2011 Harrison Howe Award Winner
Dr. Joseph M. DeSimone

The Rochester Section of the American Chemical Society (ACS) is proud to announce the presentation of the 2011 Harrison Howe Award. Professor Joseph DeSimone, the most recent recipient of the Award, will receive this honor at the University of Rochester in April 2011.

This award is being presented in conjunction with the ACS Rochester Section Undergraduate Research Symposium. On Friday, April 29th a Community Talk will take place at 7:00 pm with a reception to follow. The title is "Co-opting Moore's Law: Medicines and Vaccines from a Wafer". The poster session and student oral presentations will begin at 8:30 am on Saturday, April 30th. Dr. DeSimone will be making his keynote address from 9:00am-10:00am on Saturday. The title of this is "Bridging Fields and Harnessing Diversity for the Sake of Innovation". Lunch will immediately follow the student presentations.

Students, faculty and members of the Rochester chemistry and chemical biology community are invited to attend both days of this event. Registration for the public lecture and award presentation Friday evening is free and can be found on the right side bar called, "Register for Friday's Lecture & Reception!". Those students wishing to present a poster or give an oral presentation Saturday morning, will need to register online beginning in January, 2011.

Dr. Joseph M. DeSimone, is the Chancellor’s Eminent Professor of Chemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Chemical Engineering at North Carolina State University. DeSimone has published over 260 scientific articles and has over 115 issued patents in his name with over 120 patents pending. In 2005, DeSimone was elected into the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. DeSimone has received 40 major awards and recognitions.

DeSimone’s group is now heavily focused on learning how to bring the precision, uniformity and mass production techniques associated with the fabrication of nanoscale features found in the microelectronics industry to the nano-medicine field for the fabrication and delivery of vaccines and therapeutics for the treatment and prevention of diseases. DeSimone recently launched Liquidia Technologies (www.liquidia.com) which now employs almost 50 people in RTP and has raised over $30 million in venture financing. DeSimone’s laboratory and the PRINT technology recently became a foundation for the new $20 million Carolina Center for Cancer Nanotechnology Excellence funded by the National Cancer Institute. DeSimone received his BS in Chemistry in 1986 from Ursinus College in Collegeville, PA and his Ph.D. in Chemistry in 1990 from Virginia Tech.

The Harrison Howe Award is dedicated to the memory of Harrison E. Howe, 1881—1942, a cofounder of the ACS Rochester Section and a well-known chemist, editor, and author. The award was established to recognize a scientist who has made outstanding contributions to chemistry or closely related fields and who shows great potential for further achievement. Recent winners of the award include Charles Lieber (2002), Jack Szostak (2003), Michael Marletta (2004), Laura Kiessling (2005), Daniel Nocera (2008), and Carolyn Bertozzi (2009).

For more information about the 2011 Harrison Howe Award lecture and event please see the Harrison Howe website and/or contact Bradley Nilsson, Chair of the Harrison Howe Award Committee and Assistant Professor of Chemistry or Lory Hedges, Development Administrator, at the University of Rochester.

The support of the Rochester Section of the ACS, the University of Rochester Departments of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, and Medical Center is gratefully acknowledged.

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