose?

It’s hard to imagine another one, but I probably wouldn’t have ended up at Wisconsin if I didn’t go the engineering route. I probably would have gone to culinary arts school instead.

What are your hobbies/interests?

Cooking is one thing I’m passionate about. My wife and I love to cook for ourselves and others and travel to places that have good cuisine. I also love spending time with family, traveling, playing and watching sports, woodworking, and playing the piano and bass.

ALUMNI GIFT

HELPS NEW FACULTY EXPAND EARLY RESEARCH Reid Van Lehn

Alumni gifts can make a substantial difference in the early careers of professors, who often struggle to find funding for their fresh ideas. For Assistant Professor Reid Van Lehn, receiving a gift allows him to directly further the goals of his lab.

Reid has received the Jay and Cynthia Ihlenfeld Faculty Scholarship. This prestigious title was established through the Morgridge match, a major gift from UW-Madison alumni John and Tashia Morgridge that provided a one-to-one match for any donor making a professorship gift.

The faculty scholar award, after the match, is worth $1 million, and was donated by the Ihlenfelds, alumni with longstanding connections to UW-Madison. Jay is a chemical and biological engineering alumnus and Cynthia is a business grad. Jay and Reid also happen to be alumni of the same fraternity—Phi Delta Theta.

Reid, who joined the chemical and biological engineering faculty in spring 2016, focuses on surface chemistry and drug delivery. And though he is only just beginning his research, the funding has allowed him to expand his goals.

“One of the great things about this gift is that it’s not attached to a federal grant, so it means I can take risks, and take on new projects, and there’s not a direct line to prior success that I need to demonstrate,” says Reid.

An avenue of research he’s looking to pursue involves integrating multi-simulation approaches via machine learning to design new biomaterials. “Machine learning allows us to pick up correlations in large data sets, where it’s difficult to identify the effect of changing one variable at a time in a controlled fashion,” he says. “By combining many inputs and outputs in a model, we can identify trends showing how changing a parameter can affect biological outcomes, that we wouldn’t be able to pick up by other means.”

For Reid, who doesn’t have substantial experience in the subject, machine learning is an uncharted methodology that could provide interesting implications for the design of new materials.

Overall, the gift allows Reid to build a solid foundation for his lab, and to consider new possibilities for ongoing research. “Particularly when you’re a young faculty member, these gifts can have a large impact,” he says. “It’s the difference between being able to fund a graduate student and not being able to fund one, so it really helps further the goals of my research group.”

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Fellowships provide graduate students with critical financial support as they pursue advanced degrees. In the case of the Bird Stewart Lightfoot (BSL) Wisconsin Distinguished Fellowship, a fund established as a permanent endowment for graduate students, those students are linked to three of the most prestigious names in the field of chemical engineering. R. Byron (Bob) Bird, Warren Stewart and Edwin Lightfoot are coauthors of the landmark textbook Transport Phenomena, and individually are research giants—but they also have made significant contributions in teaching and service.

The chemical and biological engineering department provides fellowships, such as the BSL, that support graduate students throughout their first semester, at the end of which they join a faculty member’s lab group and receive funding through research grants of that faculty.

Bird For many students, including alumnus Jeffrey Herron, who received the BSL Fellowship in fall 2008, having financial support in the first few daunting months of graduate school is crucial. “Because I had funding for a year from the department, I had time to explore what options were available, meet with faculty and their students, and see what kind of work I would be taking on,” he says. “Having that time, and not going in blind, helped me make a better Stewart decision for my research interests. Having that flexibility in funding is important in having a successful graduate career.”

Herron, currently a senior engineer at Dow Chemical Co. in Midland, Michigan, is one of 10 students who received the fellowship since the department began offering it in 2007. Ultimately, Herron went on to join Manos Mavrikakis’ group, specifically applying quantum chemical calculations to the identification of new materials, focusing on applications in energy. In his work with Dow, he helps scale up lab reactions to commercial-scale, often applying similar tools and calculations that he worked on during his graduate research.

Nate Eagan

Prestigious fellowship pays tribute to trio, honors talented CBE graduate students

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Through fellowship funds like that of the BSL, students are given the freedom and flexibility to explore various chemical engineering subdisciplines, and identify the research that interests them most. They also attend Lightfoot conferences, which often can be the key to focusing in on the research area they want to pursue throughout their graduate career.

For current graduate students Nat Eagan and Maddie Ball (pictured on front cover), who both received the fellowship in spring 2015, the financial support helped them expand their knowledge of their respective fields.

“It gave me the opportunity to get out of the door and see things that I wasn’t necessarily at the stage to be a part of yet,” Eagan says. “I was able to go to the American Institute of Chemical Engineering conference in Salt Lake City, Utah. I gained a lot of good experience just being there.”

Ball, a student in Ernie Micek Distinguished Chair Jim Dumesic’s lab, was able to use the extra funds to travel to the University of New Mexico, where she worked with some of the group’s collaborators on electron microscopy. “Getting to work with them, and seeing what they do in the field of catalysis, helped me advance that area of my research,” says Ball.

