Awards for contributions to analytical chemistry and applied spectroscopy announced by Pittcon

The Pittcon Program Committee is pleased to announce this year’s recipients of 13 prestigious awards honoring scientists who have made outstanding contributions to analytical chemistry and applied spectroscopy. Each award will be presented in a scheduled symposium during Pittcon 2018, the world’s leading conference and exposition for laboratory science, which will be held February 26-March 1, Orange County Convention Center, Orlando, Florida.

Symposium sessions will cover relevant topics in applications such as bioanalytical, biomedical, clinical/toxicology, environmental, fuels/.energy, genomics, material science, neurochemistry and pharmaceutical. Methodologies include electrochemistry, fluorescence, mass spectroscopy, LC/GC, microfluidis, microscopy, sample/sample preparation and infrared, Raman, molecular and vibrational spectroscopy.

Dr. Chad A. Mirkin, Director of the International Institute for Nanotechnology and the George B. Rathmann Prof. of Chemistry, Chemical and Biological Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, Materials Science & Engineering, and Medicine at Northwestern University, is the recipient of the Ralph N. Adams Award.  This award is sponsored by The Pittsburgh Conference and the Friends of Ralph N. Adams. The award was established to honor an outstanding scientist who has advanced the field of bioanalytical chemistry through research, innovation and/or education.

The symposium will cover a broad range of topics related to nanotechnology and new probes for cellular engineering and analysis. The speakers will highlight specific nanomaterials and molecular probes that have opened new application areas in biomolecular sensing, drug delivery, and the study of disease biology.

Dr. Mirkin summarizes:

Over the past decade, we have developed methods for modifying nanoparticles with oligonucleotides and explored how they can be used as designer constructs for preparing highly ordered, highly functional materials. Over the course of these studies, we have discovered many unusual fundamental properties that make these materials particularly useful in biodiagnostics and intracellular gene regulation."

Additional awards and recipients are as follows:

• The Pittsburgh Spectroscopy Award, Michael D. Fayer, Stanford University
• The Pittsburgh Analytical Chemistry Award Xiaowei Zhuang, Harvard University
• The Pittsburgh Conference Achievement Award, Parastoo Hashemi, University of South Carolina
• Advances in Measurement Science Lectureship Awards, Neil Kelleher, Northwestern University; Francesco Ricci, University of Rome: Kourosh Kalantar-zadeh, RMIT
• The Satinder Ahuja Award for Young Investigators in Separation Science, Zachary Breitbach, AbbVie
• The Chromatography Forum of the Delaware Valley Dal Nogare Award, Robert Kennedy, University of Michigan
• The Coblentz Society – Williams-Wright Award, Charles R. Anderson, Spectral Systems,
• The LCGC Lifetime Achievement in Chromatography, Ronald Majors, ChromPrep
• The LCGC Emerging Leader in Chromatography Award, Zachary Breitbach, AbbVie SEAC - Charles N. Reilley Award, Patrick Unwin, University of Warwick
• Royce W. Murray Award, Parastoo Hashemi, University of South Carolina