Advanced Energy Conference Committees

Co-Chairperson: Doon Gibbs

Laboratory Director
Brookhaven National Laboratory

Dr. Doon Gibbs is the laboratory director for the Brookhaven National Laboratory and president of Brookhaven Science Associates, the limited liability company that manages the laboratory on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy. Work at Brookhaven encompasses energy science and technology, nuclear and particle physics, data science, biological/environmental science and national security.

Dr. Gibbs joined Brookhaven in 1983 as an assistant physicist and progressed through the ranks to become a senior physicist in 2000. Dr. Gibbs has served as group leader of X-ray scattering, head of condensed matter physics, associate laboratory director for basic energy sciences and deputy laboratory director for science and technology.

He was the 1991 E.P. Wohlfarth Lecturer in Physics at the Institute of Physics in the United Kingdom, and has been recognized with the 1985 Department of Energy Outstanding Scientific Accomplishment in Solid State Physics and by the 2003 Advanced Photon Source Arthur H. Compton Award. Dr. Gibbs is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Physical Society.

He currently serves as a member of the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council, the Long Island Association Board and the State University of New York Research Council, among others. He is credited with 136 publications.

Co-Chairperson: Richard Reeder

Vice President
Research/Operations Manager for the Research Foundation

Dr. Richard Reeder is the vice president for research and the operations manager for the State University of New York Research Foundation. Dr. Reeder also serves as associate vice president for Brookhaven National Laboratory Affairs, acting as Stony Brook University’s liaison to the nearby laboratory co-managed by Stony Brook and Battelle Memorial Institute.

Prior to these roles, Dr. Reeder participated in the Stony Brook-Battelle team that successfully re-competed the management contract for Brookhaven National Laboratory. He is currently a member of the Brookhaven Science Associates Board of Directors.

He retains the position of professor of geochemistry in the Department of Geosciences, where he served as chair for 2008-2013. Dr. Reeder’s research interests span several areas in geochemistry, including the structure and properties of disordered and amorphous solids, chemical behavior of heavy metals in the environment, and bioavailability of contaminants in environmental and remediation settings. He has focused particularly on applications of X-ray scattering and spectroscopy to natural and engineered materials of environmental relevance, making extensive use of synchrotron X-ray facilities at Brookhaven and other national laboratories.

Dr. Reeder served as director of the Center for Environmental Molecular Sciences, supported by the National Science Foundation. Dr. Reeder is author of more than 120 peer-reviewed articles. He has been a member of the Stony Brook faculty since 1980.

Ed Bogucz

Associate Professor
Executive Director of SyracuseCoE
Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering

Esther Takeuchi

Distinguished Professor
State University of New York | Stony Brook University
Chair
Interdisciplinary Science Department | Brookhaven National Laboratory

Dr. Esther Takeuchi is a State University of New York distinguished professor and the William and Jane Knapp Chair in Energy and the Environment at Stony Brook University. Dr. Takeuchi holds a joint appointment at Brookhaven National Laboratory as chair of the Interdisciplinary Science Department. She is a faculty member of Stony Brook’s Department of Materials Science and Chemical Engineering as well as the Department of Chemistry.

Dr. Takeuchi’s work includes design of electroactive materials and the concomitant engineering associated with battery design as well as mechanistic studies involving the complex interplay among redox processes, ion transport and electrode precipitation/dissolution.

She is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, was awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame and is a charter member of the National Academy of Innovation. Dr. Takeuchi received an E.V. Murphree Award from the American Chemical Society, an Astellas USA Foundation Award and a Battery Division Technology Award from the Electrochemical Society. She is a Fellow of the Electrochemical Society, the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Dr. Takeuchi is inventor with over 150 patents, and has received the European Inventor Award in the category of non-EPO countries in 2018 and the Walston Chubb Award for Innovation from Sigma Xi in 2019.

Fotis Sotiropoulos

Dean
College of Engineering and Applied Sciences | Stony Brook University
Distinguished Professor
Civil Engineering | Stony Brook University

Dr. Fotis Sotiropoulos serves as dean of the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Stony Brook University and is also a State University of New York distinguished professor of civil engineering at Stony Brook.