The BSL Fellowship also gives students some latitude in their research.

“Having a fellowship means that I’m not tied to a particular project, so I can work on things that are of interest to me and my adviser,” says Ball. “In terms of my research, we can do things that are a little more exploratory.”

UW-MADISON SPINOFF GETS FDA OK FOR BACTERIA-KILLING WOUND DRESSING Imbed Biosciences has received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration to market its patented wound dressing for human use. The dressing it calls Microlyte Ag is a sheet as thin as Saran Wrap and can conform to the bumps and crevices of a wound, says company CEO Ankit Agarwal.

The dressing is now cleared by the FDA as a class II medical device for prescription and over-the-counter use.

The ultra-thin dressing material was invented in the lab of Nick Abbott, the John T. and Magdalen L. Sobota Professor and Hilldale Professor, when Agarwal was a postdoctoral fellow and where he is now an honorary associate scientist.

Like many dressings now used to treat burns and other persistent wounds, Microlyte Ag contains silver to kill bacteria—but in much smaller quantities. “Our dressing uses as little as 1 percent as much silver as the competition, and yet the tests we submitted to the FDA showed that Microlyte kills more than 99.99 percent of bacteria that it contacts,” says Agarwal, who co-founded the company with Abbott and surgeon Michael Schurr.

The Microlyte dressing inherently adheres to moist surfaces and is so flexible that it drops into the bumps and fissures of a wound, leading to the sweet combination of greater destruction of bacteria at much lower doses of silver. It also retains moisture yet is ultrathin and breathable, allowing oxygen to reach the wound and gases to exit, all factors that promote healing. The slow release of the silver means the dressing can remain in place for at least one day. And because the material is a hydrogel (a waterbased gel), it can simply be rinsed off as needed before replacement.

Experience with animals shows that the dressing simply sloughs off as the wound heals. All of these advantages should reduce the need to change dressings, which can be so painful that sedation is needed, especially for children.

The dressing will compete in the $2 billion market sector of “advanced wound dressings,” which are used to treat diabetic ulcers, venous ulcers, burns, bedsores and other difficult wounds. The company is developing other ideas for wound treatment and discussing commercial-scale production of Microlyte. Currently, it plans to reach the market through licensing agreements with hospital suppliers.

Imbed Biosciences

She continues to conduct research in controlled surface reactions, in reference to the synthesis and characterization of bimetallic catalysts. Ball, who enjoyed the experience of working as a teaching assistant, is excited about the idea of pursuing a professorship in the future.

The BSL fellowship also helps validate students’ perceptions of their academic path.

“Bird, Stewart and Lightfoot were some of the most well-known names to come out of the university, with a lot of theories fundamental to the understanding of transport phenomena,” Eagan says. “So having my name attached to the fellowship makes the most difference. It tells me that I’m on the right track, and doing the right things.”

For Eagan, the fellowship means much more than funding for his graduate education. It’s a signal that he and other recipients have potential, an encouragement in the trying early phases of an academic career. He now is a member of Professor George Huber’s group.

The BSL fellowship is among several fellowships that help the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering to remain competitive, enabling it to attract some of the most academically advanced students. Not only does it illustrate the success of the department, it also provides students with the motivation to embrace their research.

Manos Mavrikakis, Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and Paul A. Elfers Professor and department chair, highlights the importance of the fellowship, not merely because of the endowment it provides, but in what it signifies. “Bird, Stewart and Lightfoot are three of the most recognizable names in the history of chemical engineering on the global scale,” he says. “Having a graduate fellowship with that name is among the highest honors a chemical engineering graduate student can ever imagine.”

Funding for graduate fellowships is among the department’s top fund-raising priorities.

To make a gift or to learn more how you can be a part of this important effort, contact Ann Leahy, ann.leahy@supportuw.org, (608) 316-5874.

Imbed’s Microlyte dressing is applied to a wound on a pig. The ultra-thin dressing conforms to the wound, bringing the antimicrobial silver into direct contact with bacteria.

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CLARIFYING THE CONVOLUTED CHEMICAL DANCE THAT CHARGES FUEL CELLS Using a unique combination of advanced computational methods, Previously, chemists only simulated simplified scenarios—for example, UW-Madison chemical engineers have demystified some of the complex fuel cells without any water in the mix, or catalytic surfaces that didn’t catalytic chemistry in fuel cells—an advance that brings cost-effective fuel crackle with electricity. Unsurprisingly, conclusions based on such cells closer to reality. oversimplifications failed to fully capture the enormous complexity of “Understanding reaction mechanisms is the first step toward eventually real-world reactions. replacing expensive platinum in fuel cells with a cheaper material,” says Mavrikakis and colleagues combined their expertise in two powerful Manos Mavrikakis, the Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and computational techniques to create a more accurate description of a very Paul A. Elfers Professor in chemical and biological engineering. complex real environment. They first used density functional theory to Mavrikakis and colleagues at Osaka University, Japan, published details solve for quantum mechanical forces and energies between individual of the advance in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug. 8, 2016.

