PITTSBURGH (July 18, 2019) — Giannis (Yanni) Mpourmpakis,
PhD, Bicentennial Alumni faculty fellow and assistant professor of chemical and
petroleum engineering at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of
Engineering, won the Bodossaki Foundation Distinguished
Young Scientists Award in Chemistry and was honored at a ceremony in Athens by the president of Greece.
The Distinguished Young Scientists Award honors the most
outstanding scientists of Greek descent under the age of 40 and is given once
every two years. The award was presented on June 19, 2019, and included a prize of 20,000 euros.
The award takes into consideration the individual’s
achievements in their field, their contribution to the cultural, scientific and
economic development of Greece, and their contribution to the international
promotion of Greece through their work and ethics. Dr. Mpourmpakis was
nominated by Steven R. Little, PhD, chair of the chemical engineering and
petroleum department, and Sunil Saxena, PhD, chair of the chemistry department.
“We were honored to nominate Yanni for this prestigious
award,” says Dr. Little. “Yanni has made tremendous advances in our knowledge of
the chemistry of nanomaterials. We are excited that his impressive work will be
recognized on the global stage.”
Dr. Mpourmpakis’s Computer-Aided
Nano and Energy Lab (CANELa) uses theory and computation to investigate the
physiochemical properties of nanomaterials with potential applications in
diverse nanotechnology areas, ranging from green energy generation and storage
to materials engineering and catalysis. Dr. Mpourmpakis earned his PhD at
Theoretical and Computational Chemistry from the University of Crete and was a
Marie-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Delaware.
“After careful deliberation on the ten excellent nominations
received, the selection committee, consisting of distinguished scientists of
Greek origin working in the field of chemistry all around the globe,
unanimously recommended Dr. Giannis Mpourmpakis for the 2019 Bodossaki Young
Scientist award in Chemistry,” said Professor Theodoros Theodorou, Associate
Vice President of the Board of Trustees of the Bodossaki Foundation. “The
committee appreciated Dr. Mpourmpakis’s creative use of state-of-the-art
multiscale modeling and simulation methods to understand and predict the
properties of materials systems ranging from colloidal metallic nanoparticles
to kidney stones. Dr. Mpourmpakis’s work can guide experimental efforts towards
the development of new, efficient, and environmentally friendly materials and
processes. The Bodossaki Foundation will be pleased to present its 2019
Chemistry Award to Dr. Mpourmpakis.”
Maggie Pavlick, 7/18/2019
Contact: Maggie Pavlick