Dr. Sotiropoulos’ research focuses on simulation-based engineering science for fluid mechanics, problems in renewable energy, and environmental, biological and cardiovascular applications. Dr. Sotiropoulos has raised over $35 million for research and research facility development and renovation.

In 2017, he was named a SUNY distinguished professor and received the Hunter Rouse Hydraulic Engineering Award from the American Society of Civil Engineers. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the American Physical Society (APS), and has twice won the APS Division of Fluid Dynamics Gallery of Fluid Motion. He is a recipient of a Career Award from the National Science Foundation. He is also a 2014 distinguished lecturer of the Mortimer and Raymond Sackler Institute of Advanced Studies at Tel Aviv University.

Dr. Sotiropoulos has authored over 170 peer-reviewed journal papers and book chapters and his research results have been featured on the cover of several prestigious journals. Prior to joining Stony Brook, he was the James L. Record professor of Civil, Environmental and Geo-Engineering and director of the St. Anthony Falls Laboratory at the University of Minnesota. Prior to that, he was on the faculty at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Kathleen Araújo

Director
Energy Policy Institute | Center for Advanced Energy Studies
Associate Professor
Energy Innovation Systems and Policy | Boise State University

Dr. Kathleen Araújo is the director of the Energy Policy Institute and an associate professor of energy innovation systems and policy at Boise State University.

Dr. Araújo is responsible for the strategic direction and executive decision-making for the Institute, which is the policy body for the Center for Advanced Energy Studies, a consortium of four Western public universities plus the Idaho National Laboratory. Dr. Araújo works to advance critical decision-making on energy systems change in line with priorities that include sustainability, security and industrial development.

Her teaching and research interests include strategic planning and management in energy transitions; sustainable energy; energy environmental systems; comparative policy, innovation and better practices in sustainability and resilience; international nuclear safety and cyber security; and science and technology policy. Dr. Araújo’s specialization centers on advancing priorities that include sustainability, industrial development and resilience.

She has presented or led discussions in international fora with the University of Cambridge, Arctic Circle Conference and Fukushima Medical University. Dr. Araújo is the book series editor for Routledge’s Studies in Energy Transitions. She also consults for intergovernmental organizations, among them the World Bank and the International Renewable Energy Agency, as well as industry.

Kurt Becker

Vice Dean
Research, Innovation and Entrepreneurship | NYU
Professor
Applied Physics and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering | NYU

Dr. Kurt Becker is vice dean for research, innovation and entrepreneurship at the New York University Tandon School of Engineering and a professor of applied physics and mechanical and aerospace engineering.

Dr. Becker’s responsibilities include the growth of the research portfolio of the Tandon faculty, the promotion of cross-school research collaborations and the development of an academic innovation and entrepreneurship environment at Tandon. Dr. Becker oversees the Tandon Future Labs, which aim to accelerate the commercialization and market entry of new products and processes based on science and engineering breakthroughs.

As a physicist, he pioneered the field of microplasmas and holds numerous patents on the stabilization of atmospheric-pressure plasma and its technological applications for environmental remediation and biomedicine. He was involved in two startup companies that commercialized this technology. Additional areas of interest include atomic, molecular and chemical physics, the development of new experimental techniques and processes, technology transfer and IP commercialization.

Dr. Becker is a recipient of the Dr.-Eduard-Martin-Prize for Excellence in Research and the Thomas Alva Edison Patent Award (with Erich Kunhardt), and was an American Physical Society Fellow. He has written over 200 articles in refereed journals and books, and made 375 conference presentations and abstracts. In addition, he has served on the editorial boards of numerous journals.

Lian Shen

Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Director
St. Anthony Falls Laboratory University of Minnesota

Dr. Lian Shen is a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Shen also serves as the director of the St. Anthony Falls Lab, a multidisciplinary fluid mechanics institute consisting of nearly 50 faculty and staff members and over 100 postdocs and students.

In the area of wind energy research, Dr. Shen currently serves as a co-chair of the Research and Development Advisory Group of the National Offshore Wind Energy Research and Development Consortium. He is also the director of the Eolos Wind Energy Research facilities at University of Minnesota, which has a 2.5 MW wind turbine, a start-of-the-art atmospheric wind tunnel and high-performance cluster computers.

Dr. Shen earned his doctoral degree in fluid mechanics from MIT in 2001. His research interests include computational fluid dynamics, water waves, turbulence and renewable energy, and he has published extensively in top journals in fluid mechanics.