Fuel cells generate electricity by combining electrons and protons with oxygen from the air to form water. Those electrons and protons come from a chemical fuel such as methanol.

To make the reaction that generates protons faster, fuel cells typically contain catalysts. With the right catalyst and enough fuel and air, fuel cells could provide power very efficiently.

Someday, fuel cells could make laptop batteries obsolete. Mere tablespoons of methanol could potentially provide up to 20 hours of continuous power. But alternatives to the expensive platinum catalyst in today’s fuel cells haven’t emerged because scientists still don’t fully understand the complicated chemistry required to produce protons and electrons from fuels.

And finding a good catalyst is no trivial task.

“People arrived at using platinum for a Jeffrey Heron, lead author on the paper, learned some of the computational solid-state physics methodologies catalyst largely by trial and error without necessary to model methanol decomposition over a platinum catalyst during a summer research visit to Japan. understanding how the reaction takes place,” says Mavrikakis. “Our efforts developed a big picture of how the reaction is happening, and we hope to do the same atoms, then built a scheme upon those results using molecular dynamics analysis with other materials to help find a cheaper alternative.” methods to simulate large ensembles of water and methanol molecules At first glance, the chemistry sounds straightforward: Methanol interacting among themselves and with the platinum surface. molecules awash in a watery milieu sit down on a platinum surface before The detailed simulations revealed that the presence of water in a fuel they give up one of their four hydrogen atoms. An electron from that cell plays a huge role in dictating which hydrogen atom breaks free from hydrogen atom sparks electric current. methanol first—a result that simpler methods could never have captured.

In reality, the situation is not so simple. “All of these molecules, the Electric charge also determined the order in which methanol breaks down— water and the methanol, are actually dancing around the surface of the surprisingly switching the preferred first step at the positive electrode. catalyst and fluctuating continuously,” says Mavrikakis. “Following the This type of information enables scientists to predict which byproducts dynamics of these fluctuating motions all the time, and in the presence might accumulate in a reaction mixture, and select better ingredients for of an externally applied electric potential, is really very complicated.” future fuel cells.

The water molecules are not mere wallflowers sitting on the sidelines of The Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation the methanol molecules reacting with platinum; rather, they occasionally supported the research. cut into the chemical dance. And varying voltage on the electrified surface of the platinum catalyst tangles the reaction’s tempo even further.

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reactions and adjust the computer model accordingly. In the lab, she “I was always interested in how things work,” says Associate Professor studies the ubiquitous bacterium Escherichia coli (E. coli), found in the Jennifer Reed, a 2014 recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award gut of humans and animals; cyanobacteria, a familiar sight as blue-green for Scientists and Engineers and a scientist at the Great Lakes Bioenergy “algae” in freshwater lakes; and Zymomonas mobilis, a bacterium found Research Center (GLBRC). “As a kid, I would look at the washing in the sap of sugar-rich plants. machine and wonder how it knew when the door was closed and it should Studying a variety of microbes could prove important to the biofuels start its cycle. But it wasn’t until college that I discovered it was much industry, where specific more interesting to apply microbes could be used engineering solutions to to match the specific biological problems.” characteristics of different After learning that the locales. Cyanobacteria, wide array of chemical for example, which require reactions inside a living cell only sunlight and carbon could be modeled with a dioxide to produce biocomputer, Reed became fuels, could be an ideal fit hooked on the field of for sun-drenched states metabolic engineering, the like Arizona. practice of optimizing cell But Reed’s computaprocesses to increase the tional design goes well production of desirable beyond matching the chemicals such as ethanol. industry’s geography “I discovered that a with natural variation in cell’s metabolism is this a microbe’s preferred incredibly complex system, environment. Increasing but with all kinds of the economic viability of controls in place to make the biofuel pipeline will sure it doesn’t go awry,” require creating valuable Reed says. “It all seemed co-products along the very logical. The cell is not way. To that end, Reed some random thing that also works on converting just happened to emerge. cellulosic, or non-edible, This engineer-minded plant material to the kinds description of biology of chemicals used to make really appealed to me.” plastic soda bottles, In her lab at UW– pesticides and pharmaMadison, Reed focuses on ceuticals, creating noncontrolling thousands of petroleum derived sources reactions inside a cell by Jennifer Reed working with a GLBRC team member in her lab. of a host of commercially changing the genes that valuable chemicals. help produce a specific “E. coli can be designed to produce hundreds of compounds that it chemical. For example, in her GLBRC research, she tweaks certain strains doesn’t produce in nature,” Reed says. “So you can make large amounts of yeast and bacteria so that they can better access and convert the sugar of biofuel with a small profit margin, and supplement that with smaller molecules contained in corn stover—the stalks, leaves, husks and cobs that volumes of commodity chemicals that are much more profitable.” remain in fields after the harvest—to ethanol and advanced biofuels.

Long-term, Reed’s goal is to be able to feed any arbitrary DNA And yet engineering challenges like these are not simple, nor are they sequence into a computer and predict not only the function of the genes limited to studying just one particular pathway within a cell. As Reed contained in that sequence, but also the levels, inside a living cell, of the explains it, if you want a cell to produce a different kind of biofuel, such as various products they control. isobutanol, you need to turn off the ethanol pathway and enhance flow “I’m really interested in how DNA encodes the behavior of cells, into the pathway that makes isobutanol. Knowledge of the entire biological whether we’ve engineered them or they occur naturally,” she says. system is required to develop these kinds of strategies, which is why “Right now, I have to do a lot of tinkering with various DNA elements metabolism modelers like Reed are also called systems biologists. to introduce a new pathway. But the more computational design that Reed’s research approach is unique in that it combines computational you can do, the less of that trial-and-error strategy is needed.” modeling and lab work. Running experiments with living microbes allows her to compare their observed behavior to the computer’s predicted

MODELING METABOLISM FOR

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SUMMER LAB IN CHINA

Cultural enrichment for CBE students The CBE summer capstone course is akin to “bootcamp”—it’s a five-week experience that requires students to apply all of the theory and methodology they’ve learned to hands-on, challenging experiments in the lab. But for students who elect to take the course abroad, it has evolved into much more than that.

The summer lab started in 1948, but it wasn’t until 1987 that the lab began operating abroad in London. Over the years, the department added labs in Oviedo, Spain, and Vienna, Austria. But it wasn’t until recently that students had the option of going to China.

In 2014, John Yin, a Vilas Distinguished Professor in chemical and biological engineering, led the first group of students to a Hangzhou, China, where they carried out their summer lab at the Zhejiang University. “Holding the lab abroad gives undergraduates the chance to not only get the lab experience, but have a cultural enrichment experience as well,” Yin says.

Hangzhou seemed like a natural choice for a new location. UW-Madison has had a longstanding research relationship with Zhejiang University, which was looking to expand its ties with the United States and broaden its overall impact. In addition, its laboratories typically go unused in summer, and therefore offered a perfect spot for UW-Madison students to engage in a lab experience that is both unique and essential to their engineering student careers.

Yet, the benefits extend far beyond the lab. “Going to a different place forces you to be more adaptive, especially when the people around you are speaking a different language and are from a very different culture,” says Yin. “Students are also learning rudimentary Chinese and getting a chance to practice it.”

In some cases, Yin notes, students are exposed to new experimental apparatus as well. “Students are able to deal with more highly interfaced tools, distillation towers that are linked into computer controls, for example,” he says. “This past summer, they started doing virtual labs, where students get a chance to run their experiment and make initial mistakes in virtual reality, so they go in with a little more experience.”

For student Matthew Melvin, who grew up in the Milwaukee area, taking the summer lab in Hangzhou also meant going abroad for the first time. “I loved China— I thought it was an amazing experience, and it was totally different from anything I’d experienced before,” he says.

The lab is no less rigorous than its Madison counterpart.

Students are immersed in the lab environment eight hours a day, five days a week. They interact both with a UW-Madison professor—in this case, Yin—and 1948 Summer Lab: Session 1 (top), Session 2 (bottom) professors and graduate students 10

2016 Summer La

b: Hangzhou, Ch

ina

at the lab in China, conducting experiments, writing extensive lab reports and doing oral presentations. But they also have the opportunity to explore a new city, hear a new language, and be surrounded by a totally new culture.

During his time in Hangzhou, Melvin climbed Huangshan Mountain and saw the Terracotta Army in Xi’an. He even stayed in China after the lab was over, traveling to Shanghai and a few other smaller cities.

In 2016, the CBE department offered another new lab—this time, in Hong Kong. Led

by Senior Lecturer Rafael Chavez, 11 students attended the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology to fulfill their lab requirements.

The formation of the Hong Kong lab followed much the same path as the Hangzhou lab, building on an initial relationship with CBE faculty, and fulfilling the CBE department’s desire to have even more options for the growing number of CBE students at UW-Madison.

“For many students in engineering, taking classes for credit in other countries is too difficult, because of the transfer of credits,” Chavez says. “But this course is not too long, and allows a good amount of time to really experience a culture and understand the perspective of other people. I think that’s a really valuable experience for any engineering student.”

For those students, experience living abroad and meeting people unlike themselves also is a plus for their employers—and summer labs around the world also give students a dual opportunity: to advance both their engineering and their global education.

FACULTY NEWS FACULTY NEWS

In September 2016, the independent petroleum refining and marketing company Tesoro Corporation announced plans to acquire Virent, an innovative renewable fuels and chemicals company co-founded

by Jim Dumesic. Additionally, Jim’s paper, “Production of 5-hydro-xymethylfurfural from glucose using a combination of Lewis and Brønsted acid catalysts in water in a biphasic reactor with an alkylphenol solvent,” was among a handful of papers published in ACS Catalysis in 2012 and 2013 that peer researchers in catalysis deemed as “having affected their thinking about catalysis in a significant way,” and a paper they would still be reading and citing in 2022—or 10 years later.

George Huber has given three international plenary lectures this year. In India, he spoke at the Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited. In Taiwan, he gave a talk at the International Symposium on Catalytic Conversion of Biomass. In Saudi Arabia, he spoke at the KAUST Future Fuels Workshop. While in Taiwan, George also gave a seminar at National Cheng Kung University.

Manos Mavrikakis was elected a fellow of AVS, the American Vacuum Society. The honor is the premier recognition a member of the society can receive. The society recognized Manos for his outstanding contributions to theoretical surface science and catalysis.

Jim Rawlings is among the 2016 recipients of the UW-Madison Steenbock Professorship. Endowed more than 30 years ago by Evelyn Steenbock—wife of Harry Steenbock, a biochemistry professor emeritus—Steenbock Professorships provide a group of outstanding UW-Madison faculty with 10 years of financial support for their research programs. Jim has authored three textbooks and conducts research in chemical process modeling, monitoring and control. His lab engineers molecular-scale chemical reactions.

Victor Zavala was elected programming coordinator for the AIChE Computing and Systems Technology Division, which provides programs for AIChE members who share interests in computing and systems biology.

With Dean Ian Robertson (far right) and chair Manos Mavrikakis (far left), members of the CBE faculty who received new professorships or faculty scholar honors in the past year.

At National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan, there are photos of famous chemists and one chemical engineer—our own Bob Bird—to inspire young students. Here, George Huber is pictured with his former postdoc, Yu-Chuan Lin (now a professor at the university), with Bob’s photo and his bio.

The National Science Foundation has renewed the UW-Madison REU in the Chemistry of Materials for Renewable Energy program for an additional three years to support 10 summer research students during summers 2017- 2019. The three-year, $330,000 grant is the second renewal of the successful program directed by Andrew Greenberg. Faculty participating in the program include Nick Abbott, Jim Dumesic, Ive Hermans, George Huber, Manos Mavrikakis, Brian Pfleger, Jennie Reed, and Victor Zavala.

NSF RENEWS REU PROGRAM

In an Oct. 9, 2016, ceremony at the National Academy of Engineering annual meeting, Jim Rawlings (center) was among 80 U.S. and 22 foreign scientists inducted as fellows of the NAE. View video of the induction (Jim appears at approximately 23:00) at youtu.be/ZukfNygSnWg.

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ROGER HARRISON SCHOLARSHIP: HALF PAGE

In early fall, the department hosted a reception for undergraduate scholarship recipients. Many of the scholarships our students receive are made possible through gifts from our alumni. Our students are deeply grateful for this support—and if you would like to make a gift that makes a major difference in our students’ ability to pursue their chemical engineering education, please contact Ann Leahy, (608) 316-5874.

A PRIME PUZZLER

Professor Emeritus Bob Bird created this puzzle, which takes excellent advantage of prime numbers. When you’ve finished the puzzle, arrange the letters in order from top to bottom to spell out a message from Bob. ENJOY!

LETTER Pair prime numbers with the prefix “19” to create years in the 20th century that correspond to the following events. Use the key below to fill in the companion letter blanks.

Prime numbers from 1 and 100, with their “companion” letters:

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02 = Y

29 = P

67 = G

03 = X

31 = O

71 = F

05 = W

37 = N

73 = E

07 = V

41 = M

11 = U

YEAR

HISTORICAL EVENT

_ _ _ _

JFK’s inauguration

_ _ _ _ Dalai Lama escapes to India

_ _ _ _ 26th Amendment passed

____ Grand Canyon established as national park

_ _ _ _ Star Spangled Banner officially became the U.S. National Anthem

_ _ _ _ Germany attacked Balkans & Russia

_ _ _ _

U.S. entered WWII

_ _ _ _

Mother Teresa & Princess Diana died

79 = D

_ _ _ _

Margaret Thatcher became PM

43 = L

83 = C

_ _ _ _

Alaska & Hawaii became states

13 = T

47 = K

89 = B

17 = S

53 = J

97 = A

_ _ _ _

U.S. declared war on Germany (WWI)

19 = R

59 = I

— — — —

Harold Urey discovered heavy water

23 = Q

61 = H

_ _ _ _

Dirigible Hindenburg exploded in NJ

IN MEMORIAM Alum establishes fellowship to turn students into scientists Roger Harrison (MS ’69, PhD ’75) has mentored many trainees during his long career as a professor at the University of Roger Harrison Oklahoma—and even students who’ve never met Roger can learn from the University of Wisconsin-Madison alumnus, thanks to the textbook he authored, Bioseparations Processes and Engineering.

Now, he will help even more students receive engineering training, thanks to a generous $200,000 gift to establish a fellowship in chemical and biological engineering.

“UW-Madison is where I learned to be a scientist,” says Roger.

“The mentoring I received and the campus environment set me on the path toward my career.”

Today, Roger researches targeted therapies that can treat a variety of cancers. Recently, he and his students helped develop a method to selectively attach carbon nanotubes to tumor cells, which allowed the researchers to specifically destroy that malignant tissue with a pulse of infrared heat. This photothermal therapy is currently in animal trials.

One of his earlier innovations—a way to produce highly pure biological products in bacterial cells called the NusA expression system—is still widely used in research labs spanning 18 countries.

Before joining the faculty at Oklahoma University, he spent time with the UpJohn Company (now owned by Pfizer) and Phillips. He credits his success in industry and academia to the training he received at UW-Madison, where he learned biological transport phenomena from Hilldale Professor Emeritus Ed Lightfoot, who also served on Roger’s thesis advisory committee.

He still stays in touch with people in the CBE department—several current and former colleagues recently got together in San Francisco during the annual meeting of the American Institute for Chemical Engineers, Nov. 13-18, 2016. He also returned to campus on Oct. 18, 2016, to deliver a seminar describing his ongoing research to develop targeted cancer treatments.

The idea to establish the fellowship first arose from Roger’s conversation with fellow alum R.I. Fenton-May at the CBE department’s centennial celebration in 2005. The Fenton-May fellowship has enabled graduate students to make important intellectual contributions to the chemical engineering discipline.

One such recipient, Tony Plauck, has just joined the Dow Chemical Company, thanks, in part, to the advances he made in the catalysis field while supported by the Fenton-May fellowship.

“You always hope that you can help students get to the point where they can do more than just execute ideas, but genuinely come up with new insight,” says Roger.

His gift will have additional impact, thanks to a matching fund established by UW-Madison alumni Ab and Nancy Nicholas and their family. The incentive helped inspire him to donate at this time, and he hopes others will follow his lead.

“I wanted to set an example and encourage other alumni to do something similar,” says Roger.

Longtime engineering dean passes away As dean of the College of Engineering, Paul Peercy constantly sought ways to help students succeed in engineering. In ongoing efforts to educate “global” engineers, he focused on diverse and interdisciplinary experiences, innovations in teaching engineering, and on hands-on work that connected the technical aspects of engineering students’ education with real challenges facing society. “Engineering is where science meets society,” he said in a 2012 interview, referring to myriad global challenges, including energy needs and pollution.

“These are problems that can’t be solved without engineers and can’t be solved by engineers alone.” Peercy, who served as dean from 1999 until retiring in 2013, died Oct. 20, 2016, after a lengthy illness. Read more and learn how you can make a gift in Peercy’s memory that helps carry on his commitment to undergraduate education here: go.wisc.edu/peercy-passes-away.

Robert A. Greenkorn died June 13, 2016. He attended the University of Wisconsin for four semesters. He entered pilot training and then was assigned to a patrol squadron. He flew combat missions during the Korean War and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and three air medals. After completing his service, he returned to the UW and completed his BS ’54, MS ’55 and PhD ’57 in chemical engineering. After holding positions elsewhere, he became an associate professor of chemical engineering at Purdue University in 1965, and two years later, professor and head of chemical engineering. During his career at Purdue, he held several other positions; among them, associate dean of engineering, vice president and associate provost, vice president of the Purdue Research Foundation, vice president for research, dean of the Graduate School, special assistant to the president, and director of the Technical Assistance Program, which he authored.

We extend sympathies to the family and friends of Lila, wife of Ed Lightfoot. Lila died Nov. 16, 2016. She was a delightful person with a dry sense of humor that grew from a perceptive and compassionate approach to life. Her marriage of 67 years to Ed was a true and loving partnership that took her around the world and brought her lifelong friends.

Ed believes Lila’s influence was the key to his professional success, as well as personal happiness. Lila ran family businesses, camping trips, and a household full of friends, graduate students, and a caboodle of pampered cats and dogs. Lila is proudly and lovingly survived by her husband, Ed; her daughters, Dory (Enrique) and Nancy (Nick); her sons, Ted (Sue), Robert (Karin), and David (Barry); four nieces; her granddaughter, Kate; and many friends.

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ALUMNI NEWS

We always welcome memories of our alums’ time on campus!

Here are two notes we recently received from alumni who look back fondly on their ChE education.

REMEMBERING AN ACT OF KINDNESS Here’s a note from Calvin Pipal, who earned his bachelor’s degree in ChE in 1949. Calvin writes: “I read with keen interest your article on Professor Henry Barschall in the last issue of Perspective. It brought back a fond memory. In 1947, I took a physics course headed by Professor Barschall. I was unable to take the scheduled final exam because of a health problem that required hospitalization. After discharge from the hospital, I went to Professor Barschall’s office to arrange a makeup exam. He said, ‘Didn’t we give you a grade?’ I replied that I didn’t know, that I just assumed I didn’t get one. He then examined his records and told me that, since I had a straight A coming into the final, there was no need to take a makeup exam and that I received an A for the course. I have always treasured this act of graciousness and trust. I received my BSChE in 1949 and went on to spend 39 wonderful years with 3M Company. I am now 92 years old and enjoy many fond memories of the UW and 3M. Professor Barschall is included in these.”

