Prof. Jingguang Chen is the Thayer Lindsley Professor of Chemical Engineering at Columbia University, with a joint appointment at Brookhaven National Laboratory. He received his B.S. degree from Nanjing University and his PhD degree from the University of Pittsburgh. After finishing an Alexander von Humboldt postdoctoral fellowship in Germany, he joined the Exxon Corporate Research Laboratory for several years. He started his academic career at the University of Delaware and rose to the rank of the Claire LeClaire Professor of Chemical Engineering and the Director of the Center for Catalytic Science and Technology. He is the co-author of over 500 journal publications and over 20 United States patents. His research interests include fundamental understanding of carbides, nitrides and bimetallic catalysts for applications in thermocatalysis and electrocatalysis. His research group utilizes a combination of experimental studies, in-situ characterization and density functional theory calculations.
He served in many leadership positions, including the Chair of the Catalysis Division of the American Chemical Society, the President of the North American Catalysis Society, and the Chair of Gordon Research Conference on Catalysis. He was a co-founder and the director of the Synchrotron Catalysis Consortium, which was established in 2025 with support from the Department of Energy to assist catalysis researchers to utilize synchrotron techniques. He is an Executive Editor of ACS Catalysis and has been on the editorial advisory boards of many journals. He received the George Olah Award on Hydrocarbon Chemistry from the American Chemical Society, the Robert Wilhelm Award on Chemical Reaction Engineering from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and the Robert Burwell Lectureship from the North American Catalysis Society. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
It is our great pleasure to welcome Prof. Jingguang Chen to PodCAT for our 50th episode!