Rakesh Agrawal

Winthrop E. Stone Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering. Leadership in the areas of gas separation and liquefaction led to many patents during his career at Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. He invented several novel gas separation and liquefaction processes that have been used to produce the world's largest natural gas liquefaction plant, ultra high purity gases for the electronics industry, and several highly energy efficient gas liquefaction plants. Since joining Purdue University, his research is addressing energy and creating solutions both for a future based on solar energy and for transition away from the current fossil resource based economy. He identified and is codeveloping promising processes (H2Bioil and H2CAR) for the U.S. to produce its entire liquid fuel for transportation from available waste biomass. He is unique in preparing the entire solar cell device from starting chemicals and characterizing them at every level for structural and electrical properties. His lab holds the highest power conversion efficiency record for solar cells made from nanocrystals of CZTS. Multicomponent chemical separation processes are known to be energy intensive, his group is developing methods to synthesize and identify energy efficient process for such applications. Recipient, U. S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation.