Author: Israel E. Wachs

Israel E. Wachs is G. Whitney Snyder Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and Director of the Operando Molecular Spectroscopy and Catalysis Laboratory at Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA, USA. He has earned wide recognition for his pioneering research into heterogeneous catalysis of mixed oxides for his modern approach to establishing fundamental relationships between surface structure and kinetic activity/selectivity. In 2016, he received AICh E’s top award in chemical reaction engineering, the R. H. Wilhelm Award, sponsored by Exxon Mobil Research for seminal contributions toward the development of innovative concepts for molecular chemical reaction engineering of mixed oxide catalyzed reactions by establishing fundamental catalyst molecular structure-activity kinetic relationships. He has also been honored for his work on green chemistry technologies by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Dr. Wachs received his B.S. from the City College of the City University of New York and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University.                       Miguel A. Bañares is Full Research Professor at the Institute for Catalysis and Petroleum Chemistry, CSIC, in Madrid, Spain. He has been deputy vice president for Scientific-Technical Fields at CSIC, Spanish National Research Council. The Bañares group focuses its research on understanding structure-performance relationships in catalysis combining spectroscopy during catalytic reactions with simultaneous activity measurement (operando methodology, a term that he coined in 2000) for real-time monitoring of catalytic processes, catalyst evolution, and synthesis. He has been awarded the Doctor Honoris Causa degree by the Université de Caen Normandie, France, for his seminal operando spectroscopy work. Dr. Bañares received the B.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Universidad de Salamanca, Spain.