CHE GENERATIONS Stephen Oswald (BSChE ‘84) wrote us to tell us the following: “I was recently reviewing the summer lab photos on your website, and of course, came across my photo, as well as my uncle Thomas Oswald’s photo—my father’s twin brother (pictured). What was interesting, however, is that my son, Matthew Oswald, is currently entering his senior year and is also in the chemical engineering program at UW-Madison.

When Matt completes his degree next spring, he will become the third generation of Oswald Badger chemical engineers ... that may be a first for the ChE program.”

Chemical engineering PhD alumni currently working in the chemical and synthetics development group in R&D at Bristol-Myers Squibb. Given the group has about 40 chemical engineers, that fact that eight of them are alums of one department is amazing! The photo was taken at the group’s summer picnic. Back row (from left): Ronald Carrasquillo (PhD ’15), Shawn Brueggemeier (PhD ’05), Joshua Selekman (PhD ’13), Eric Saurer (PhD ’10) Front row: Selin Aytar (PhD ’12), Fulya Akpinar (PhD ’14), Bahar Inankur (PhD ’15), Patricia Cho (PhD ’14).

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From left: Raj Gounder, Lars Grabow, Jeff Greeley, Yuriy Román and Benjamin Chen.

ALUMNI MAKE A MARK AT CATALYSIS CONFERENCE Three speakers in the 2016 Gordon Research Conference in Catalysis, held June 12-17, 2016, at Colby-Sawyer College in New London, New Hampshire, are alumni. The conference program focused on four critical areas of catalytic science: synthesis of new materials, in situ and operando characterization, computational modeling, and reaction mechanisms, and how the interplay of each of these areas leads to better understanding and finally a working catalyst.

Jeff Greeley (PhD ’04), who now is at Purdue University, presented, “Structure and reactivity of multifunctional catalytic interfaces from first principles.” Yuriy Román (PhD ’08), who now is at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, gave the talk, “Design principles for the synthesis of transition metal carbide nanoparticles and their application in catalysis.” And Lars Grabow (PhD ’08), who is at the University of Houston, presented the talk, “Computational design of catalytic materials for natural gas upgrade.”

Also, Raj Gounder of Purdue, who earned his bachelor’s degree in 2006, was a discussion leader at the conference, and Benjamin Chen, who currently is a PhD student in CBE chair Manos Mavrikakis’ group, was a poster presenter.

“Gordon Research Conferences are among the most prestigious in the world,” says Manos. “They are thematic and report only cutting edge research across the globe.

This one was focused on heterogeneous catalysis and having so many people in that elite group of speakers/ discussion leaders speaks volumes of the quality of training CBE offers in that area.”

Benton recognized for teaching Mike Benton (PhD ’07), an associate professor in the Cain Department of Chemical Engineering at Louisiana State University (LSU), received the 2016 Student Choice Award for Instructor Excellence. It is the second year in a row that Mike has won the award—evidence of his dedication and love of teaching.

Top radiologist Bluemke to return to Madison In July 2017, Dr. David Bluemke (BS ‘80) will return to Madison with his wife, Bonnie, to become a professor in the UW-Madison Department of Radiology. He has made numerous contributions to radiology in his role as professor of radiology at Johns Hopkins (1993-2008) where he served as chief of MRI, and as senior investigator and radiologist-in-chief at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Sciences Center since 2008.

In particular, David’s interests are in cardiovascular disease and its complications, with a focus on atherosclerosis imaging and using traditional and molecular imaging to detect, quantify and monitor disease. He has been named among the top 10 radiologists by Medical Imaging (2007), listed multiple times among America’s Top Doctors by Castle Connolly, and in 2015, AuntMinnie.com named him the year’s most influential radiology researcher.

In 2018, David also will become editor of the journal Radiology, the flagship journal of the field, and move the journal to Madison. David is a native of Brookfield, Wisconsin; he and Bonnie are excited to be moving back “home” to Wisconsin.

Gilbert among top scholars in Canada Peter Gilbert (BS ’13) was among Seven Queen’s University students to earn the 2016 Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship. It awards $150,000 over three years to up to 167 doctoral students across Canada every year.

“Our seven new Vanier Scholars have shown their tremendous research potential,” said Brenda Brouwer, vice provost and dean of the Queen’s University School of Graduate Studies. “These are Canada’s most prestigious awards for doctoral students and will put these young scholars on solid footing for future research success.

We are very proud of their accomplishments and grateful that these talented trainees have chosen Queen’s. They will no doubt make significant scholarly contributions and, in so doing, advance our commitment to research excellence.”

