Dr. Héctor D. Abruña of the Cornell University faculty will present the address “Energy in the Age of Sustainability” at Hope College on Thursday, March 26, at 8 p.m. in room 102 of VanderWerf Hall while on campus through the James and Jeanette Neckers Lectureship in Chemistry.
Abruña, who is the Émile M. Chamot Professor of Chemistry and director of the Energy Materials Center at Cornell, will also present a research-focused talk, “Operando Methods for the Characterization of Energy Materials,” on Friday, March 27, at 4 p.m. in Winants Auditorium of Graves Hall.
The public is invited to both events. Admission is free.
The Thursday-evening address will deal with global and national energy issues and how ongoing work at Cornell, especially on fuel cells and electrical storage technologies, can provide some potential solutions in meeting global energy needs in a sustainable and environmentally responsible way. The Friday-afternoon lecture will review the development of operando methods for the study and characterization of fuel cell and battery materials.
Abruña has received numerous awards, including a Presidential Young Investigator Award, Sloan Fellowship, J. S. Guggenheim Fellowship and J. W. Fulbright Senior Fellow. He is the recipient of the Electrochemistry Award for the American Chemical Society (2008), and the C.N. Reilley Award in Electrochemistry for 2007. He was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2007, member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2007 and Fellow of the International Society of Electrochemistry in 2008. He received the D.C. Grahame Award from the Electrochemical Society for 2009, the Faraday Medal of the Royal Society for 2011 and the Brian Conway Prize from the International Society of Electrochemistry for 2013. Most recently, he was named a Fellow of the Electrochemical Society.
He is the co-author of more than 420 publications and has given more than 550 invited lectures world-wide. He is most proud of the close to 100 graduate students and post-docs that have worked with him over the years.
Abruña completed his graduate studies with Royce W. Murray and Thomas J. Meyer at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1980 and was a postdoctoral research associate with Allen J. Bard at the University of Texas at Austin from 1980 to 1981. After a brief stay at the University of Puerto Rico, he joined Cornell in 1983. He was chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology from 2004 to 2008.
The James and Jeanette Neckers Lectureship and Student Assistance Fund through which Abruña is speaking was established in 1984 by Dr. James W. and Jeanette Hoffman Neckers, members of the college’s Class of 1923, to support annual lectureships in chemistry. Through additional gifts from Dr. Neckers, the fund was expanded to include student summer research stipends and student scholarships.
James Neckers was chairman of the Department of Chemistry at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale for 37 of his 40 years at the university. Under his leadership, the department grew from a three-year offering in chemistry to granting the doctorate; the faculty grew from three to 23. Jeanette Neckers died on June 10, 1992, and James Neckers died on May 8, 2004.
Graves Hall is located at 263 College Ave., between 10th and 12th streets. VanderWerf Hall is located at 27 Graves Place, between 10th Street and Graves Place (11th Street) and Central and College avenues.