Letter from the ChBE Chair鈥擠ec. 19, 2023
Dear ChBE Colleagues, Alumni and Friends,
As the fall semester winds down, I鈥檓 thrilled to share the latest updates from our department.
We have a vibrant community with 338 undergraduates and 164 PhD students. Of those almost听47听percent identify as female and nearly 14 percent of our undergraduates are first-generation college students. We鈥檙e nationally recognized by the U.S. News and World Report as earning the No. 14 spot in its Best School rankings for chemical engineering among public institutions for 2024.
Of note are the early successes of our young faculty. This year, Assistant Professors Kayla Sprenger and Ankur Gupta were selected for the prestigious AICHE 鈥35 Under 35鈥 award. These faculty, along with recent hires of experienced faculty from other institutions, have contributed to the major growth of our research programs, with $14.2 million in new awards in 2023.
Our department is excelling in research related to sustainability, biotechnology and cutting-edge materials.听For example, in a study published in Nature Materials, the Hayward Research Group has developed a novel and resilient photomechanical material that can transform light energy into mechanical work without heat or electricity. Refer to the articles below to read more about our research in this area. I also encourage you to check out our department videos highlighting our and 辫谤辞驳谤补尘蝉.听
And our students have won a variety of impressive awards, including:听
Ashish Srivastava won two of the college鈥檚 top fall 2023 awards, Outstanding Undergraduate of the College and an Academic Engagement award.
Katayoun Jamei also won an听Academic Engagement award, impressively maintaining her work as a cardiac nurse in an operating room while completing her BS degree.
Gesse Roure, who defended his PhD in chemical engineering in July, won the CEAS Outstanding Dissertation Award.听
Keala Gapin, a chemical and biological engineering senior, was the recipient of a 2023 scholarship from the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation, an organization founded by the Mercury 7 astronauts and sustained by successive generations of NASA astronauts.听
PhD student Nicole Day received the 2023 Acta Student Award.
Our Alumni-Student mentor program continues to thrive. This year alongside our usual program of pairing students with our alumni, we expanded our program by matching an additional six students with medical students from University of Colorado School of Medicine. This initiative aims to support students aspiring to pursue medical school after graduation. We are always looking for more ChBE alumni mentors, so if you are interested, please fill out this very short form, and we will be in touch.
Professor Will Medlin
Wishing you a restful and happy holiday season.
J. Will Medlin
Department Chair
Denver Business Challenge Endowed Professor听