Exploring the diverse field of rheology—the study of the flow of complex matter, including liquids and so-called ‘soft solids’—Peter is

exploring the relationship between molecular structure of polymeric liquids and their rheological properties. His doctoral research aims to predict the behavior of polymers in various conditions or applications; improving understanding of how these materials behave during the manufacturing process and leading to more effective processing methods.

Hei tapped to lead cell manufacture effort Cellular Dynamics International Inc. appointed Derek Hei (BS ’88), vice president of clinical manufacture, quality and regulatory activities.

He will lead efforts in support of manufacturing induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-based products for cell therapies. He has more than 20 years of experience developing biotherapeutics from research through clinical trials, most recently as director at Waisman Biomanufacturing at UW-Madison.

Liao selected president of Taiwan’s Academia Sinica Earlier in 2016, James Liao (PhD ’87), the Parsons Foundation professor and department chair in chemical and biomolecular engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles, was named president of Academia Sinica, Taiwan.

Headquartered in the Nangang District of Taipei, Academia Sinica is the national academy of Taiwan and covers research in the humanities and social sciences, life sciences, and mathematics and the physical sciences.

His research focuses on metabolism, including its biochemistry, extension, and regulation. He credits mentorship for defining his career.

“One afternoon with Ed Lightfoot changed my life,” James said during an April 2016 visit to Madison. “I knew nothing about biology; I was interested in polymer chemistry. He convinced me to apply control theory to the biology of metabolism.”

James is one of the most decorated CBE alumni, says Manos Mavrikakis, Paul A. Elfers Professor, Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor, and department chair. “He worked with Professor Ed Lightfoot to obtain his PhD in the area of biological engineering, and that training set him on a course for a highly successful career in academia,” says Manos. “The fact that Professor Liao has been elected to both the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences in the United States speaks volumes to his success and achievements, and we are delighted with his election to the presidency of Academia Sinica, Taiwan.

This election is a great and well-deserved honor.”

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After 25 years, Roger Packard retires The Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering bids a fond farewell to Roger Packard, who served as a department administrator since 1991. During his 25 years of work, Roger was instrumental in creating the tight-knit community of excellence that distinguishes the CBE department. He was the voice of CBE—crafting department newsletters in their signature style and keeping in contact with alumni. But in many ways, Roger also acted as the central nervous system and heart of the department.

“Roger Packard has been a good part of the behind-the-scenes glue that has facilitated the department’s sterling reputation,” says former Professor Stuart Cooper, who worked with Roger for two years before leaving UW-Madison in 1993.

Whether he was assembling nomination packages for external awards, assisting faculty members as they navigated the tenure process, or coordinating recruitment visits for highprofile candidates, Roger always made things run smoothly.

“Roger’s ability to get things done provided the department with a strategic advantage,” says Steenbock Professor and W. Harmon Ray Professor Jim Rawlings.

Although Roger mainly worked directly with CBE department chairs, every student, professor, administrator and alum, in some way, has benefited from Roger’s dedicated work.

And Roger’s professional efficiency came with genuine congeniality.

He always made people feel welcome, even during chaotic times. For example, when Jim first arrived on campus after transferring his research group from another university, his promised lab space was still under construction upon his arrival. Luckily, Roger coordinated with facilities across campus to make the rocky transition as pleasant as possible.

“He was absolutely central to the department’s smooth functioning,” says Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and Harvey D. Spangler Professor Mike Graham. “His professionalism,

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Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering 1415 Engineering Dr. Madison, WI 53706

independence, can-do attitude, attention to detail and commitment to excellence were of incalculable value.”

Alumni who never met Roger face to face during their time on campus certainly came to know his distinctive voice through his writing for the CBE newsletter. And whenever former students came back to their alma mater, Roger happily arranged campus tours to make their visits special.

“Roger’s deep understanding of CBE’s culture and functions leaves some big shoes to fill,” says Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor, Paul A. Elfers Professor, and current department chair Manos Mavrikakis.

His capabilities and collegiality made the department’s centennial celebration in 2005 a smashing success, when Roger helped arrange the logistics for more than 300 people to come back to Madison for a reunion. “He added a level of professionalism and quality to his work that reaped many benefits to individuals, the department, and the institution,” says Milton J. and A. Maude Shoemaker and Beckwith-Bascom Professor Tom Kuech.

In his retirement, Roger is dedicating even more time to his environmental conservation work with the Madison Audubon Society, where he has served as board president since 2012. He and his partner, David Musolf, have been instrumental over the years in restoring more than 650 acres of prairie, wetland and woodland habitat in the Faville Grove Sanctuary—an ongoing effort since 1998.

Although chemical and biological engineering is sad to say goodbye to such a dedicated and valuable team member, the department’s loss will be a boon to the plants and animals at Faville Grove. We wish Roger and David nothing but the best as they move into this next stage in their lives, and if Roger’s track record with CBE is any indication, the state landscape is in capable hands.