He has led or participated in many projects in wind energy research sponsored by U.S. Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, Xcel Energy Renewable Energy Fund and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority.

Michael Thurston

Technical Director & Research Faculty
Golisano Institute for Sustainability at Rochester Institute of Technology

Nada Marie Anid

Vice President
Strategic Communications and External Affairs | NYIT

Dr. Nada Marie Anid is vice president for strategic communications and external affairs at the New York Institute of Technology. Dr. Anid has also served as the first female dean of the NYIT School of Engineering and Computing Sciences.

Dr. Anid has worked on several strategic partnerships, including the creation of the first Entrepreneurship and Technology Innovation Center fostering applied research in energy and green technologies. The Center is a business accelerator that provides support for startup businesses. As dean, she oversaw the creation of NYIT’s NSA/DHS National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education, the university’s federal- and state-funded Entrepreneurship and Technology Innovation Center and a business incubator.

The energy and sustainability initiatives launched by Dr. Anid include a National Science Foundation-funded project; a multidisciplinary undergraduate minor to enhance STEM learning in energy science, technology and policy; and the University Transportation Research Center Transportation Innovation Series.

Her own research is in the fields of alternative energy, sustainability, transportation, biotechnology, water quality and engineering education. A promoter of technology entrepreneurship, she is the co-editor of the book The Internet of Women: Accelerating Culture Change.

Rajit Gadh

Founding Director
Smart Grid Energy Research Center | UCLA
Founding Director
Wireless Internet for Mobile Enterprise Consortium | UCLA

Dr. Rajit Gadh is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science and the founding director of both the UCLA Smart Grid Energy Research Center and the Wireless Internet for Mobile Enterprise Consortium. The Center supports the development of the next generation of the electric utility grid. The Consortium is a university, industry and government collaboration that supports technological and business research and education.

Dr. Gadh has taught as a visiting researcher at UC Berkeley, has been a professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison and did his sabbatical as a visiting researcher at Stanford University. Dr. Gadh is on the editorial board of Computers in Entertainment and the CAD Journal.

His research includes smart grids, microgrids, electric vehicle to grid integration, electric vehicles and autonomous vehicles, smart transportation, AI and machine learning in electric vehicle and autonomous vehicle management.

Dr. Gadh has won several awards from the National Science Foundation (Faculty Early Career Development Program, or CAREER, award, Research Initiation Award, etc.), the Society of Automotive Engineers (Ralph Teetor educational award), IEEE (Wireless Telecommunications Symposium student paper award), ASME (Kodak Best Technical Paper award), AT&T (Industrial Ecology Fellow award), Engineering Education Foundation (Research Initiation award) and a William Wong Fellowship award from the University of Hong Kong.

Serpil Guran

Director
EcoComplex Clean Energy Innovation Center | Rutgers University
Director
RutgersX EcoIgnite Clean Technology Proof of Concept Center and Accelerator Program | Rutgers University

Dr. Serpil Guran is the director of the EcoComplex Clean Energy Innovation Center at Rutgers University. The center promotes the commercialization of environmental and alternative energy technologies. Dr. Guran is also the director of the RutgersX EcoIgnite Clean Technology Proof of Concept Center and Accelerator Program. RutgersX is the university’s first business-accelerator program.

In addition to managing EcoComplex operations, programs, business incubator and facilities, Dr. Guran also serves as a courtesy associate teaching professor, a role in which she teaches courses in sustainability and bioenergy. She also has a courtesy teaching affiliation with the university’s Plant Biology program.

She is a chemical engineer trained in thermochemical conversion (pyrolysis and gasification) of biomass and waste materials for production of fuels and chemicals. Dr. Guran specializes in research, development and assessment of sustainable biofuel production and waste recycling technologies, and life cycle analysis of clean energy systems and alternative fuel production systems.

Currently, she is working on circular carbon systems, the food-energy-water nexus and waste synergy by promoting integration of organic and plastic waste into development of a circular carbon economy with the goal of mitigating climate change and promoting economic sustainability and social justice.

William Jemison

Dean
Wallace H. Coulter School of Engineering / Tony Collins Professor of Innovative Engineering Culture

2021 Conference Committees
and Workshops

Conference Chairperson